Day 18 8/16/10 the hills are alive!

50 degrees and cloudy...again. It warmed up to the mid 70's which was quite an accomplishment. We drove to Hill City, South Dakota which wasn't too far away....it was just deeper into the Black Hills. We were staying at Rafter J Bar Ranch. Its origins began as a stop for the stage coach in the 1800's during the gold rush. It was known as the Mile 12 stop. We knew our new friends from Pennsylvania would be st this campground and we were hoping to see them, but when we pulled in, we were overwhelmed by the size of the campground. To our surprise, hey left a note for us to come to their site. We headed up there, but they were not sound,so we left them a note. We had linch and headed down to check out Hill City. It was a nice little town. The population at the last census was 700. We walked sound for a couple of hours. Some stores had your usual junky souvenirs but some shops had jewelry made from Black Hills gold. After spending some time there, we headed back to csmp and hung out.