Day 10: The Black Hills (South Dakota)

With so much to see here in the Black Hills of South Dakota, we fell a little behind on the blog...

We left Wall in the morning and drove West on I-90 toward Rapid City. The scenery changed quickly from flat prairie to the dark-colored jagged mountain rocks that are known as the Black Hills.

After taking a windy road with tunnels through the mountains we arrived early at our camp site. Later in the afternoon we disconnected the camper from the truck and set out to see some sights.

First, Crazy Horse. This is a monument that is being carved into a mountain to commemorate Crazy Horse, a famous Indian leader. It has been under construction since 1948 and is not even close to being finished. So far only the head is recognizable.

A very impressive visitor center has been built at the base of the monument, which among other things includes this model depicting how the monument will look when it is finally completed. (Sorry Ron, we didn't get to try the Bison Chile you recommended here since the timing didn't work out!)

Next, and very close by, Mount Rushmore.

We planned our visit so we could attend the evening lighting ceremony, a daily 9 PM ritual. Mount Rushmore was very impressive and the whole experience was very well done. We parked in a mountainside parking garage and then walked up a granite walkway containing flags of all the states toward a large ampitheater facing the memorial.

At 9 PM, the ceremony started with a video highlighting the significance of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Teddy Roosevelt and why they were selected to be included in the monument. Washington represented the birth of the nation, Jefferson represented the expansion of the nation across the continent, Lincoln represented the preservation of the union, and Roosevelt represented industrial development and natural conservation.

At the end of the video, the entire audience sang the national anthem as the spotlights facing the monument were slowly turned on.

The park ranger than asked anyone who had served in the military to come forward and participate in the flag lowering ceremony. All in all, a very cool and patriotic experience.

With that, we called it a night and returned to our campground for the night. Tomorrow we'd be checking out some of the caves in the area.

View from the side as we drove home.

Random Fact of the Day: Thomas Jefferson came up with the first ice cream recipe in America and at Mount Rushmore there was an ice cream shop where you could buy Thomas Jefferson's vanilla ice cream. We tried it - pretty good!