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Hello everyone. I’m Ken. My wife and I are looking for advice on areas to visit in South Dakota for the summer. I have always wanted to visit the beautiful black hills area, Mt. Rushmore, etc.. and plan on doing just that. However tourism is not the intent of my visit per say. We are a couple in our 50’s and early 60’s looking for a bit of a cooler place to spend our retirement anywhere from a couple of months to 6 months. We do not need employment but are not independently wealthy. Both of us have pensions but neither of us has reached social security age, and I will be the only one that gets it anyway. I am retired military and my wife is a retired educator. I still work part time here in south Texas as a teacher but do not plan to work in South Dakota. We like being able to try new restaurants from time to time and having a decent place for groceries, housewares, garden supplies, etc.. I also use the VA for some of my medical care. Reasonable access to a VA clinic would be nice too. Both of us enjoy our plants and gardens. We also love the beautiful scenery in places we have been. I also love to fish, and would like to be able to not only do some river fly fishing but be able to put a small aluminum boat in a lake for some walleye often. We do not need close access to the big city but a city a reasonable distance for us to go shopping once in awhile would be nice. We like the slower pace of life and have no need to rush as if we had kids at home and had to work every day. We are basically wanting to scope out an area where we could find a smallish two bedroom, two bath mobile home, cabin, house near what we love to do we could purchase to live in part of the year. Looking for inexpensive, but safe and nice for us to live in. Even better if it has a little bit of yard we could have a vegetable/herb garden, but doesn’t have to be much land. If it helps we live in an over 55 mobile home community here. There are only a few of us here all year. All of my immediate neighbors are away from here from about April to December, so we don’t have to have neighbors all around us. I realize we probably can’t find mobile home communities like we have here and don’t necessarily need one there. But, not looking for an expensive or large home to pay for at this point in our lives. I think I would like living near the best part of nature your state has to offer but not sure if I need to be at the center of all the tourists on a daily basis. We are not coming their to be yearly tourists. We are coming to live there for part of the year for starters. Possibly longer in the future. Looking for any suggestions for places to live. Our best place would depend more on housing cost, availability of fishing, and safety. We would appreciate and suggestions on areas to check out this next summer. Thanks for your time.
If you're looking for a cooler place to live in the summertime, do NOT look east of the Missouri River in South Dakota. Summers here are absolutely brutal, due to an extremely high dew point combined with high heat. I personally don't think I can take another Eastern SD summer; this year about killed me.
Central SD can get very hot too, but with lower humidity than eastern SD.
Far Western SD or Wyoming would be your best bets if you're looking for lower heat plus a low tax burden. You may be interested in Hot Springs, SD, due to your interest in VA services.
Thanks for your reply 601halfadozenoranother. Yea, I was kind of leaning that way a bit. But, not sure if it would be too touristy at that time. I had also started looking closer to the Missiouri River for Walley fishing. Maybe somewhere in between? Most things others care about really are not much of a concern to us. We don’t need a lot of culture, shopping, family related stuff anymore. Access to decent fishing for someone not getting younger, decent summer weather, and well as cheap as I can get for the quality I am happy with. Might even try my hand at grouse hunting, but not sure if I have to stay over winter for that or not. The hunting isn’t even remotely important. I haven’t hunted birds or animals since I was a teen or young man. Fishing is my passion more than hunting ever was. Hunting was something my dad and I shared together and for the most part that is what made it fun and interesting. My grandfather and dad were both avid fishermen. Unfortunately one is gone, and my dad really can’t get around to do much fishing unless there is a nice pier he can take his electric wheelchair on. But, because of them I continue to love fishing.
Spearfish would probably fit the bill. Lots of retirees that way. Housing is more expensive than in much of the Hills. But you have excellent fly fishing right in town and Walleye fishing at Orman Lake a half hour away. VA is in Sturgis about a 30 mins away.
Hot Springs has cheaper housing and the VA is right there. Its also close to good lake fishing at Angostura but is farther from good fly fishing that Spearfish. It also has fewer restaurants and amenities that Spearfish and the Northern Hills. On the plus side its significantly warmer and less snowy than Spearfish.
