Rapid City - Church & Pizza

Saturday and Sunday were fairly restful days.  Being a 3 day holiday, there are lots of people here in the Black Hills, but not nearly as busy as it was when the Sturgis Rally took place earlier in the summer.  As we drive along, we see RV Parks which are very empty.  The first RV Park we were going to stay at, closed on August 31st, so we decided to stay where we are.  Anyway, we just did not want to fight the traffic visiting the sites.  However, we did decided to go to Church in Rapid City, and boy, are we sure happy that we did.  Not because there was another Papa Murphy's there to get Pizza for dinner...but because they had a special speaker today....

After essentially doing nothing on Saturday but relaxing and rejuvenating....it was fairly easy getting up, getting ready, and leave by 9 to get to church by 10.  Rapid City is only 42 miles away...but it took the entire hour to get there...which is life in the Black Hills....you just got to give yourself time to get there.  As we were coming up to Rapid City, we went by Bear Country USA, a drive through wildlife park just outside of Rapid City.  There was a line of cars to get into it...and that was around 9:45.  It opens at 9 am, and if we went, it would cost us $30...$30 to see all the wildlife in one place that we have already seen along our 5 month trip.  So it does not sound too appealing to us...although I have been to this type of park before, and it was real interesting to do.

We got to church right at 10, so we were just a bit late for the music worship.  There was around 150 people in attendance.  The church is in what seems to be a converted grocery store which now makes for a wonderful church.

As I said, today they had a special guest speaker.  The speaker was Freddie Prez, who currently "is" Freddie Prez Attractions, and does State Fairs, Carnivals, etc.  However, Freddie is also an old-time, 1980's era Christian Band member, formerly of the band Liberation Suite, which played a lot in Europe.  Now he is an entertainer reaching out to kids, youth, and adults through his music, his Games, Karaoke, Lip Sync, Guitar Hero, Bingo, and more. 

For church what Freddie did was give a history of Contemporary Christian Music, and the relationship that the music has had with Calvary Chapel.  It was very interesting, and uplifting.  One thing that struck us was that he said that today's Christian Music is very much a "money" thing more than it was back in the 70's and 80's.  As such, much of the music is what he calls, "praise and worship" music (because it sells better), but back in the earlier days, the music was much more  a "call to repentance" type of music.  He feels that there needs to be a mix of both...that through music, we have an opportunity to teach about Jesus to those who will hear it through music more than through preaching.  The music leads to the desire to learn more, hence the preaching and teaching comes in then.

Before we left Rapid City, we drove to a Papa Murphy's to pick up another pizza....we sure like Papa Murphy's....take it home and cook it when you wish is the way to go...and a large pizza for $8 just can't be beat.

Since Papa Murphy's was on the west side of town, I took highway 44 and planned to catch the turnoff to highway 16...but missed it.  So highway 44 took us all the way to highway 385.  Near this intersection is Pactola Reservoir, and Marcia took a few pictures of it as I drove along.

There are lots of nice places in the Black Hills, and we will not be able to see them all.  As we got to Hill City, there was a Diner there that we saw along the way to Rapid City, and so we decided to stop.  It is an old fashion diner, and most of their menu was burgers, so we both had a burger.  It was ok, not as great as the lady who saw us waiting said it was, but still, it was nice to sit in an old fashion diner run by locals.  The service was nice, the people were nice, and we were both impressed by the young family of five which was sitting across the aisle from us.  Three young kids, from a baby to probably a 4 year old, and mom and dad were in their early 20's.  The kids were well behaved, mom had to go out with the baby, and later when she returned with it, he went out to the car....all because the child was crying a little....they did not want to disturb those in the restaurant.  As we left, Marcia told the young mother how impressed we were with their little family...and to keep up the good work.  I think this young mother appreciated it, even though she was not stressed out at all.  If only all young families had a mother and a father who are so attentive and nice to their children....

Well, we have two more days to see more of the sights of the Black Hills.  Tomorrow I think we are going to do the Iron Mountain Road, stop at Mt. Rushmore again, and perhaps visit Crazy Horse...which we have driven by a few times, but have not yet stopped to visit.