Day 3 of Labor Day trip

The next day we would not venture more than 40 miles from our hotel but we still managed to have a full day, not getting back until just about dark.  After breakfast we headed towards Mt. Rushmore, trying to beat the crowds.  We knew the place must get really filled up based on the fact that they have two - five story parking garages.  We don't think we've ever been to a National Park with a parking garage.  Besides the parking garages we were immediately greeted by a Mt. Rushmore soda machine.  We thought that was a nice touch but it didn't make us any thirstier. 

We did manage to beat the worst of the crowds but there were still quite a few people there.  We actually rented an audio tour guide so we could get the story behind some of what we were seeing. The last time we were here, maybe ten years ago, it was raining and we were pretty much in and out. This time the weather was beautiful.  We took the time to get a closer look at monument by walking the Presidential Trail which is a loop trail that gets you up closer to the base of the mountain.  We noticed that the majority of the visitors to the monument do not do this and stay back near the entrance.  We were able to get some unique shots of the monument by taking this extra little walk.

 

Some of the crowds we were able to avoid

After Rushmore we headed to Crazy Horse Memorial.  Crazy Horse Memorial is a memorial slowly being carved out of the mountain.  When completed it will be depict Crazy Horse, an Oglala Lakota warrior, riding a horse and pointing into the distance. The memorial has been under construction since 1948 and is being built using only private funds.  When complete the final dimensions will be 641 feet wide and 563 feet high. By comparison, the heads of the four U.S. Presidents at Mount Rushmore are each 60 feet high.  The monument has been in progress since 1948 and is far from completion.  We had visited about 10 years ago and we do not remember much difference in what we saw then and what we saw now but we will have to look at pictures when we get home.  We decided that we will likely probably not live to see the completion of the monument.

What the completed monument should look like..some day.

After leaving Crazy Horse we started making our way around the park, ultimately heading to the Wildlife loop and the Iron Mountain Road.  Our route took us on the Needles Highway, which in many places we had no idea how they cut it out of the rock.  There are several places where there is only a very narrowly cut tunnel tall enough maybe for a small box truck at most and not much wider than a single car.  We were really in no hurry and we gladly took our time enjoying the scenery.  We also pulled off the main road for a quick side trip up Coolidge Mountain which gave us some beautiful views of the surrounding parks and Mt. Rushmore and Crazy Horse far off in the distance.

Our next stop was the wildlife loop, which is simply a looping drive around Custer State Park where there is known to be good chances of wildlife sightings.  We had hoped to see buffalo and for a long time we didn't see any.  Instead we saw more prairie dogs, tons of pronghorn deer, and a bunch of burros, or what we called begging donkeys.  The burros are actually decedents of the herd of burros that used to carry visitors up to the top of one of the mountains.  The rides were discontinued and the burros were released into the park and today their descendants are a popular attraction.  Today they pretty much beg every passing car for food.  We were prepared with apples which they happily gobbled up. Once our apples were gone it was pretty hard to get the donkeys away from the car, they just wanted more. We drove down just about every side dirt road looking for animals and besides the deer we only got some really nice scenery.  Finally, after a few miles we stopped at a ranger station to inquire about where the buffalo might be and the woman inside told us to keep going, about 5 miles up the road they'd be everywhere.  So we headed up the road and sure enough, we ran into quite a few buffalo.  They were walking right down the road towards our car (and other cars) creating something of a traffic jam.  These animals are quite huge and very much intimidating.  Even though we were in our mini-van we still did not feel completely safe, almost as if they could charge our car and do some serious damage if they only chose to.  We later learned that when settlers first started moving west there were millions of buffalo and the scene was described as "the plains were black and appeared to be in motion"; there were that many buffalo! 

Pretty drive...we had the place to ourselves

After our buffalo fix we started making our way back to Rapid City.  We chose to take the Iron Mountain Road back towards Mt. Rushmore.  Definitely not a shortcut, the road is famous for its scenic, one-lane tunnels aligned to frame the faces on Mount Rushmore and its looping "pigtail bridges" where the road passes under itself as it twists down the mountain.  The tunnels were really cool as they were built to intentionally give the traveler a view of Rushmore as you exited the tunnel.  We stopped at a few places along the way for pictures and to stretch our legs before making our final push towards the hotel back in Rapid City.