Day 4 - Mount Rushmore and Black Hills

Monday was our most exciting day yet on the trip as we had a number of cool things planned. It was really tough to filter through all our pictures and get to a reasonable amount to share. We started out by going to Mount Rushmore. In typical Julia fashion she asked repeatedly how much longer we had until we saw the "People Mountain". Then as we were pulling into the parking area she asked when we were going to the pool. So at least one person was going to be disappointed. Later in the day when I was wearing down and the girls wanted to do a bunch of stuff at the campground Allyson said "hey they've been a good sport about doing all the stuff we wanted to do." That was a good reminder that it's easy to think for a moment that we are doing all this for them, but it's really for us.

Mount Rushmore was less than 10 minutes from our campground so the drive was super fast. We parked pretty quickly and started walking over to the main area. Almost immediately you could tell it was special. There were several entryways leading up to the monument. After the last entryway there were flags and placards for all the US territories. It was all really neat. Note: the kid that looks like she's just walking by in the picture below is our daughter Sam. She refused most pictures on this trip.

We spent 15-20 minutes just staring at the sculptures, which is a long time with five kids. I think even Sammy could tell it was special. Then we went down into the visitor center and checked that out. The girls have been working on Junior Ranger activities at the parks and they went through those here too. I have to note that I think the visitor center in Mount Rushmore is probably the best one I've been to. The content of the exhibits was great, the feel of it all, with all the granite buildings was really cool. Conveniently, the curators left out the part of us robbing the Sioux of the land Mount Rushmore is on, but maybe they didn't want to dampen the mood. It's possible that was mentioned somewhere in an exhibit I couldn't read while chasing our "Junior Rangers". Nonetheless, the whole experience exceeded all my expectations and I think it made a great impression on the girls.

After Mount Rushmore we headed into Custer State Park. While planning the trip I saw it was a 20 minute drive, but Google Maps was telling us 45 minutes. Allyson and I were getting concerned about how much driving we had been doing with the kids, and we actually almost considered not going into the park. What a mistake that would have been. The extra 25 minutes turned out to be because a herd of bison were taking over the road to the visitors center.

It was really amazing to watch them up close. They come up right alongside your car and go in between cars and then back and forth up the road. It was a lot of fun to see up close. One frustration with the bison viewing situation is that people become oddly infatuated with them. I mean, it was unique and a very special experience. But after about 15-20 minutes I’ve had my fill. I don’t need to see every bison, but apparently some people do. 25 minutes into the ordeal the guy two cars in front of us was hanging out the window still filming them. I mean if we were on an African safari and saw a pack of elephants I would probably watch them for hours. But bison aren’t that rare. And there’s only one road, so if the people around you want to watch bison all damn day then I guess you (and your fussy kids) are going to as well. We were stopped by the bison for about a half hour, and that seemed to be just about our limit so it worked out well.

Eventually we made it to the visitor center where we got out, moved around, and sorted out how to head out to Sylvan Lake along Needles Highway. Needles Highway is this stretch of road winding through the Black Hills. In all my reading before the trip I had never come across it. If it hadn’t been for our friend Dana suggesting we go there and Sylvan Lake we would’ve missed them both. Needles Highway is this 10-12 mile route with granite rocks that resemble needles. It starts as 7-8 miles of winding, slow driving roads, and then you get several miles of really amazing views, and some super narrow tunnels through the rocks. The only way I can describe it is spectacular. I could’ve killed a whole day pulling over to each overlook and taking it in.

Our last stop in the Black Hills was Sylvan Lake. It’s a lake nestled in amongst the rocks at an elevation of 6,145 feet, which made for some really beautiful views. Allyson and the girls got their feet wet which was fun to watch. We walked around for a while and then made our way back to the car. It was really neat, so a big thank you to Dana.

Back at our campground we took a short break and then went to the pool, which we’d been asked to do at least 50 times. We grabbed some pizza, hit up the playground, and then went back to the camper to head in for the night. It was a great day.

It’s really hard to overstate how amazing this whole area of South Dakota is. It’s an endless supply of fantastic historical and geological things to see. I would highly recommend coming here to anyone else.

Random Notes and thoughts from the day:

• I have been pretty shocked at Allyson’s reaction to bug bites. Now there were a bunch of bugs in Kennebec, South Dakota and we did get bitten. But Allyson reacts to a bug bite like it’s a gunshot wound. Then you have to hear about it for several days. I mean, we aren’t hardcore camping with the motorhome but we’ve gone on several dozen trips now and we do frequently encounter bugs.

• One of the playgrounds at our campground should be the model for how all playgrounds are done. It had closed off areas up top so kids couldn't fall out, and it had a cushy artificial grass surface under it. It was clean, felt safe, and the kids loved it.

• A decent amount of the visitor center at Mount Rushmore talks about the main designer's insistence on accuracy. I guess he was maniacal about it. Now I’m a fan of attention to detail, but it has to be practical. I’m pretty sure two of the people on that mountain died before photography was invented. So you are trying to be accurate to paintings. It just felt a little disjointed. And if Thomas Jefferson was around to see it he surely would not be happy about the size of his nose. I guarantee he would not have walked away from a painting back in the day with it including a honker like that.

• During the day I overheard Julia singing to Nolan. I asked her "what's that you're singing honey?" and she said she made up some lullabies for Nolan and sings them to him. Now, Julia isn't exactly the world's biggest sweetheart, so I was genuinely touched when I heard this. I asked if she would sing them for me and she said no because she makes up the words as she goes and she was shy, which was fine. Later I ended up overhearing some of her lyrics and they were really something. They included "we brought you to this family after we found you in the street" and "I'm going to shower you in a thousand gold coins". This kid is a wild one.

• I have no idea what the hell my kids do in their sleep, but this is why they can't sleep in Mom and Dad's bed:
  

As I write this we are already at our next stop in Estes Park. I'll share some more about the trip here in a later post. If you've made it this far thanks for reading!