1.) Mount Rushmore
If you are sightseeing in South Dakota a must see would be Mount Rushmore at least once in your life. They do have a restaurant on site and a visitor center with movies on the history. They also have some sort hikes which we didn’t do because it was super hot the day we skipped over those but we did watch the movies and have some ice cream. Mount Rushmore Website
2.) Custer State Park
There is so much to stay about this park! It’s one of the best state parks I’ve ever seen. We stayed in three campgrounds while we were there and all three were very clean. The park has a ton of wild life to see. There are lakes, swimming areas, tons of hikes and enough to keep you busy that you wouldn’t never need to leave the park! We can’t say enough great things about this park.
More information on this State Park on our blog post here: Custer State Park is its own awe inspiring destination!
Official NPS website on Custer State Park
3.) Corn Palace
This is a nice stop when you are driving across South Dakota. It’s indoors and air-conditioned and they allow you to bring our dog in as well! It’s very interesting all the corn artwork. They also sell popcorn. For us it was a great stop! Corn Palace website
4.) Dead Wood
There are shoot outs in the street, lots of restaurants, casino, and tons of shopping in Deadwood South Dakota. We only went up there for the day since we thought the kids would enjoy watching the shoot outs. Deadwood South Dakota website
5.) Wall Drug
We wrote a blog post from our experience at Wall drug which as more details. This is tourist trap full of Americana but for us it was a nice worth well stop. The donuts are really good for breakfast.
6.) Missile site
We spent a few hours at the Missile site and visitor center. The kiddos even earned a Jr. Rangers Badge here and participated in a ranger lead activity. We also went to one of the missiles to see it in person. This was a great history lesson for us and the kids. We wrote more about it in a separate blog post.
Minuteman missile national historic site Blog Post
This is the official website for details
7.) Badlands
We camped in the Badlands park and enjoyed seeing tons of wild life as well as their dark sky program. We would highly recommend one night here but in the summer its all in full sun so it’s best if you have a fan or ac as it gets super hot!
Official NPS website on the Badlands here
8.) Mammoth Site and Museum in Hot Springs
This place is an active dig site where they are pulling out mammoth bone fossils. They have a a complete history of how this occurred and explanations of the dig site you are able to walk around and see the actual site which is very cool. They did have a small kid space with sand for them to dig in outside of the main dig site to satisfy the kid that really wants to dig. It is all indoors so it’s a great rainy day activity. Mammoth site webpage
9.) Wind Cave
Unfortunately, we didn’t make it to this one has they sell out of tours at the beginning of the day. Tickets are only sold on site the day of so the line for tickets starts before they even open for the day. If you plan on going make sure you research this one prior to heading out.
Click here for the wind cave website
10.) Sioux Falls South Dakota
We only spent a couple hours here but we could have spent a whole day at this park enjoying the falls and exploring. If you are driving past on I-90, then I would stop for sure but give your self several hours to rest and enjoy this park.
