Fall Break Trip to South Dakota, Day 3

We got up early to go to Mount Rushmore. It's not going anywhere, but we wanted to give ourselves plenty of time to see the mountain and do a couple of fun things in Keystone, the town adjacent to Mount Rushmore. 

Turns out, we needn't have gotten quite such an early start. Everything I thought we might do in Keystone, a chair lift ride to an alpine slide, ziplining, and downhill tubing were all closed for the season. They closed at the end of September and we are two weeks into October. Bummer!

However! The main attraction, Mount Rushmore, wasn't going anywhere and we were excited to see it. As you approach, you can see the mountain peeking through the trees as you drive the winding road towards the visitors center. Upon seeing it for the first time, Brandt said, "That's poggers!" 

"That IS poggers!" I agreed. It was so cool. I have seen pictures of Mount Rushmore, but they don't really do it justice. It's just amazing. It was chilly but sunny as we looked at the mountain. You approach the mountain along an Avenue of Flags, with all the state flags arrayed in alphabetical order. They create quite a dramatic approach. At the end of the Avenue of Flags, you arrive at the Grand View Terrace. It does provide quite a grand view. We viewed. From there, we walked the Presidential Trail, a .6 mile trail with access to viewing sites near the rocky slope below the faces. Lots of places to take photos! We passed the sculptor's studio which was not open (probably because it's October) and continued on the nature trail back to the visitors' center and gift shop. 

It was so impressive. It was a massive undertaking that took twelve years to complete and learning about how it was done was fascinating. I was just amazed and felt compelled to purchase things at the gift shop. Isn't that the best way to show one's appreciation?

Goofy picture of me and Brandt as I was trying to take a selfie.

Someone took pity on us and took our picture.

Since we couldn't ride the alpine slide, our next stop was to Crazy Horse Memorial, just a few miles away. Crazy Horse Memorial was the commissioned by Henry Standing Bear, a Lakota elder, and is meant to depict Crazy Horse on a horse. This is what it is supposed to look like when it is finished.

It's never going to be done. 

Construction began in 1948, nearly 75 years ago, and the only thing done so far is Crazy Horse's face. The carving is being funded privately, through donations and admissions. Twice the federal government offered money to see it to completion, but the offers were turned down. The same family has been involved in the sculpting for three generations, but it is a huge project that seems to be crawling along. His head was completed in 1998 and from what I can tell, little else of import has happened. I shouldn't judge because sculpting a mountain is ridiculously difficult, but I think they should take the government's money and get it done a bit quicker. At the rate they're going, it really never will be finished.

There is an interesting Native American Cultural Center at the site and we wandered around. You can take a bus up closer to the mountain, but it began raining quite heavily while we were there and being outside in the rain lacked appeal. 

A closeup I didn't take.

We left Crazy Horse and drove to Custer where we had lunch in a little restaurant. The food was quite tasty. Brandt and I both had bison burgers. We also stopped at Horatio's Ice Cream, an ice cream shop that sells house made ice cream in a building that was once a bank. You could still see the vault.

Patriot buffalo in Custer.

We drove back to Rapid City through the Black Hills, bisecting Custer State Park and along the beautiful and twisty Iron Mountain Road. It was about 3:00 in the afternoon when we got back to Rapid City and we decided to go see a movie. Of the limited choices, we opted for The Minions Movie. It was very silly.

We had some dinner then went back to the hotel to soak in the hot tub and watch some TV. We probably could have found some other things to do in town, but relaxing felt quite nice.