Wall Drug

Going back a couple days to finish my trip…

Can a person NOT stop at Wall Drug in Wall, South Dakota?

Ya, I suppose one could but after seeing the road signs for a hundred miles or more, it is pretty difficult! 🙂   Plus, I felt obligated to stop and take a look just so I could add it to my list of sites seen.

I pulled into town fairly late on Sunday evening (probably 7 pm) and activity was low. I found several parking lots around Wall Drug but only one that was not marked with “no camping allowed” signs.  Hint: it is the one that is just to the west of the store/main street.  There is also a semi-truck gravel parking area just beside it (south side) that also does not have the ‘no camping’ signs.  I took up residence and before long, three other RV’s had done the same.  It was too late to go shopping so I settled in for the night. Nobody disturbed us all night so I guess we weren’t breaking any rules.  Whenever I ‘camp’ like this, I do not put the jacks down nor put the slides out.  I know some folks do but it just doesn’t feel right to me.  Obviously, I do not put out chairs, awnings, or clothes line for laundry either.

Early Monday morning I strolled over to Wall Drug. It is an interesting place, not unlike many of the western tourist attractions, and appeared to have lots of good deals on knick-knacks while I was there.  However; I am not a knick-knack collector so my purchases amounted to a whole dollar for three post cards.  Since I was shopping at daybreak, some of the shops were not even open yet – this helped to make it a quick tour. Wall Drug has been around for a very long time so there is some interesting history on the walls – it is worth a few minutes to check it out.

Before many folks are even out of bed, I was truckin’ westbound on I-90 again.

I didn’t have far to go. My destination was Box Elder, SD which is where my mail forwarding company, America’s Mailbox, is located.  I stopped for fuel at the Flying J in Box Elder and tried a slightly different approach.  In the past I have let the fuel nozzle run til it automatically shuts off (full) and watched a couple cups of fuel slosh out and down the size of JBAM.  Since there wasn’t too much noise and there were many open fuel islands, I filled the final ten gallons very slowly listening for a change in the sound of the fuel.  Doing so allowed me to get more fuel into the tank than I had expected and avoid the ugly mess on the side of my rig!  I know diesel foams so I think I was giving the fuel time to settle which is why I got more in that expected.

I was too early for check-in at the America’s Mailbox campground so I parking in the Flying J parking lot for a while and rested.  Yes, I know, it was only about 10 AM but it is never too early to rest. 🙂