The Sertoma Butterfly and Marine House -- Butterfly Division

 We had a great chance to see the wonderful aquariums in the Sertoma Butterfly and Marine Cove house in Sioux Falls last time. However, now it is time to take a look at the star attractions -- the butterfly house.

 The Flight Room is about 3,600 square feet of tropical paradise and contains many, many tropical plants, flowers and of course, butterflies. Held at a constant 80 degrees, this is a perfect environment for the butterflies.

 There are thousands of butterflies tooling around as you stroll through the flight room on paved paths. They are literally everywhere and beautiful to see.

 Rick was not sure where to take pictures first, as there were many, many butterflies all vying for his attention. He did not know the names of these, but had a great time watching them.

 The butterflies arrive at the Sioux Falls location as chrysalises which were raised at butterfly hatcheries. These are grown and hatched in a special room (which we could view) and when they emerge, enter the flight room. 

 Butterflies from around the world are represented here and include locations such as Central and South America, Africa, Asia and Australia.

 It was amazing to sit on one of the benches, next to a small waterfall, and watch these beautiful creatures fly among the tropical foliage.

 Rick was surprised at the wide variety of color, shapes and sizes of the different butterflies as these two indicate.

 There were small and large butterflies and literally all colors of the rainbow.

 This fellow was hard to pin down for a picture, but eventually Rick was able to wait for him to light long enough to take this shot.

 Rick really liked this one. Not sure where it is from, but the colors were amazing.

 Finally, this one was one of the largest in the flight room and flew very rapidly and well.

The Butterfly House is a great place to visit to see both butterflies and aquarium dwellers. This is well worth a visit of a few hours when you are in the Sioux Falls area.

The Sioux Falls Sertoma Butterfly House and Marine Cove

Located in the city of Sioux Falls is a very unique attraction -- the Butterfly house and Marine Cove. This large building houses thousands of butterflies as well as a number of very large aquariums which makes up the "Marine Cove" portion. Rick thought the addition of the aquariums was a great idea since he used to keep large aquariums in years past.

 Rick started his visit at the aquariums, which were great. There was a wide variety of freshwater and marine aquarium displays featuring many wonderful fish.  These large Oscars were clearly the masters of their large tank. There were a few other fish in it, but they stayed well away from these guys!

 The next aquarium was a marine tank and featured these clown fish that seemed interested in checking me out while I was watching them.

 One of Rick's favorites is this yellow tang. A saltwater fish, this beautiful marine specimen comes from the Hawaiian and Indonesian reef areas. I really liked the related materials in the tanks, such as this coral which makes the Tang feel right at home.

 I enjoyed the way the tanks were mixed between freshwater and marine environments. After the coral reef tank and the tangs, we came upon this blue discus fish in a nice freshwater tank. As you can see, the tanks were in great condition and well maintained.

 Moving back to the marine tank environment, Rick spotted this fellow nestled into the coral. I am not sure of this species, but it is a colorful and interesting fish.

 The fish were great to watch, but Rick also enjoyed the interesting plants and corals in the tank. The plants and reef materials really set off the fish and help display them in a fashion similar to their native environment.

 There were even a number of anemones in the marine tanks. While these look like plants, they are actually predatory animals and wait for their prey to land on them. These are beautiful to look at, but can be dangerous to unwary fish and other small marine creatures.

The aquariums are great and Rick loved them, but wait until we get inside the butterfly area!

The National Music Museum -- Part 2

 The Music Museum at the University of South Dakota has two full floors of exhibits and we were delighted with what we found upstairs, beginning with this original foot pump organ.

 Upstairs, there is a wide variety of instruments, including a number of horns and brass instruments.

 There was also this harp guitar which was something we had never seen before. Apparently, this allowed (a skilled player!) to play harp music at the same time as they strummed the guitar. Apparently, it did not catch on.

 The harp guitar was not the only harp-related item. The harp zither is from 1920 and was made for a professional musician. I will bet it sounded great and wished we could have heard it.

 At the other end of the size spectrum is this square grand piano from 1891. This piano was given to a 14 year old girl who kept it in pristine condition her entire life and finally gifted it to the museum. The woodworking on this piano was amazing.

 Here is a very unique item - a double harp. Built in 1890, this is one of two known to exist with the other being in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. I will bet this was quite a challenge to play.

 Here is an early electrified keyboard from about 1900. This forerunner of today's electronic organ used electric motors, relays, and more. The components are huge and really gives one an idea as to the great progress that has been made.

 

 Here is another remarkable grand piano from 1864. As with the other instruments, this one is in spectacular condition.

 Of course, the brass instruments are well represented as this display from the famous Conn Instrument firm. In fact, we realized that our son learned to play on a Conn trombone. Pretty cool.

