Rapid City, South Dakota, proves it’s more than a pass-through en route to iconic attractions across the Black Hills and beyond. Proximity to destinations like Mount Rushmore National Memorial, Crazy Horse Memorial and Custer State Park give groups options for day trips, but the state’s second-largest metropolitan area presents plenty of reasons to linger close to the city limits.

“We are a hub-and-spoke community,” said Tyson Steiger, director of sales for Visit Rapid City. “Visitors can wake up here, have breakfast, spend part of the day at locations like Devils Tower National Monument or Badlands National Park, and enjoy dinner in our historic downtown.”

A two-hour City View Trolley Tour covers local history and includes a stop at the kitschy Dinosaur Park, where visitors can get a Brontosaurus-eye view of the prairie and city below. Strolling along Main Street Square and through its Art Alley leads to encounters with familiar faces and friendly locals. Known as the “City of Presidents,” bronze statues of U.S. leaders populate its sidewalks. Boutiques and galleries like Prairie Edge stock authentic tribal and artisan wares, and shopkeepers are happy to share the stories behind them. 

“People who live here truly love this place, and they love to talk about where they live,” Steiger said.

The Journey Museum

An immersive and educational experience covering numerous millennia, The Journey Museum’s exhibits connect visitors with the people, cultures and science behind Western South Dakota’s ancient Black Hills and prairies.

“This is the place to start your Rapid City-area experience because it will allow you to understand and appreciate all that you are about to embark upon,” Steiger said. “This area is truly unlike anywhere else in the entire world.”

Starting in the Star Room, visitors can consider cultural stories about the birth of the universe and scientific perspectives about the beginning of time. Gazing at constellations and galaxies within the night sky is a gateway to learning about astronomy, paleontology, geology, archeology and anthropology tied to this region.

The Journey Museum, which is home to the Sioux Indian Collection, holds one of the nation’s finest collections of Lakota art. Its display of decorative and everyday objects offers a window into Native American history. Exhibits also walk visitors through South Dakota’s pioneer period, when the discovery of gold led to a Black Hills boom.

The Journey concludes in the present day, depicting how the local community contended with natural disasters and rebuilt around its incredible assets.

Reptile Gardens

Reptile Gardens is an award-winning specialized wild animal park and botanical garden that features one of the world’s largest collections of reptile species and subspecies. Its two-level Sky Dome is an oasis filled with orchids, bromeliads, caladiums and other tropical plants as well as free-roaming lizards and frogs. (Venomous and non-venomous snakes are held behind glass.) On the lower level, a giant crocodile named Maniac lives amidst his crocodilian cohort, near exhibits of tarantulas and other big bugs.

Reptile Gardens team member John Brockelsby said self-guided tours typically take around two hours, and the attraction offers a flat motorcoach rate for up to 50 guests. The giant tortoises are Reptile Gardens’ most popular exhibit for all ages, and guests can enjoy up-close encounters.

“People get in and pet them and have the picture taken with them,” Brockelsby said. His personal favorite, Orville, is more than 120 years old.

Hourly shows focused on snakes, alligators and birds educate and entertain visitors. For those who are not especially fond of the living species showcased in the Sky Dome, many exhibits also feature mineral specimens, wood carvings and fossils — including an exact cast of the largest Archelon Turtle Fossil, which paleontologists discovered nearby.

Fort Hays Chuckwagon Supper & Show

After groups work up an appetite touring the Southern Black Hills, Fort Hays Chuckwagon Supper & Show welcomes them by busloads. The property, which features the movie set from the 1990 Kevin Costner Western “Dances with Wolves,” is designed to accommodate a crowd.   

Its chuckwagon runs seven days a week during the tourism season and can seat up to 425 for supper and a Wild West-themed variety show. The menu features barbecue beef and chicken, baked beans, baked potatoes, spice cake, applesauce, biscuits, and coffee or lemonade.

Krystal Jones, who co-owns the attraction with her husband and father-in-law, said groups typically arrive around 5:30 p.m. and first tour the movie set and other historical buildings, like a post office and blacksmith shop later brought on-site. Visitors can watch tin plate-, rope- and shingle-making demonstrations, too.   

“‘Dances with Wolves’ was filmed on my husband’s great-great-grandfather’s homestead and moved up here to where my husband grew up,” Jones said.

The Fort Hays team also operates special buses capable of navigating Needles Highway, a 14-mile scenic road within Custer State Park that’s known for hairpin turns and rewarding views of granite spires.

Black Hills Gold Factory Tour

South Dakota’s 1876 gold rush filled the Black Hills with fortune hunters, including French prospector and goldsmith Henri LeBeau, who is credited with developing a tri-color yellow, green and pink gold jewelry style that spread among miners and remains popular today.

According to local legend, LeBeau, unfamiliar with the territory, got lost in the wilderness. After the starving Frenchman collapsed from exhaustion, he woke from dreams of the vineyards of his homeland and stumbled across lifesaving South Dakotan grapevines growing near a creek. To celebrate his luck, LeBeau crafted jewelry featuring a grapevine and leaf motif in a tri-color gold design that has come to represent the region.

Visitors who take a free Black Hills Gold Factory Tour can watch as jewelry is handcrafted in a process of lost-wax casting and see how diamonds are cast into molten gold. The close-up look takes around 20-30 minutes and is followed by plenty of time to browse or shop.

“Visitors will appreciate the artistry of the jewelry-making process,” Steiger said. “It’s something that’s uniquely Rapid City.”

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