Sunday, June 19, 2005
TXPTLMS #6: South Dakota During a Thunderstorm
Top Ten Places That Leave Me Slackjawed
Now maybe unimpressive cornfields and wheatfields and ryefields and whatnot left me a poor judge of scenery or maybe it was the endless smell of feet, but the night we spent at the Safari Red Arrow Camping Ranch in Rapid City, S.D.**, was amazing. A thunderstorm blew into the neighborhood and set off a light show like nothing I've seen since. Forget Frampton. Forget Pink Floyd at the planetarium. This was the light show to end all light shows. (right now there's thunder rumbling outside, but it's pretty weak and there's no visible lightning to go with it -- stupid Oregon.)
I remember watching the storm light up the sky from the rec room at the RV park. The walls had long windows, providing a panoramic view of the lightning against bruise-colored clouds. Cheap insulation ensured unobstructed volume for the thunder. It was quite a night.
I can't remember if my sisters were in the rec room or were cowering in the RV. If they were there, I was probably tormenting them (and since I usually remember tormenting them, they probably weren't. When we were at a park in Flint the tornado-warning sirens started up. As we headed for the car, I spun around as I ran announcing, "It's a twister! It's a twister!" while they cried. Good times.)
In the Meteorology For Credit course I took in college, they said such storms are common on the Plains. It's almost enough to make me consider thinking about the possibility of maybe perhaps visiting there again. Almost.
*The photo is not of our Sunrader; I appropriated it from elsewhere on the Web. Ours had both cabover windows intact, but lacked the a/c unit on the roof (we just had a little crank-open vent).
**I checked with my folks to find this out as I wasn't paying attention at the time. My best guess would've been Nebraska, which, while close, would have been wrong.
- Yosemite
- Whiskeytown Dam
- Santa Cruz Giant Redwoods
- Disneyland
- California Palace of the Legion of Honor
- South Dakota During a Thunderstorm
Now maybe unimpressive cornfields and wheatfields and ryefields and whatnot left me a poor judge of scenery or maybe it was the endless smell of feet, but the night we spent at the Safari Red Arrow Camping Ranch in Rapid City, S.D.**, was amazing. A thunderstorm blew into the neighborhood and set off a light show like nothing I've seen since. Forget Frampton. Forget Pink Floyd at the planetarium. This was the light show to end all light shows. (right now there's thunder rumbling outside, but it's pretty weak and there's no visible lightning to go with it -- stupid Oregon.)
I remember watching the storm light up the sky from the rec room at the RV park. The walls had long windows, providing a panoramic view of the lightning against bruise-colored clouds. Cheap insulation ensured unobstructed volume for the thunder. It was quite a night.
I can't remember if my sisters were in the rec room or were cowering in the RV. If they were there, I was probably tormenting them (and since I usually remember tormenting them, they probably weren't. When we were at a park in Flint the tornado-warning sirens started up. As we headed for the car, I spun around as I ran announcing, "It's a twister! It's a twister!" while they cried. Good times.)
In the Meteorology For Credit course I took in college, they said such storms are common on the Plains. It's almost enough to make me consider thinking about the possibility of maybe perhaps visiting there again. Almost.
*The photo is not of our Sunrader; I appropriated it from elsewhere on the Web. Ours had both cabover windows intact, but lacked the a/c unit on the roof (we just had a little crank-open vent).
**I checked with my folks to find this out as I wasn't paying attention at the time. My best guess would've been Nebraska, which, while close, would have been wrong.
Mikesell
1 Snarky Remarks:
lindaruth, at 8:21 AM
Linda