A pre-graduation camping road trip west of the Mississippi
My name is Tyler Larrabee, and this is my first time writing for BLANK – though you may have heard of me if you are a regular reader, as I am in a local band called STONEFISH, and I started the New Ground Music Festival last year.
However, unlike the majority of my event-promoting friends, I just turned 18 years old on June 23 after graduating from Knoxville West High School on June 18, an experience I didn’t think I would get to have given the current situation with the pandemic. Over the past four months, the overwhelming sentiment from the community towards graduating seniors in high school and college has been very positive. Many people have stepped up to create Facebook pages, rent billboards, make yard signs, send cards and show their support in various other ways for which I’m very grateful.
Through all of that, there has been one phrase that I’ve heard countless times in reference to my class’s unique situation. It goes something to the effect of, “You will certainly have a great story to tell your kids!” And that is true: The class of 2020 does have a story to tell. We were born around the time of 9/11, grew up during the financial crisis of 2008 and graduated into the uncertain world created by the coronavirus, all the while watching movements for gay rights and Black Lives Matter take place, awareness and response to global warming arise and the spectacle of mass school shootings.
I can’t quite picture looking back on my graduation ceremony with great pride simply because it was unique, though. I feel like this whole situation has stolen so many memories and experiences from me, and no extra cards or billboards could completely make up for that. So I decided to make my own memories and create a better story to tell m kids one day.
After the recent developments in our country increasing tensions and the already toxic level of social media, I’d had enough. I deleted my socials and texted Sebastian LaTorre, my best friend since sixth grade. I explained to him that I desperately needed to get away from people and get a mental break or else I might explode. He felt the same. So I searched for “isolated backpacking in the USA,” which returned “Badlands National Park, South Dakota.” The name rang a bell from some history class I’d taken, and after looking at some images on Google, I decided that was the place.
After six days and a few trips to REI, we loaded up the car and headed out. We had a vague outline for the trip and a general idea of what we were going to do, but other than that, we were on our own. The freedom was enough to put a significant smile on my face, and my heart felt full.
We left Knoxville early and arrived in Nashville at around 7 in the morning. We drove into the city to find abandoned police cars, metal barricades strewn about and storefronts covered in plywood. We wandered the streets until we caught the smell of freshly baked biscuits. We found ourselves drawn into a small store called Rise, where I got chicken and biscuits with fries and a cinnamon roll. Heavenly.
From there we drove on to St. Louis, where we stopped at noon to take pictures at the Gateway Arch and the statue of Lewis and Clark. Despite all my travels to the West (and the fact that my state borders it), I never before had seen the Mississippi River. We headed on to Columbia, Missouri, where we attempted to stay in a state park. However, everywhere we tried was closed to campers. I asked Siri for the closest campground and was directed to Connor’s Landing. It cost only $10, which is more than free but good enough considering we wanted to pitch our tents and make food before dark.
We arrived to find a small building surrounded by picnic tables full of people talking and eating. Turned out we accidentally stumbled upon a popular local spot, nestled among trees and right next to the Missouri River. We watched the beautiful sunset on the water and made friends with a woman who turned out to have family in Knoxville, some of whom attend South-Doyle. It seemed like it would be harder to escape our home and life’s problems than we thought.
It was onward to Kansas City for lunch. I found that deciding on where to get BBQ was quite an excruciating task. We ended up at Q39 South in Overland Park, where Sebastian and I got to experience the city’s famous burnt ends for the first time. They were mouthwatering, to say the least. We drove on, and the weather that night was wonderful, so we set up hammocks next to a lake in Lewis and Clark State Park, just north of Omaha, Nebraska.
The next morning started with Sebastian getting a ticket at the Iowa border for driving at a speed that, let’s just say, would have resulted in a ticket in any state. Our drive that day consisted of going straight across the state of South Dakota, and we entertained ourselves by stopping at some roadside attractions: the Dignity Statue, Corn Palace in Mitchell and Wall Drug Store. We found the people of South Dakota to be extraordinarily kind and always willing to offer advice or lend us their maps or gear.
That evening, we filled up our water bottles (15 liters each, as there is no water available in the park) from the free hose at the Conoco station in Wall before heading into Buffalo Gap National Grassland for our first real night of camping. We found a beautiful spot at the top of a cliff overlooking the iconic formations and the rolling fields and ponds in between. However, what we did not account for is how fast wind speeds can pick up when there is nothing stopping them for hundreds of miles. A strong storm blew through that night, bringing with it torrential rain and lightning. The looming threat of bison was the least of our worries as Sebastian and I both threw our bodies against the sides of our tents in an attempt to keep the 60-mph winds from breaking through or, worse, blowing us off the side of the cliff on which we so naively camped. Sebastian pulled up a radar app only to see a notification to “seek shelter immediately.”
