Beauty in Stone

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Greetings from Rapid City, South Dakota! On Thursday we got an early start leaving West Yellowstone. We drove through the eastern part of the park, then through Cody, Wyoming, the rodeo capitol of the world. It was a long day on the road.....left at 6 am and arrived here at 5:30 pm. We went to downtown Rapid City for dinner at the Firehouse Brewery located, as you would expect, in the old firehouse. Great food.....Tom loved his buffalo brisket. We had our leftovers for lunch yesterday. On Main Street there are bronze statues of the presidents, which was fun to see. Yesterday, after attending to some necessary details, like laundry, we took off for the Mt. Rushmore area. We stopped first at the Crazy Horse memorial, a work in progress. The scale of this sculpture is incredible, dwarfing Mt. Rushmore. We saw a short film on the beginnings of the memorial, and even got to witness a blast. The sculptor's family is continuing the work that he began (he died ) using entirely private donations and entrance fees to the memorial. As you can see, the face is completed, and the focus is now on the horse's head. From there we headed to Mount Rushmore on a very scenic, albeit very narrow and winding road. We spent some time in the park, and then headed to a restaurant located in nearby Hill City for dinner. So, how much do you think that steak dinner cost? Would you believe $10.95, which also included an iceberg wedge with some yummy homemade ranch dressing (neither of us like ranch dressing, but this was so good). It's so funny that this place only serves one entree for dinner, but has a choice of at least a dozen desserts! See the one I selected......was called "Berry Delight", and it was the kind of dessert our mothers used to make. After dinner we headed back to Mount Rushmore for the evening program, which had a patriotic theme. It ended with the lighting of the sculpture, done slowly and subtly, and veterans and armed forces personnel assisting in the flag lowering. We both said that even though we've seen countless pictures of the sculpture, it has much more impact in person. I can't imagine anyone taking on such a seemingly overwhelming task as creating art out of a mountainside! It was almost 10 pm by the time we got back to the hotel. After breakfast today we headed to Badlands National Park. Neither of us was quite ready for how this magnificent landscape suddenly emerges from the prairie! For the past few days I've tried to imagine how forbidding much of this landscape must have seemed to the explorers and pioneers traveling along the Oregon Trail, and today was no exception. We had a mild day, with the temperature in the low 70's.....can only imagine how intense this landscape would be in the summer's heat. This area looked to us as if God had been making drip sand castles! He's quite a sculptor, too. On the drive back we stopped at another National Park, Minuteman Missile National Historic Site. For those of us who remember civil defense sirens and duck and cover drills, this brought back memories. Another full day of incredible sights. We've gone almost 2400 miles so far. Tomorrow we drive again, ending up in Council Bluffs, IA. Again, we enjoy your responses so much. Tom & Nancy

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Photos

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This bison was this closewalked right past my car window 1 foot away

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The lake was like glass-great reflection

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Buffalo Brisket-yummy