Lawrence County Courthouse, Deadwood, SD.

10:50 am Sunday, September 23, 2007

Aaaaah, another week has slipped by me and now, today is our final day in Denver, CO. My last posting brought you to our stopover in Sundance, WY—a quickie to visit a buffalo jump and Devil’s Tower—both worth seeing. So far, the weather we have experienced has been iffy; some really hot days but a lot more windy, overcast and cool ones. We are “Happy Campers” as long as it doesn’t blow too hard (as it did last Monday when we decided to sit tight in Scottsbluff, NE and wait it out for one more day which was a good decision).

When we left Sundance, we traveled east on another short hop (97 miles) to Rapid City, SD. We stayed in a very nice (although a bit off the beaten path) Coast to Coast park named Hart Ranch. Our little Lone Ranger was indispensable because even running to town for a bite to eat was a 20-mile round trip and the little fellow gets pretty good gas mileage. With our reasonable C to C rates ($10/night inc. cable TV) and Penny the Pace’s gas guzzling behind (bless her little pea-pickin’ heart) parked for a week it was actually a nice break for the budget.

You might remember we spent one week in Rapid City back in June of 2005 while traveling with our friends, Gloria and Les and Ardella and Don. When we realized how close we were while at Buffalo, we decided to go back and spend some time in the vicinity again. Back in 1990, Phil and I were in the area while on our “genealogy jaunt” to Iowa so this was our third visit and it did not disappoint. South Dakota has a treasure in this part of the state and there is no doubt it was just as awe-inspiring as I remembered from former trips.

Please excuse the blue hue to some of these photos. Somehow, we bumped a setting that we did not catch until we viewed the pictures taken when we arrived home. Obviously, the learning curve on our new camera continues to taunt the operators.

America's "Shrine of Democracy."

"A monument's dimensions should be determined by the importance to civilization of the events commemorated. We are not here trying to carve an epic, portray a moonlight scene, or write a sonnet; neither are we dealing with mystery or tragedy, but rather the constructive and dramatic moments or crises in our amazing history." Gutzon Borglum

Did You Know? Mount Rushmore is named after a New York City Attorney? Charles E. Rushmore was sent out to this area in 1884 to check legal titles on properties. On his way back to Pine Camp he asked Bill Challis the name of this mountain. Bill replied, "Never had a name but from now on we'll call it Rushmore."

Here we are again! I feel so grateful to be able to revisit this wonderful tribute to our nation.

Welcome back Joy and Phil!

Phil caught a quick picture of this splendid example of a White Tail buck. Look at his rack!

One lone bull beside the road munching away. They are oblivious to traffic and/or gawking tourists. Such magnificent animals. We are so happy they have been saved from extinction.

The yearly round-up of buffalo (aka bison) is not due to start until October so we are not quite sure what this bunch of cowboys/girls along with a park ranger were doing except moving the herd away from the road. Bummer!

The buffalo herd moving away from the road.

Head 'em up and move 'em out!

Most of the cowboys appeared to be civilians ... volunteers maybe? What fun!

Traffic slow down while the resident donkeys beg for treats.

Isn't this the sweetest face?

Prairie Dogs and Pronghorn antelope. Both common sights in the park.

12:50 pm Monday, September 17, 2007

Our next stop after we left Buffalo was Sundance, WY for two nights. It was a short travel day but we wanted to do some sightseeing on the way to Rapid City, SD. The buffalo jump was very interesting. I had anticipated a high cliff with a huge bowl at the bottom so it was a surprise when we drove up to this very small area.

Pronghorn antelope, wild turkeys and white tail deer were so plentiful on our travels that Phil nearly drove off the road many times as the sightings were around every corner. But we really got excited when he caught movement out of the corner of his eye across a large expanse of prairie. We turned around and drove back and using the binoculars, we found it was a large red fox jumping from prairie dog, rabbit or ground squirrel hole to hole (we have no idea which one) looking for his dinner. We watched him for 15 minutes and he was still working hard without success.

The next day the weather was not cooperating when we drove to Devil’s Tower but when we arrived the clouds lifted and cleared enough to get a pretty good picture. This monolith is a formidable piece of rock but the wind, rain and cold made closer examination too uncomfortable so we drove away with the lament, “I guess we will just have to come back!”

This white tailed doe and her adorable, spotted twin fawns were very curious about us. They are a common sight both in and out of towns in Wyoming and Montana.

This is one of the ridges known as a buffalo jump. Once they had horses, the Native American's would stampede a portion of the huge buffalo herds crossing the prairie over the edge of this hole where they would fall to their death. Other warriors would surround the bottom and move in to kill the animals that did not die from the fall. Almost every bit of the buffalo was used by the indians but the 20 layers of bones found to date indicate this site was used for many years. The "dig" is locked up with a heavy metal door after Labor Day so we didn't get to see the actually excavation site.

Okay ....

Ingenious donation receptacle.

Information sign at Devils Tower.