Search This Blog

Monday, August 20, 2018

Back to South Dakota

Aloha Everyone,

The two of us are back in South Dakota to take care of the annual registration requirements for Honu. J.J. also needs to renew his driver’s license which may be done 180 days prior your birthday. To avoid a winter visit to South Dakota (middle of March is still winter around here), we are planning to extend our stay. We have driven 120,000 miles in Honu and there are some repair, maintenance and upgrades that will also require us to remain in one place for awhile.


Jeff asked me how well-versed I am about South Dakota. For example, can I sing the state song, do I know the state bird, state fish, state animal, state flower, state tree? Well to be truthful, I really don’t know much about South Dakota. So in the next two blogs, I will try to share the results of my research on South Dakota.


1). South Dakota, known as  “The Mount Rushmore State,” is 16th in size among the 50 states.

2). South Dakota has 77,123 sq. miles which averages just 10 people per sq. mile. 

3). Because of Great Lakes of Missouri River, South Dakota has more miles of shoreline than Florida.

4). Origin of state name is based on the Sioux Indian word, dakhota meaning “friend”.

5). State animal is coyote.

6). State bird is Chinese ring-necked pheasant.

7). State fish is Walleye.

8). State insect is Honeybees.

9). State flower is American Pasque.

10). State sport is rodeo.

(Source: Travel and vacation guide publications, plus https://statesymbolsusa.org/symbol-official-item/south-dakota/

Aloha -- Cathi