visit to Custer State Park and Rapid City (Spearfish, Deadwood: to buy, bankruptcy)
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Thanks to everyone who gave me great tips as to what to see and do while visiting South Dakota. I had a fabulous time, although there were a couple of questions that I wanted to ask.
Being from southern California I have truly gotten to experience what living in a melting pot is really like. While in Rapid City I was walking down the street with a family friend and some young men (probably in their 20s) rolled down the window and yelled n**** at him. Is racism prevalent in Rapid City? Was this just young kids being ignorant or is this a shared feeling among the majority there?
Something else that was intresting, but not at all bad, was that I noticed whie getting gas that the cheapest gas was not the lowed grade. I noticed this in Wyoming to, the unleaded plus was cheaper than the unleaded. Is that incentive for the people of South Dakota to buy gas with fewer emissions? I wish it was that way in Cali!
I absolutly adored Custer State Park, Bear Country USA was great and I enjoyed a lot of Rapid City. I didn't think that there would be such a distinct divide of the city but as a whole the city was very nice. I was glad to get to see the city in person, although know I know that not a whole lot of downtown is open on a Sunday. Thanks again to everyone who helped make my visit so wonderful!
THe unleaded plus is the one with 10% ethanol and is usually a nickel or so cheaper, and not everyone is racist in South Dakota, obviously, wherever you go you'll find a**holes like that but hopefully he just tuned it out and didnt let that affect your trip....Most of my friends from college are African-American and we've had that had happen a time or two as well as fighting for it a time or two (unfortunately)......Glad you had fun
Yup, what Deadwood said. Anyone with any common sense around here would never be that hurtful to another person walking down the street. The kids were just jerks OR they knew him well and were just joking. Unfortunately, it's probably the first thing though.
Like Deadwood said, our super unleaded is cheaper because of the ethanol. I believe that's made from corn and we have a lot of that around here.
I'm so glad you enjoyed your trip and thank you for posting how you felt about it here.
Thanks to everyone who gave me great tips as to what to see and do while visiting South Dakota. I had a fabulous time, although there were a couple of questions that I wanted to ask.
Being from southern California I have truly gotten to experience what living in a melting pot is really like. While in Rapid City I was walking down the street with a family friend and some young men (probably in their 20s) rolled down the window and yelled n**** at him. Is racism prevalent in Rapid City? Was this just young kids being ignorant or is this a shared feeling among the majority there?
Something else that was intresting, but not at all bad, was that I noticed whie getting gas that the cheapest gas was not the lowed grade. I noticed this in Wyoming to, the unleaded plus was cheaper than the unleaded. Is that incentive for the people of South Dakota to buy gas with fewer emissions? I wish it was that way in Cali!
I absolutly adored Custer State Park, Bear Country USA was great and I enjoyed a lot of Rapid City. I didn't think that there would be such a distinct divide of the city but as a whole the city was very nice. I was glad to get to see the city in person, although know I know that not a whole lot of downtown is open on a Sunday. Thanks again to everyone who helped make my visit so wonderful!
That's great you had a good time in our state! You'll have to come back again sometime!
I don't view South Dakota as a racist state at all... and it's not prevalent.
It does exist though, sadly, like it does everywhere.
Racism is something that I will never, ever understand.
The car of full of #$%& were just punk kids (sad that they were my age) trying to be cool or something. Like I said, I'll never understand it.
Like others said, I think the Unleaded Plus (with ethanol) is lower because of the corn production in the region.
I think Unleaded Plus has lower MPG than Regular Unleaded, but I could be wrong. I've heard both sides of it. I usually buy the Unleaded Plus.
Mid-grade unleaded in the Midwestern states achieves it higher octane by using ethanol as an additive--the ethanol production receiving a federal government--read: taxpayer paid--subsidy. So, you're not paying for it at the pump, BUT . . .
I'd guess that the kids nknew the guy they were yelling at or something. Most racists are too chicken to expose their hate publicly like that. I've never heard outspoken racism in South Dakota. I think most people keep their bigotry to private conversations at the dinner table, which isn't healthy either.
The kids definitly didn't know the guy, seeing as he had come with me, however, we didn't let it affect our trip, it just caught us quite off guard. Everybody else that we met was wonderful, including our charming little old bus driver that gave us a tour of Mt. Rushmore and Crazyhorse- he was telling us all about what was around.
My boyfriend had suggested that maybe ethanol was the reason for the lower price in gas but we weren't sure. I think it's a great idea, might as well put that corn to use and pay some farmers for their hard work! You would think that California would adopt something like that since we're "so" (can you sense the sarcasm here?) worried about being economically friendly. I'm not against being economically friendly---but let's face it, most if it's crap.
I forgot to mention- I absolutly LOVED Art Ally. I though that was a GREAT thing to provide for teh youth in your city. I was also impressed with the lack of dirty language and obscene pictures- glad to see that they aren't taking it for granted and wasting such a precious outlet.
I'm thinking the next time I would like to come to South Dakota might be during the fall. Do you guys have lots of fall foliage?
Thanks again- I adored your rolling hills, big sky, and clean air. I really miss it.
For fall foliage Spearfish Canyon is where its at. Norther hills tour yesterday, the aspen were turning a golden color. The full effect of the colors were not yet felt, but it was a good start.
Just an FYI to the OP, I live in Nevada right now, and all our gas and almost all of California's gas contains ethanol, from a low of 6% to a high of 10% depending on brand.
As for using corn of the production of gasoline, personally I would prefer corn to be used as food. I have to admit, though, I don't know how ethanol production versus food production affects farmers.
couple years ago the ethanol hype was at the forefront. Prices set a record. The ethanol plants signed contract with the farmers for a good price, for the farmer. Well fast forward to last year, the market went down, the ethanol plants had to honor the contracts, it sent a couple of companies into bankruptcy.
Personally I am not a fan of ethanol and am against the subsidy.
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