 The museum offers a wide variety of instruments -- including this "Sargent Pepper" trumpet from the Sargent Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club movie featuring the Bee Gees and many others.

 Finally, we saw these saxophones and thought back to when our daughter played the Sax. However, we did not know then that the Sax was developed by Adolphe Sax back in 1857. These original saxophones are the ones that created this popular instrument in the future.

We learned quite a bit during our visit to the museum and really enjoyed seeing the wide variety of rare instruments. This is well worth a trip.

The National Music Museum at the University of South Dakota - AMAZING!

We drove down to Vermilion, SD to take a look at the campus of the University of South Dakota and the National Music Museum located on the campus. The University is a nice sized campus of over 10,000 students and is likely not the place you would expect to find a true, world class museum. 

 However, this museum hosts one of the finest collections of musical instruments and related items in the world. Offering some 15,000 exhibits, the range of instruments is absolutely incredible.

 Housed in an original 1910 Carnegie Library building, the museum offers a great site to explore musical instruments you will see no where else.

 This is the Guitar annex and Orinda was startled at all the guitars and related instruments on display. There were many, many unique and custom instruments located here and it was fun to learn about the history of each one. Many of these are relatively recent in construction -- especially compared to many items in the rest of the museum.

 For example, this Grand Piano from 1815 provided not only piano music, but also bassoon, harp, bells and a base drum. Built and played in Vienna, this gives an idea of the top of the line home entertainment instrument 200 years ago. Notice the spectacular, original condition of this piece -- the woodworking was amazing.

 How about this 1808 organ from Pennsylvania? Used until 1941, this is one of the best preserved American organs remaining. This is a BIG instrument!

 Many years ago, Rick had a brief encounter with violin lessons (which were dropped to the relief of Rick and his instructor!). Anyway, Rick has been intrigued with the instrument ever since and these example are truly unique. The instrument facing us is in original (unrestored ) condition -- which does not seem to be a big deal until you realize if was built in 1792!

 Now the paint on this harpsichord is a bit cracked, but otherwise, the instrument is in excellent condition. In fact, even the paint is in good condition considering it was built in 1530! Think about it -- folks alive in Christopher Columbus's day listened to this very instrument. Wow!

 This was one of Rick's favorite violins. Built in 1613, this is one of three un-altered example of a Cremonese (the location of the builder) violins in the world.

Here are other violins from same period (early 1600's) and in superb condition. Rick thought these looked alot like his rental violin in 4th grade, but he did not think the museum would let him try to squeak out a rendition of "Mary Had a Little Lamb" on one of these!

This museum is one of the most amazing museums we have been in. It really gives one pause to look at an instrument that is close to 500 years old. This is well worth the trip if you are in eastern South Dakota. 

The Actual Sioux Falls in the City of Sioux Falls

One of our favorite stops while in Sioux Falls, South Dakota is at the real Sioux Falls which provides the name for the city. Located very close to downtown, the falls are now in a great park setting.

 The park provides an extensive walking area along the falls which allow you to see the falls from several different vantage points.

 The falls are on the Big Sioux River and pass through this extensive area of rose quartz rock. This sold rock is why the river falls though this area as it has withstood the erosion for centuries.

 Not surprisingly the falling water attracted interest from folks in the area who saw it as an opportunity to generate power for a grist mill and later, for electricity. In fact, just to the left of Orinda is an old turbine house that was used to power the flour mill built here.

This is the remains of the Queen Bee Flour Mill which was place in operation in 1881 and powered by the river. The mill was some 7 stories high and dominated the landscape here next to the river. 

This is the foundation for the large pipe that channeled water into the turbine house seen in the distance. The water dropped about 50 feet which was sufficient to provide about 800 hp for the operation of the mill. 

Here, Orinda provides a better view of the pipe support and gives an idea as to the size of the pipe and the distance that it ran to get to the flour mill. Unfortunately, the water volume was not sufficient to fully power the mill and it went bankrupt in 1883. The mill operated on and off for the next 40 years or so, but never fulfilled its hoped for production. 

This picture shows what the mill complex used to look like and gives an idea as to how the mill operated with the water feed pipe dropping into the turbine. The turbine was connected to a series of gears and shafts which then drove the mill. 

We are visiting in late summer and the water flow is at a low point, but it is still a beautiful place to visit as Rick and Orinda verify here.

The largest drop on the Falls is about 25', with a total drop of over 50'. At high water, the river expands well beyond the normal course seen here, and covers all the rock shown above. That is an impressive sight to see. 

 Orinda really enjoyed our visit to the Sioux Falls on this beautiful day. We are always surprised to find visitors to the area that have not heard of these great falls and would encourage anyone to pay them a visit.