Thanks Chops for the reply. It appears that both of you feel that the black hills area is better for my wants than closer to the Missouri River. But, I could be wrong. When I first started my research I thought that the black hills area would be where I wanted to be, but then I started looking into the fishing aspect and the river kept being mentioned. I think we would definitely like the views in the black hills better. We just got back from Alaska, and if money was no object we would probably go there in your summers. But, is is just to cost prohibitive to go there every summer. We will probably visit there again though. Not trying to compare Alaska to South Dakota though other than both have more scenery and wide open country more than most places.
If all you wanted was Walleye fishing and other warm water species then the Pierre area would be great. It's also great for bird hunting. But there's not much else to do in Pierre and its very isolated.
If you enjoy trout fishing in rivers (and that's my absolute favorite kind of fishing) then its hard to beat the Hills. The creeks and fish are small but there are plenty of them and very little pressure outside of a few hotspots. There some decent grouse hunting north of Spearfish as well. And there are enough lakes around to provide decent fishing for walleye, pike, bass, etc.
I think the Hills just offers a great variety of activities and amenities, there's something for everyone to do practically year round. I've lived and traveled all over the country and its one of my favorite areas. Here's an example of why,
Saturday morning I was fishing Spring creek up in the Hills with my son. This spot is 20 mins from my house in Rapid We were in a beautiful pine forest fishing a rocky creek. There were trout and chubs and frogs and crawfish. The birch were just starting to turn colors. We watched deer swim across the creek and feed on the shoreline. That afternoon we headed east of town to the prairie for a dove hunt. This spot is also only about 30 mins from my house. We didn't shoot a limit but there were enough birds to keep us interested and the we were out in the wide open plains and enjoyed an amazing sunset. Not many places in the country where you can get that kind of variety in the landscape and not have to fight crowds.
Sounds great Chops. I don’t care about getting large fish or even a lot of them. I am basically a fisherman that does it mostly for fun but keeps one or two for a nice dinner for my wife and I from time to time. I do not collect fish, save fish to give away, or fill my freezer with them. My dad and I often in the past have been able to catch all the redfish, sheepshead, and trout we could catch in the bays near Rockport Texas. But, generally after we caught a redfish or a couple of trout each assuming we were eating them soon we would just catch and release or go for a boat ride. I don’t condemn those that do, but never felt right about taking more than I could use in a reasonable time. Besides, that just made me want to go fishing again, which was fine by me. I loved trout fishing in the rivers of Colorado when I went to college there. I am guessing it is similar there. You can’t really beat fresh river trout. I probably wouldn’t bird hunt much mainly because I don’t really care for it much as a meal. I have never had grouse, so might enjoy that. I love to shoot though. Can’t do that much around here. Deer other than sausage or jerky isn’t my favorite either and more than likely wouldn’t take on such a job of preparing one today. I wouldn’t mind going for a hunting trip and helping someone spot them, but probably wouldn’t take one myself for these reasons. Thanks again for all your help. It seems like a trip to the black hills area is a must for many reasons. Now if next summer would roll around.
Any idea on the type of boat needed or even possible on any of the lakes around there? I thought I might just bring a small aluminum john boat type with a smaller motor on it. Or, is a non motorized setup better?
If you want world class Walleye fishing then Pierre or Chamberlain are the two places to explore. The downside for those areas may be the size of your boat. That reservoir is too windy and too large for a 14 ft aluminum boat. A 16 ft boat might be o k as long as the engine is big enough. [25horse or more].
I live south of Hot Springs and am happy with the area. Housing is inexpensive and there are a large number of retirees living here. As mentioned above, Lake Angustora has excellent Walleye fishing. Cold Brook has decent Trout fishing. The V A has a regional clinic in Hot Springs and we have a couple of grocery stores, an Ace hardware store as well as an assortment of resturants and other business's. Wind Cave National Park and Custer State Parks are a couple miles north of town. My wife and I visit both of them frequently to view the Buffalo, Deer, Antelope, Elk and other wildlife. Hot Springs is on the southern end of the "tourist" spots in the Black Hills, consequently the tourist traffic is lighter than in Custer or Sturgis.
Any idea on the type of boat needed or even possible on any of the lakes around there? I thought I might just bring a small aluminum john boat type with a smaller motor on it. Or, is a non motorized setup better?
You would probably be fine with a 16 ft v hull with a 25 hp on Orman on Angostura. I don't think I'd put anything smaller than an 18 footer on Oahe and a 20 ft would be better. You could probably make do with a 16 footer if you watched the weather and stuck to fishing in the summer.
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