I’ve been going through some of my older pictures and our trips are usually a “play it by ear” type of thing. It can be frustrating, especially now, to not be able to find a place to camp, but only a few years ago it was very easy to just pull into a park and find a camping spot. That flexibility allowed side adventures. We had several of those side trips on our trip out west in 2008.
One of those was the “geographical center of the USA.” I had read an article shortly before our trip about it so I recognized the town when we were driving. The city of Belle Fourche in South Dakota, being the closest to the actual center has capitalized on this odd distinction by setting up a visitor center close to the actual center, so we stopped to take a look and get directions to the actual center.
The actual center is in the middle of nowhere on gravel roads … at least it was in 2008. It was a nice country drive on empty roads to a spot along the edge of a field surrounded by wire fencing.
A little dirt path had been worn from the few tourists that had made the trip before us that lead out to a tattered USA flag and the actual 1962 survey marker.
Then we headed back to the van and our next adventure: Devil’s Tower.
