We pass on through Pringle. A short distance from here we find some interesting specimens which look like petrified acorns or small nuts embedded in limestone. But the next is the most peculiar specimen of all. As we cross the railroad well on the way from Pringle to Minnekahta, there stands, west of the track, in a pasture, a peculiar beast. It is made up of a log, with four prongs (branches) resembling legs. Another log is attached for a head and two root systems attached for horns. The result, with the addition of a little paint resembles very much a grotesque elk.
In Edgemont we see huge specimens from the petrified forest, one tree of solid rock weight 14,370 pounds. The specimens are remarkable, but we are not destined to see the petrified forest itself. In Hot Springs later we are to find all the petrified wood we care to carry home, however. We will speed back to Minnekahta and thence over U. S. 18 to Hot Springs.
Gray Rocks, Custer, S. D.
Battle Mountain Sanitarium for Old Soldiers
CHAPTER XVII
Hot Springs
We arrive in Hot Springs late in the afternoon and look for a cabin for the night. All of them are filled up, so we look for a camp site. Evans Heights is too steep for our heavily loaded car, and we drive down to the Municipal Camp. After pitching camp we attempt to find out what there is in Hot Springs to see. We find that there is much and accordingly lay our plans for a big day.
After breakfast the first thing we do is to cross the railroad track on foot looking for petrified moss and wood. From the stream bed we get several particularly fine specimens of the moss. These we cache while we go into a pasture up the slope across S. D. 79 looking for petrified wood. Our search is soon rewarded. We find many fine specimens and return to camp well loaded with stone. The phenomenon of the mineral water turning vegetation into stone is a peculiar one.
We next take the twelve mile road down past the camp toward Cascade Springs. Ten miles from Hot Springs we come upon what at one time promised to be a fine modern city. Modern buildings were built, including brick business buildings with glass fronts. The hope was that “Cascade” was to be the center of medical baths instead of Hot Springs. At the head of the would-be town is a great warm spring, or we might say a geyser boiling out of a large hole in the ground. The water is highly medicated. Other similar springs are in close proximity.