In the morning, we headed into the Badlands National Park, where we began our trek of the Sage Creek Wilderness Loop. It was a 22.5-mile, off-trail hike that required use of a map and a compass to navigate and was expected to take three days to complete. We ate some peanut butter and Nutella sandwiches and were off. It started out easy enough, but the shocking weight of our packs was an obstacle on its own. After quite a few misturns due to our lack of orienteering experience, we made it to our recommended campsite for the night. However, since it was only noon, we decided to go on to the next spot.
This required hiking through a very long wash. Sebastian fell off a 10-foot drop, landing face first in a puddle of water, and I stepped into a sinkhole and got stuck in waist-deep mud. And if those occurrences weren’t exciting enough, we turned a corner at one point to find ourselves face to face with a bison. We stopped dead in our tracks about 10 feet away from it. Sebastian grabbed his bear mace, and I reached for the hatchet in my side pocket, our only two forms of defense. The bison scrambled up the side of the right wall, and we did the same on the left. The two of us spent the next 15 minutes staring him down, none of us moving on our respective sides of the wash. Eventually, he must have realized Sebastian and I were no threat because he began to carry on eating grass as we carefully continued on our hike. We finally reached a basin where we set up camp among some rocks in an attempt to stay away from the five or so bison we could see around in the distance. Unfortunately, there were these godawful birds that make the sound of a bison snorting when they fly, which kept scaring us.
The remaining two days were much less eventful; we followed game trails and grand rock formations, crossing basins and following old fence lines. There were deer, prairie dogs, pronghorns, sheep, bison, the infamous “lone llama” and other animals all around us. Sitting in the middle of a field surrounded by such untamed wildlife, I truly felt like I was a small, insignificant visitor here on Earth. It was quite refreshing.
Upon our arrival back at the parking lot, we headed for Rapid City. There, we walked around to look at the statues of all previous U.S. presidents that inhabit each street corner downtown. We stopped at Armadillo’s Ice Cream before heading to Lead, where we stayed in an Airbnb and finally got showers. That night, we got dinner at a local place, Lewie’s Burgers and Brews, which was super cool, but we left in a rush when one fairly large intoxicated man started voicing his violent intentions. I hope that situation turned out OK for all persons involved.
We headed into Wyoming the next day to see Devil’s Tower, but it was fairly underwhelming, and you had to pay for admission, so we thought, “Hey! We’re pretty close to Montana; let’s go so we can check it off the list!” And we did. Then we looked at a map and thought, “Hey! Now we’re pretty close to North Dakota …” So we went there, too. Driving through Montana, you can really tell why they call it Big Sky Country. The roads were very subpar, but that was OK because I couldn’t have been happier driving freely while listening to John Mayer’s “Paradise Valley” in the state in which it was written. We stopped in a bar in Baker, Montana, for some wings before crossing into North Dakota. At this point, we were so far away from our little hub in South Dakota that it was dark by the time we arrived back in Custer State Park, so we pulled into a spot and slept in the car.
We woke the next morning at five o’clock and drove along the wildlife loop where we came across a large herd of bison grazing with their calves. It was a totally different experience seeing up close these bison that are so used to human activity compared to the ones in the Badlands. From there we headed on to Mount Rushmore and the Crazy Horse Memorial, both of which were uniquely powerful and educational with regard to the history of our country.
We made our way back around to Custer State Park, where we began our second hike. This one, to Black Elk Peak, was significantly easier, given that there was a trail this time. When we got to the top, we hung out in an old stone fire tower with a group of wrestlers from the University of Michigan, one of whom is headed to the Olympics in Tokyo next summer. It is the tallest peak in South Dakota, and you could see for miles in every direction. We watched a beautiful sunset, ate dinner and set up camp for the night.
On the morning of June 13, we hiked back down and spent the afternoon by the lake at the base of the mountain. We visited the Mammoth Site, a museum and active archeological dig that, due to special environmental circumstances, allowed the accumulation and preservation of a lot of mammoth bones. It was really quite amazing. That evening, we stopped in a bar in Edgemont for some wings before finding a spot along the highway to camp. The light pollution was one of the lowest we had experienced, and we could view the entire Milky Way.
From there, we headed to Cheyenne, Wyoming, where we walked around, even venturing into the state capitol building and talking to some politicians about the government structure there. That evening, we arrived in Longmont, Colorado, where we camped in the backyard of my great aunt and uncle. There, we got our second shower of the trip and a real meal. In the morning, we drove for 19 hours straight (an achievement I’m quite proud of), stopping only for dinner at Arthur Bryant’s in Kansas City. We arrived home in the early hours of the morning and slept all day.
The next day, Sebastian and I graduated high school, another achievement I am proud of. I’m really glad, though, that I gave myself a different kind of story to tell my kids about this era of history.
