2009 07 03 Mount Rushmore Independence Day Celebration, Keystone, SD

We couldn't think of a more perfect location to see a fireworks display than the Independence Day celebration at Mount Rushmore National Monument.

A few days ago we made a visit to the park to scope out our perfect viewing spot. This morning, at 4:30 a.m., we started packing our picnic basket. Food and drink, cameras, blankets, pillows, lawn chairs, umbrellas, rain suits - planning for anything Mother Nature might throw at us.

We lined up on the highway at 6:00 a.m. Now mind you - the fireworks don't start until 9:25 p.m. You know where I'm going. Traffic was already stopped at the edge of the town of Keystone and the Monument is another 2 miles up the mountain. We put the car in park and shut off the engine. A real sense of community emerges - and after a while we visited with other folks who were doing the same. We got the camera and snapped a picture of the traffic on the highway and of the Monument. After an hour or so the line moves a bit - to within a mile or so of the park. At 7:15 we're finally inching our way in. The early start will hopefully get us a parking spot inside the park and allow us to get our prime viewing spot.

Yes! We were lucky - one of the cubby holes outside the museum is free! Once we were set up all we had to do was sit, and wait, and eat. It was fun to see all the people and watch how they coped with kids, each other and the rain! The park quickly filled to capacity. Everyone has their own style of coping with the rain. And rain it did - throughout the entire day.

Around 6:30 pm the skies started to clear and we enjoyed a B-1 Bomber fly-over from Ellsworth AFB. The Park Service program honored the Native American Code Talkers of WWII, we enjoyed Native American dance and music. Vets, teachers, moms and dads, grandmas and grandpas were honored too. But everyone really was there to see some fireworks and at 6:30 we felt sure we were home free.

It was not to be. On the horizon clouds started to build. In 30 minutes we were completely fogged in. There was some discussion the event would be cancelled. We crossed our fingers and hoped for the best. At 9:15 a test firework was fired. You could hear the bang and the foggy sky lit up a rosey pink - sort of like a grand nite lite. The Master of Ceremonies asked if we thought they should go ahead with the program - Of course! Heck! we've been here all day and night. Also, if it's not held tonight it won't happen again until next July 3rd! You see the National Park Service won't compete with the local celebrations of the towns and communities surrounding the monument. Yep! the fireworks were a go! As heavy fog enveloped the entire mountain we were able to enjoy an intersting display of colored fog - accompanied by loud booms! It wasn't the grand display we were hoping for, andit was somewhat anti-climactic. Too bad - so sad. There is always next year.

When it was all over we grabbed our stuff and made our way to the car for the 2 hour wait to leave the parking garage. It was well after midnight when we got back to the bus - exhausted and sleepy. Oh well - you can't win 'em all.

2009 07 02 Hail! Hail!

Throughout the day we were surrounded by an ominous weather system. Dark clouds were on the horizon and in the rear view mirror as we toured the area. We managed to be either ahead or behind the system all day, but as we made our way back to Rapid City from Sturgis, Deadwood, Lead and Silver City we noticed that fog was setting in as we drove up the mountain. The higher we climbed, the more dense the fog became. I glanced along the side of the road and noticed some white stuff. The further we went the thicker and heavier it got. I mentioned to Joe that it looked like snow. Then you could make out that it was piles of hail. We just missed a pretty intense hail storm of nickel size hail. You could see that the mountain sides were covered, the ground around the trees was covered, and the sides of the road were covered. I can only imagine if you were on a bike how that must have felt. Ouch! People were stopping along to take pictures. We consider ourselves lucky - what our car might look like if we'd been in the middle of that. We were lucky we missed that bit of action.

2007 07 02 Sturgis, South Dakota

If you're a fan of motorcycles, you've certainly heard of Sturgis, South Dakota. This is Mecca if you're a biker. We drove from Rapid City through the meadows and mountains to Nemo and on to Sturgis. Of course we bought biker t-shirts for the Justin and Peyton, and a Buffalo Chip t-shirt for Joe. After lunch at Rosco's (a burger of course) it was on to Deadwood - the infamous town where Wild Bill Cody was gunned down during a card game. Places of an historic nature are well marked, however gambling and tourist shops are the norm. Tours of old gold mines and wild west sets offering old-time photos, souveneir shops filled with paper weights, key chains, coffee mugs and t-shirts. What we enjoyed most was the beautiful scenery. South on Hwy 385 to Silver City back to Rapid City. Another great drive to take in the area.

2009 07 01 Iron Mountain Road Drive

There is a fantastic drive from Custer State Park taking the Wildlife Loop and Hwy 16a north on Iron Mountain Road. The road is narrow and winds through meadows and mountains, traveling through some of the most scenic areas of the park. The meadows and forest are home to Bison, Elk, Prong Horn Sheep, Prairie Dogs, Eagle, Hawk and numerous other birds native to the region. The road travels through bridges that have been cut through the rocks. Traffic is limited since bridges and tunnels and hair-pin curves just won't allow for large trucks and RVs. As you make your way around sharp curves along the sides of the mountain you witness the incredible views of Mount Rushmore from great distances. Trees have been cut to frame the Monument, making a fabulous, picturesque view of the Monument. This is a very special place that is not to be missed.

