Oh, winter in the black Hills, although it was 55 degrees a couple of days ago.
Now it's 20 degrees and snow.
So we've known we've got some moderate temperatures during the year.
Winter always catches back up with us.
Everybody its Tristan Emond with mindful living Realty, a realtor
right here, rapid city, South Dakota.
Welcome back to my YouTube channel.
I talk everything about moving to rapid city, and then wonderful things around.
And the black hills, D'you what its cold outside.
So I'm not going to talk about this right here.
Okay. That's better.
So winter, winter in the rapid city and the black Hills, what's it like?
So when during the black Hills can be all over the place, it
can be snowstorm in October that lasts all the way through March.
Or we can have this year.
For example, we had a snow storm, one in September with a little snow storm
in October, and then we didn't really have any snow again until december.
And now it was 35 degrees last weekend.
It's going to be like eight on Wednesday and there'll be 45.
This next weekend.
Look at this.
This is a very typical black Hills crazy weather patterns in the winter time.
But it's not always this way.
It does get cold.
We've got blizzards, we get the wind blowing.
And once the wind starts blowing, that brings a windchill factor that drops those
temperatures way down sometimes where negative 20, 30 degrees below zero with
a windchill in the middle of the night.
So let's talk about how it can survive in the winter, the long cold winter.
Cause even if it's a light winter around March, we're really like.
Can it just be Spring, I'm tired of not being able to go outside
and not have to be bundled all up.
I'm ready for the sun.
And warmth can just spring tip.
Number one, winter in the black Hills is beautiful when the snow
comes down and it covers the trees.
It covers the Meadows it's then the sun comes out and it glistens on that snow.
It's amazing.
The different kinds of landscapes.
It's like a whole different black Hills.
So take the time to go find and enjoy that beauty.
No matter where you go in the black Hills, you can find a drive.
That's amazing.
In the winter time, my wife and I last weekend, we went up to Rockford and
went from Rockford north along Rockford road that pulled up just another side of
Terry peak and lead and Deadwood area.
Beautiful little drive, a lot of little meadows some amazing places
back there that isn't well-traveled, the wildlife is still out.
And while I flew on Custer state park and it's a whole different drive,
Spearfish canyon and spearfish.
It's also a great time to rent a cabin in the Hills and enjoy the winter views.
We rented a cabin last year on the top of Terry peak with some amazing, winter
views we had the sunsets every night.
It was a great time.
We didn't ski, but we enjoyed being out in the winter and kind of
cuddled in that nice little place where we could have put fireplace
on watch TV and just enjoy the day.
Surviving the winter point 2 enjoy the scenery by going on winter hikes.
Now, hiking is amazing thing to do in the black Hills, no matter any
time of the year, but it's a whole different ball game in winter.
It's like an entirely different hike.
We went on iron Creek trail of near Spearfish canyon.
And we got to see the river running between the snowbanks and
the snow up on the hill, made our little snowman along the rock and
had a great time on that hike.
The other great hike we did was rough lock falls.
Now they close off the road.
They actually get to the falls and they'd just leave that first snowmobiles.
So if you're going to hike it, you got to hike it the entire way.
And you're probably going to want to bring snowshoes.
And while you're doing your hiking, don't forget to check out
the ice caves around rapid city.
The most popular one is community caves, but that's quite high.
That's going, that's going up to get up to the cave where you see
the water frozen over the cave.
Great place.
Great hike.
Amazing to see, just make sure you're ready to go up that hill.
That's a good one and more most important thing to think about when
you're hiking in the black Hills during the winter is be prepared.
Now I did put a video about preparing for the winter and
I'll put that up here somewhere.
So you can check out that, make sure you've got the right
clothes because you've got the right water, the right food.
Make sure you are prepared if you do that in winter hiking.
So you don't get a caught in the cold surviving in the winter.
Part three, snow sports.
If you love adventures, there's so many winter sports.
In the black Hills, Terry peak is the place to go.
If you love snow skiing and snowboarding, they've got all sorts of trails from
the bunny hill to the experienced Hills, driving down through the trees.
They've got lessons for you and your family, and a great ski chalet
to, you know, relax and drink beer.
The next fun adventure in the black Hills is snowmobiling.
There are all sorts of places you can read snowmobiles one seaters
two seaters and trails all over the place to go and have some fun.
And enjoy getting into those back trails of the black Hills last year, my son
and I went to big hill, which is just south of Spearfish, just up the hill,
about half an hour, beautiful day.
It was with a bunch of snow.
We went snowshoeing along there, up there.
There was not only miles of snowshoe trails, but also groomed cross-country
ski trails and fat bike trails.
Not to mention the parking lot was this old trail head.
So a lot of things you can do up in the big hill area in Spearfish.
Another popular thing to do around here is ice fishing.
Now I'm not a fisherman to begin with, but then you put it on ice and cold, just not
my thing, but I've seen a lot of friends go out there and they're pulling in.
It's a pretty amazing fish.
And having quite a bit, you know, the actual equipment where they
bring in the big Hut and everything and a, to warmer on the hut than
it was probably it's in your house.
A lot of fun ice fishing in Sheridan lake pactola, like deer field lake
and all around the black Hills.
And when you're done doing all that, you can still go ice skating.
You can go ice skating at main street square in rapid city or Wilson park.
They flooded a certain area and you can go.
In the park, there also rank at Braeburn park, which is over, just off Jackson
Boulevard on the far west side of town.
And of course there's the ice arena in town where not only do they play hockey
and other things, but you also have some open skate times that are kind of fun.
Got a great story about the ice arena.
A number of years ago, took my daughter out to go ice
skating, doing the free skate.
