She went back to weed whacking with a glare at me the idler, so I stopped sipping tea, got Rusty back in the van and put his leash away. I looked around.
It’s true: we had been here when Mz Personality showed up for work and yes we had overstayed the three hour limit by probably nine hours but there seemed no pressing need to vacate the space. Even the night before the place was mostly empty.
We only ended up in the rest area by accident. I had tried to book a campsite at Vermillion Lake State Park off I-90 but the website didn’t allow me to complete the transaction. South Dakota strikes again! I have some experience using websites and I know online idiocy when I see it… so rather than risk not finding a site by the lake where I had been yearning for a swim we stopped at the rest area to sleep. Which we did, and apparently lingered too long and broke all sorts of obscure rules by excessive resting.
Our drive across South Dakota was marked by our crossing of the Missouri River which splits the state roughly in two. It took us a moment to figure it out but the river marks the time zone change and in this modern era the van clock and our cellphone clocks all switch automatically. It seemed unnaturally late to us at one point and we had to glance at the microwave clock which is set to ship’s time and sure enough it was on Mountain Time while our electronic impedimenta were marching to Central Time, an hour later.
Round the back of the supermarket in Chamberlain I found the parking lot filled with powerful four wheel drive trucks. Winter struggles only hinted at.
The Missouri also marked a decided change in scenery. Gone was the ranch land of endless dry yellow grass. Now we found ourselves on the edge of the cornfields of Midwest fame. It was Iowa before Iowa.
I had not been looking forward to droning across the Great Plains so the plan was to try to split up the drive into feasible segments, to pull over and rest and try to stop and check stuff out. We did well with the Badlands and the corn palace. Now we were looking for a pleasant rest stop, a break from driving and not in a rest area as they are too stressful in this state.
We entered the park and paused to salute this fine Midwest institution, below, free use of a sewer dump and a water hose. Often found in rest areas it helps make cruising in an RV very simple. Florida and the western states haven’t yet figured this out.
We had found Union Grove, a state park with a campground and a day use picnic area. I confidently stepped up to the unstaffed automatic payment machine with my credit card. No dice. The machine was broken of course. I pressed the green button yet no message appeared on the screen. I stood staring at it idiotically. 
The spot was lovely and quiet. There was a park ranger’s residence up the street but no sign of other users or rangers or anyone.
So we had lunch. We were scofflaws but I couldn’t see how we could pay the stupid eight dollar day pass. No cash accepted, credit card only and total electronic failure on their part.
Rusty was okay with it. I wasn’t; I don’t like taking advantage.
We drove on out of South Dakota, the difficult state.
