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The nice thing about this section of the country - western South Dakota and eastern Wyoming - is that in spite of the size of the land and the distances between pretty much any one place and any place else, there is a concentration of wonderful monuments and natural phenomena within a few hours drive of each other.

I have had a fascination with Devils Tower ever since the movie "Close Encounters of the Third Kind". Driving west on Route 24, you first see it about 20 miles away, a huge stone monolith rising from the surrounding hills - just an ash gray silhouette, until you get closer.

Devils Tower is 1267 feet of frozen magma (above ground) - the remnants of a volcano. The surrounding cone eroded away a long time ago, leaving the central, very tough plug of solidified stone as a silent reminder of the area's previous violent geology.

This is one of the premier climbing spots in America. The Tower is scaled regularly by experienced climbers, and several were on their way up (or down) while I was there. As a matter of fact, there was a wedding party going to the top for the marriage ceremony. I think this is an effective way of filtering your guest list down to those that really want to be there. I bet the catering bill is astronomical, though.

Not being an experienced technical rock climber, I did not entertain the thought of making the ascent (well, not for long, anyway). But, there are outfits that will train you to that end, and there are a number of established routes up the mountain. But - some other time ...

At the top of the tower, there is actually a lot of wildlife, including birds, rodents and snakes. The birds got there the obvious way. I'm not quite sure how the rodents and snakes got there. If I was a snake, I don't think I'd try slithering up a 1200 foot vertical rock face to chase a mouse. I imagine they were dropped by birds of prey.

There are two trails that go completely around the tower. The short one is a little less than two miles long. Walking around the tower, there is an eerie quiet - as if the giant stone was absorbing all noise in the area.

As I left the park to return to my motel in Hulett, I spotted some proghorn antelope. I had though about camping, but the nights were getting chill, and I had too much website work to do.