And there was a bunch of preteen girls running skating,
round the skating on the rink.
And this is about the time when frozen had just come out.
So of course over the speakers here comes the song, let it go, let it go.
And it was hilarious.
Listened to all the girls, singing the song as they went around around
the ice at the top of their lungs.
It's a great place to ice escape plus it's indoors.
So we've got that going for you too.
If you're in Deadwood, they also have an ice skating rink in
their outlaw square this year.
They also did something fun by adding in ice bumper cars.
I haven't tried that yet, but it's on the list.
That's gotta be amazing.
And finally, you can get involved in hockey, whether that's adult
hockey, getting your kids involved in youth hockey, there's figure
skating lessons, so many more ice things you can do in rapid city.
Did you really enjoy hockey?
Don't forget to go down, check out the rush, playing their games at the monument,
begging of the monument civic center.
We come to number four on the list, all the events that go on in
the monument right now, we've got going on with the second biggest
event in the black codes area.
And that's the stock show and rodeo here.
You have everything from rodeos to stock shows to concerts, to so many
fun things at the stock show and rodeo.
Lot of people come to town to enjoy that.
The monument has so many different events and activities during the winter.
And they're inside.
Look at this.
Whiskey tips here's that rodeo has mentioning the bands rush games, the black
Hills sport show and outdoor expo, amateur hockey games, car shows more concerts,
a dart tournament, a holistic wellness, the black Hills brawl fight league.
So many different things going on.
And the monument, keep your eye out for them.
They'll be there to keep you entertained during the winter time
surviving in the black Hills, number five, local winter events, some
of which aren't so south Dakotan.
My first one is really a lot of fun is burning beetle.
So here you go to Custer, South Dakota, you get a torch and you get that
was lit and you walked through the.
Residential streets of Custer saying burn beetle burn.
And they've got this beetle here, as you can see in the photo in front of you and
you let the fire light the beetle on fire.
This was in reference to a number of years ago when things were really
dry and the beetles were starting to take over some of the trees and
starting to kill off a lot of trees.
As some of the moisture came back, the beetle went away
and this is our celebration.
Conquering the beetle of the black Hills.
Once the Beatles burns at the end, they've got fireworks that goes off to
enjoy this cool winter celebration and what can be more fun than an outhouse
race in Nemo South Dakota, here's where your team makes your own outhouse.
And you've got people that are sitting in it and people that pull it and
people that push it and you race.
Cause you've got all these different little fun, little outhouses that
people have made throughout the.
Oh, you have more South Dakota than that.
Spearfish has Chinook days.
This isn't celebration of the world record temperature change that
happened in 1943 in Spearfish in two minutes, it rose 49 degrees.
Wow.
They do this festival right with sports music, beer, and a bonfire.
You can also find winter festivals that lead and at the miner brewing company in.
If you're in Deadwood, they also have a lot of fun events, such as
the canine keg pull, where they have dogs, race, pulling a keg.
I've also always wanted to go to the snow cross races.
What could be better than professional snowmoblie riders racing around
the days of 76 event complex.
There's also a winter carnival and free ski up at the big hill trail
area that I mentioned earlier.
And if you're wanting to drive a little bit, you can go to Sundance Wyoming, where
they have a fantastic winter festival, including still skiing behind a horse.
This is a great site to check out this black Hills and Badlands site.
I'll post that below.
Here's the things involved in February.
We mentioned the sock show there's Mardi Gras weekend in Deadwood, the
winter fat bike classic, a father daughter ice fishing event that black
Hills sports show I mentioned earlier.
Calamities shindig the Sundance winter festival with the skiing and so many
more things happening in the black Hills.
Also check out the events, rapid city page for all sorts of different events
going on in the black Hills as well.
Many of which we've already talked about.
There's also this thunder on the ice snowmobile event.
This is amazing to me.
Cause I remember when I was a little kid, we would have snowmobile
races on lake Benton in minnesota.
And never to be left behind is the outdoor campus.
Want to learn about ice fishing?
Here you go.
How about dark horse, spearfishing.
Go for it.
Family Dutch oven cooking.
So many different things you could do at the outdoor campus.
This winter surviving winter in the black hills number six,
shopping museums and beer.
Here.
We are in the downtown rapid city webpage, and you can see you're
over explore how many different bars and brews are in the downtown area.
Grab your friends go to a brewery, enjoy some beer, enjoy some wine.
There's a number of wineries around too.
And then check out the many galleries, museums and art, not only in the
downtown area, but all over rapid city.
And don't forget, check with the mini plays, theaters and movies.
You're going to attend throughout the rapid city area.
And when things get really cold and you just want a place to go inside to
get away from it all, go to the mall.
There's plenty of walking space.
There's plenty things for kids to do.
There's plenty of different shopping areas and things to enjoy at the Rushmore
mall and then go down the street to Rushmore crossing where there a Sam's
club target, Scheels, so many different stores in restaurant crossing, and finally
make sure that you have fun in the snow.
We're in the black Hills.
There's lots of Hills.
You'll find plenty places to go sledding, go find a sled.
You bought one for 10 bucks at Walmart, go sledding down the hill.
And in the spring, when the snow is really nice and wet, do so many
things, make your snowman, make snow forts, have snowball fights.
And of course, when it snows in, may you make your snow chair?
All right, everybody there, we have it enjoying the winter in
the black Hills of South Dakota.
Hope you've enjoyed this video.
Make sure you watch this video, which I mentioned earlier, preparing for
winter in the black Hills to make sure you have all the right equipment,
the right clothing and everything that you might need the expectations
for winter and the black Hills.
Thanks everybody.
Have an amazing day.
And remember love where you live.