Crazy Horse & Mt. Rushmore

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8 years ago we came thru this area on our way to Mt. Rushmore passing the Crazy Horse sculpture. We didn’t stop because we did not want to spend too much extra money but did take photos from the road. Since that time we learned that the Crazy Horse Memorial is only being made thru private donations. Also because we were spending time with American Indian issues we thought it would be a good time to visit.

Crazy Horse is a very short drive from Custer although driving an RV adds to the time for us. I think it takes about 1 hour with an RV.

The memorial is well organized with lots of RV and auto parking. We paid $25 which is the price for a car load of people. After parking visitors enter into a Visitor Center to watch a film on the building of the memorial and then enter a very large museum. Many people have made donations of historic items filling several large rooms. It is really collection overload.

From the museum, people go onto a patio where the models of the monument are located. Everyone takes a photo of the model with the actual sculpture in the background; well I didn’t but others did. We wanted to go out to the actual monument but there is a charge of $4 or $5/ person to ride a bus to the base and $125/person to go up on the arm. We didn’t feel like paying so much more so we just looked from the patio.

I should mention that the exhibits also include a couple of rooms of the home of the sculpture and a peek into his workshop.

Mt. Rushmore is only another hour away so worth a visit. When we arrived at Mt. Rushmore it was starting to rain so we went into the Visitor’s Center 1st, but we needed to collect the Jr. Ranger info anyway.

It continued to rain and mist but we enjoyed the visitor’s center, learning about the area. We would go out on occasion, when the clouds would lift, for a look and photo or two. We were lucky though, the rain stopped and we were able to do some walks before leaving. A longer walk is available that goes to the sculpture studio and then back to either the visitor’s center or the parking lot. The walk is considered more strenuous but we didn’t think that it was so bad and very scenic.

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