Lee and Karen Duquette,
The Two RV Gypsies: Full-Time RVers
at Bear Country USA (a drive-through wildlife park)
13820 US-16, Rapid City, South Dakota 57702
May 19, 2016 and a link to the same place in 1987

call: 606-343-220 for hours,
(9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on this date)
(times and cost subject to change)

Not everyone has had a full-grown black bear look in the window of their family car, or if they have, it was not by choice. But the two RV Gypsies have had bears walk right by their car several times during their travels.

Not everyone has seen a reindeer or a elk up close. But the two RV Gypsies did, several times, while they were in Alaska and Canada.

Even so, the two RV Gypsies went to Bear Country U.S.A. in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Nestled over 200 acres amidst towering pines and along rolling meadows just eight miles south of Rapid City, Bear Country U.S.A. offers visitors intimate views of most North American mammals. Visitors take a leisurely three-mile drive through several enclosures and encounter black bear, elk, reindeer, deer, cougars, bobcats, rocky mountain goats, bighorn sheep, dall sheep, pronghorn and buffalo.

At this “the home of the largest collection of privately owned black bear in the world”, Bear Country U.S.A. guests are guaranteed to see more than they bargained for. On this date, in their own car, the two RV Gypsies watched as these animals frolicked in a pool, climbed trees and ambled across the road in front of their vehicle.

BELOW - Statues: Bears (statues) trying to catch salmon jumping upstream (the salmon are hard to see in the photos)

Below: Karen Duquette kissed a bear

Below: ELK

The Elk shown in the photo below was licking a baby elk but it is hard to see the baby in the photo, just as it is hard to see the bird in the above photo.

Below: Arctic Wolves

Below: Big Horn Sheep

Below: Rocky Mountain Goats

Below: BEARS

The bear shown below was licking the dead bugs off of the front of the two RV Gypsies' car.

The bear shown below kept walking back and forth across the street DIRECTLY in front of the two RV Gypsies' car. It took awhile before Lee Duquette could drive the car past the bear.

Below: A bear hanging down
with its tongue sticking out.

Below: Notice Karen Duquette in the car mirror
while taking the photo of the bear.

Below: BABYLAND in Bear Country U.S.A.

Before seeing the rest of the 2016 sites listed below, check out the FLASHBACK to Bear Country USA in 1987. The photos are different from these. There is a link at the bottom of the 1987 page back to this 2016 page.

Menu for Lee and Karen Duquette,
The Two RV Gypsies in South Dakota
May 15 - 20, 2016
You may view these adventures in any order your choose.

(There is also a link to Wyoming at the bottom of this page)

S.D. Welcome Center / Rest Area / travel (site 12)

Travel photos in South-Central South Dakota

Mitchell Corn Palace - site 13

Badlands Petrified Gardens - site 14

Wall Drug, the Jackalope and more- site 14

Rapid City, The Berlin Wall, and more- site 15

Bear Country USA in 2016 (this page) with a link to 1987

Chapel in the Hills

Cosmos Mystery Area

Dinosaur Park in Rapid City

Formal Gardens and sundial in Rapid City

Pactola Lake, part of Black Hills National Forest

Presidential Statues in Rapid City

Marlins Restaurant

CAMPGROUNDS THE TWO RV GYPSIES STAYED AT IN South Dakota

Sioux City North KOA in North Sioux City, SD

Hills RV Park in Plankinton, SD

Belvidere East Exit 170 KOA in Midland, SD

Three Flags RV Park in Black Hawk, SD

AFTER you have seen all of the above sites in South Dakota, please continue on to the adventures of the two RV Gypsies in Buffalo, Wyoming.

OR Continue Navigation in the order of your choice via the alphabetical or category buttons below OR Click here to see travels by the year (not the best way)