We had a great day in Sioux Falls today.  We went for a tour of McKennan Park, which was beautiful on this gorgeous fall day. We saw the “Pillars of the Nation” monument which has rocks that were collected by each state and sent to Sioux Falls for display to show our solidarity as a country during World War II.

We also took the dogs to the park to play and burn off some of their energy.  It was such a joy to spend the day outside without any worries about going back to work the next day; our time together was so limited before that it is truly a breath of fresh air to be able to just relax and take it all in without any pressure.

Sioux Falls has a surprisingly large craft beer brewery selection.  It is not something we expected when we came to visit our friend, Bethany, but it was a welcome discovery.  We went out to a local bar tonight that has an ever-changing selection of beer, many of them brewed locally.  We were fortunate enough to talk with one of the brewers after tasting his beer and what a treat that was!  We both learned quite a bit about beer and were able to appreciate it that much more.  As a huge bonus, our dogs were welcome at the bar!  Both of them were awesomely well-behaved and seemed to relax and enjoy the night nearly as much as we did!

A few downer moments of the day showed us how truly new we are at the art of living and traveling in an RV:

First off, we took our bikes off the back of the Jeep to make driving around town easier.  Unfortunately, we found out that some damage had been done to both bikes.  My bike had the rear brake line completely break through due to how it was bouncing around on the bike rack and my chain fell off!  This made my tire able to freely spin which wore through the grip on Andy’s handle (brand new last year!).  Unfortunate.  I guess that’s all part of the learning process.

Also, tonight we decided to stay in our lovely but loud campsite for a few extra days.  Tonight after looking at how much we would owe the campground, we found out what a huge difference it was if we just paid for the weekly rate instead of paying again for another three nights.  It is significantly cheaper to pay for a week!  So we wrote out a check for the difference between what we had paid and what the weekly rate would be and are crossing our fingers that they accept this payment and don’t question our mistake.  It easily saved us $10 a night.  This learning curve can be quite expensive.  Looks like we will be here through the end of the week!