Mitchell, SD and the Corn Palace

By Katrina Kane, on July 16th, 2007

Moved on over to the east side of South Dakota to Mitchell, home of the Corn Palace. This is much bigger than Sturgis, hot at the moment, and a nice, flat, easy drive from the west side. I crossed another time zone into Central time which made me later than expected. Oops!

I’m staying at Rondee’s RV Park behind the Days Inn, another Passport America park. I have now recouped the cost of my Passport America membership and will be reaping the gravy for the rest of the year at half price RV parks. Woohoo! Rondees seems to be run by the Days Inn. The wireless internet looks excellent here and you can purchase a day pass to the hotel’s indoor waterpark (pool, giant slide, buckets dumping water overhead, hot tub). The laundry room looks good. There is a Walmart and Cabela’s nearby and plenty of fast food joints and restaurants.

The Corn Palace is here and certainly worth a visit since it is free. Every year they pick a theme and spend $130,000 to redecorate the outside with corn. Corn is a big deal here with lots of corn fields and cattle. This decorating practice started way back in the early 1900s for an exposition and has continued to draw tourists. The corn murals are amazing. The Palace is also used for basketball games, conferences, world-class entertainment during the annual festival, etc. I also caught the Blues brothers hanging out here across the street at the local ice cream parlor. 😉