2009 07 01 Custer State Park and Wind Cave National Park

Weather in the region has been fantastic - mid 80s - a refreshing change from the triple digit temps we endured in Dallas. This area has had a lot of precipitation, and the prairies are an artists palate of green. Wildflowers abound and complete the landscape - yellow clusters of sweet cover next to long stretches of prairie meadow, patches of plants with clusters of tiny blue blossoms atop whispy stems cap another hill, then stretches of white daisies dance in the soft breeze.

When we visited the region a number of years ago it was very hot, extremely arid. The prairie were completely brown. Today the landscape is a thousand shades of green - soft and velvety - in perfect contrast to the rugged beauty of granite and limestone. Morning in this place is very tranquil. Even though it's high season you feel as if the entire park is your private Shangrila.

We spent the morning driving south to visit Custer State Park and Wind Cave National Park, just outside Pringle. The National Park Service offers guided walks that educate visitors about park management, ecology and wildlife. It's interesting stuff - the flora and fauna of the region. It is also breathtaking to see great herds of bison. These creatures are so majestic. It is hard to imagine that over 40 million once roamed our country. And then there are the prairie dogs. They are so curious, peeping out of their dens, chirping your presence to the village.

After our hike with the ranger we explored an amazing and complex underground world with a tour of Wind Cave through the Natural entrance. Wind Cave is particularly interesting because it offers an unusual and abundant formation of boxwork, rarely found elsewhere. The cave also has white, snow-like formations referred to as popcorn, frostwork or moon-milk. With over 131 miles of explored passages it is the 4th longest cave in the world. Almost all of the passages lie beneath a square mile area of land, making Wind Cave one of the most complex caves in the world. The natural opening to the cave was found by a local hunter, Alvin MacDonald, who was tracking an animal he had shot. In a small ravine he noticed the grass moving. As he bent down to investigate, wind escaping from the cavern blew his hat off. Soon Alvin started bringing his friends to the entrance to show them his "Hat Trick". Next he was crawling through the small natural opening, documenting each exploration in great detail in his diaries. In 1903Wind Cave National Park was set aside as the eighth national park in the US and the first created to protect a cave.

06 30 2009 Crazy Horse Monument

The Crazy Horse Memorial honors the North American Indian and is so much more than a mountain carving.

Crazy Horse was born on Rapid Creek in the Black Hills of South Dakota in about 1842. While at Fort Robinson, Nebraska, under a flag of truce, he was stabbed in the back by an American Soldier and died September 6, 1877 (about age 35(?))

Crazy horse defended his people and their way of life in the only manner he knew, but only after he saw the Treat of 1868 broken. The Treaty, signed by the President of the United States, said, in effect: As long as rivers run and grass grows and trees bear leaves, Paha Sapa - the Black Hills of Dakota - will forever be the sacred land of the Sioux Indians. Only after he saw his leader, Conquering Bear, exterminated by treachery. Only after he saw the failure of the government agents to bring required treaty guarantees, such as meat, clothing, tents and necessities for existence which they were to receive for having given up their lands and gone to live on the reservations. Only after he saw his peoples' lives and their way of life ravaged and destroyed. Crazy Horse was never known to have signed a treaty or tuched the pen.

Crazy Horse, as far as the scale model is concerned, is to be carved not so much as a likeness, but more as a memorial to the spirit of Crazy Horse - to his people.

With his left hand thrown out pointing in answer to the derisive question asked by a white man, "Where are your lands now?" he replied, "My lands are where my dead lie buried."

Sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski was a completely self-taught sculptor. He never took a formal lesson in art, sculpture, architecture or engineering. He arrived in the Black Hills in 1939 to help Gutzon Borglum on Mount Rushmore.

Almost 70 years ago, Lakota (Sioux) Chief Henry Standing Bear asked Korczak to create a monument of Crazy Horse in their sacred Black Hills. Standing Bear read reports of Korczak's artistic achievements and invited him to create a mountain tribute. Chief Standing Bear wrote "My fellow chiefs and I would like the white man to know the red man has great heroes, too."


Following the completion of Mount Rushmore, Korczak served his country in Europe in World War II. After the war he returned to the Black hills to tackle the mountain.

He started with chisels and hammers, doing back breaking work by hand. The first blast on the mountain was June 3, 1948. Korczak's wife, Ruth, was by his side every step of the way. She was 18 years younger than he, but embraced his dream. She took care of 10 children, five girls and five boys, the visitors, a dairy, a sawmill and Korczak. Following his death at age 74 in 1982, Ruth took on Korczak's monumental task of making the dream come true. She is supported by an enthusiastic staff, business-savvy board of birectors of the nonprofit foundation and a growing international group of members of the Grass Roots Club. Seven of their children help to continue and expand on their father's work. The other three children live within fiv emiles of the Memorial. Ruth still lives in the home Korczak built in 1947 and works 7 days a week keeping all aspects of the Memorial going. At age 82 her love for her work keeps her happy and she is grateful to begin each new day.

The Monument is funded by visitor fees and generous donations. No Federal money has ever been accepted and will never be accepted!

Workers hope to have the head of the horse completed within the next seven years, and the entire sculpture, in the round, should be complete within the next 40 years!

2009 06 30 Mt. Rushmore

It's been almost 10 years since we last visited Mt. Rushmore. The Monument continues to amaze us - what a tremendous work of art!

We are staying in Rapid City this week and plan to observe the annual fireworks display at the Monument. Should be a really neat way to celebrate the Fourth!