We put up for the night in one of the Hill City cabins. These are not in some ways as nice as some of the others, but are very comfortable nevertheless. We must try the cabins by all means while in the Hills. Most of them cost a dollar a night. In them, generally are a bed or two, a cook stove, table and cooking utensils, with possibly other conveniences including stove wood.
Hill City is in the heart of the Black Hills. It has excellent connections with various cities, fishing grounds and places of scenic interest. Sylvan Lake is nine miles distant, Rapid City 20, Deadwood 40, Custer 15 and the Game Lodge 27. Hill City is only a small place, but it is an “up and coming” progressive little town. They believe in advertising, and a few of its citizens are rather farsighted in their attitude toward visitors. The tourist park is not like some of the rest, but it affords shelter and many conveniences. In a few years it will be coming to the front.
We have not been in Hill City long before the “filling station information bureau” tell us that no trip to the Hills is complete without a visit to the Keystone mines and Rushmore Mountain. So, for them we start. Keystone is about ten miles from Hill City. We leave town at the north end, over the railroad tracks, headed due east. The road is very, very winding. It follows the valley of Battle Creek, going up and down over small hills, tributary springs and streams, and around rocks. It crosses the railroad no less than sixteen times in the ten miles, two times under the track.
Covering the entire road and surface of the hills is a layer of powdered mica. One must pinch himself to see if he is actually living and awake and not riding along over the streets of gold in the hereafter. Maybe some of us had better take a good look, for our streets in the next life may be of coal dust or cinders.
White Tail Buck
We stop along the road to collect a few specimens of the rocks of this vicinity. We hope that we may pick up some rose colored quartz, the rock that is most popular for decorative purposes in the “Hills.” Here an unexpected pleasure awaits us. A young fawn is standing across the ravine watching us innocently. When we discover it we cannot help turning to stare, rapt in wonder. Soon a doe, then another, and behind them two bucks and more emerge from a thicket. One of the bucks raises his front foot and points his muzzle toward us. The whole herd turn and bound gracefully out of sight. It is a scene that will long remain in our memories.
Trout fishing is good in Battle Creek and Slate Creek on the other side of Hill City.
Just before reaching Keystone we turn up a side road to the right. We come to two very impressive log houses. These, we decide, are just the type we would like to build for ourselves. We drive in and ask the man in the yard what a house like that would cost. Imagine our chagrin when he tells us the houses belong to the millionaire owner of the Etta Lithia Mine, one of the larger mines of the Hills. The large house is the house in which the owner lives for two weeks each summer.
It cost $6,000, we are told. On the inside we find all sorts of fishing and other sporting equipment. There is a beautiful hardwood floor in the house, running spring water, soft rain water from a cistern, a fireplace in each room, rustic furniture with bark still on, and even twin beds.