Rain, Fog, And Rock - But That's How We Roll.

If you're listening along with us - Kelsey's theme song for Denver was "Rocky Mountain High" by John Denver. Not only are the Rockies located by Denver, but it's the "Mile High City" and John Denver wrote it - you can't get much more significant than that! Way to go sis.

So after leaving Denver, we made our way through the wide open and spacious Wyoming which to be honest, after you lose sight of the Rocky Mountain skyline, there's pretty much just open fields and rolling hills. For hours. But, after about a few hundred miles on the road and about six hours in our compact Kia rent-a-car, we made it into South Dakota and headed toward the Crazy Horse Memorial monument and park. However, it was pouring rain and you could barely see 100 feet in front of you due to heavy fog and dark clouds. This was of course problematic for our tour guide of Crazy Horse and the Black Hills (Dad), but after a bit of coaxing from mom, we decided to go ahead and pay the admission fee to get into the attraction and at least check out the museum while we were there anyways. Turns out, after about a 20 minute informational movie all about the history of Crazy Horse, his significance to the Lakota people and how the Native Americans in the region found the Black Hills to be a sacred place (thus the same reason the monument is located there) the sky opened up and the storm blew over and blue skies painted a backdrop behind the over 550+ foot tall mega-monument.

Now, I won't bore you with all the extra historical jargon about how the whole monument came into works and began, but let me just let you know that the project started in 1948 by a single sculptor with a hammer and chisel and now over 60 years later, only the full face of Crazy Horse, is completed other than creating the appropriate tunnel through the center of the mountain and outlining the statue itself. What's wild about this landmark is the fact that it's built "in the round" or as a 360 degree project out of the mountain rather than a partial snapshot of Crazy Horse (like Mt. Rushmore is only one-sided). Last fun fact: the architect that began the Crazy Horse project, Korczak Ziolkowski was an apprentice sculptor to Gutzon Borglum who was the chief sculptor of Mt. Rushmore.

So after we got our family photos, toured the National Native American museum, and got reassembled in the car we turned the wheel toward Mt. Rushmore, another staple icon of America. Turns out the two monuments are only 15 minutes apart, so the drive up the mountain wasn't too bad except for the fact that you guessed it - it decided to rain heavily on us again. However, perseverance is a great American quality and our family is no exception, so we trucked on up to the top and got our parking pass into the heart of the Black Hills National Forest. We strolled up the nicely polished pathways to the observation deck to see the four friendly faces of America's presidents past. Mom, our tour guide for Mt. Rushmore informed us that each of the presidents (Washington, Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, & Jefferson) each stand for different American Ideals (The birth of a nation, preservation, development, & growth - respectively). Therefore we got the essential family photo, sibling shots, parent pics, and Kelsey and I spent about 15 minutes trying to capture an image of us picking the noses of the presidents. We're such patriotic folk. Needless to say, despite the fog and rain that came and went, we did get some great shots.

Following the Mt. Rushmore excursion we saddled back up in our compact Kia and headed down Iron Mountain, which is a road leading through the Black Hills National Park and supposed to be a harbor for great wildlife and scenery. Dad took us down the mountain on hairpin turns, past some grazing deer (that's about all the wildlife we saw), and through some tiny one-lane tunnels. Then, after getting to the bottom of Iron Mountain, we decided to go back up through the tunnels another time, because Dad read somewhere that the engineers that created the roads along the mountainside designed the tunnels to face a certain way, so that you can actually see Mt. Rushmore through the tunnel as you drive through. Well now we were on a mission to find one of America's most recognizable landmarks, through the vantage point of a tunnel located on a mountain (crazy? yes. don't ask.) Anyways, despite this daunting task (and fog - that is a killer adversary when you're looking for a landmark) we actually came upon our final tunnel and there she was - Mt. Rushmore in all her glory shining like a beacon back-lit upon a South Dakota sunset. PS: if this is too cheesy and poorly patriotic, you can just skip a few lines down. Anyhow, Dad and I spent about twenty minutes trying to figure out a way to get the best picture of Mt. Rushmore through the one-lane tunnel as we made a few passes through it from each direction. I also got out of the car and continually configured the camera to get the right light, all while trying to dodge mountainside traffic that came through and impeded our view. But, this is an adventure right? So we took the necessary risks.

After that eventful evening, we made the trek 30 minutes north to Rapid City, South Dakota. Rapid City is a nice-sized city, probably about 65,000 people or so and was quite clean and well-put together. Kelsey voted for Italian food, since we'd pretty much lived our life the past few days off left over pizza and fast-food, and we tried every local Italian joint in Rapid City (we drove all over the place 2-3 times) but all of them were closed on Sunday nights, so we had to settle for the Olive Garden franchise to settle our Italian craving. After eating way too much, we found our Super 8 motel, posted the blog and passed out. Day 3's goal was head to the grand and exciting little town of "Wall, South Dakota" where Wall Drug Store was created. I'm pretty sure that's a tourist trap, but more details then!

PS: Here are the Theme Songs for our attractions lately:
Mt. Rushmore: "Rockin' in the USA" ~John Cougar Mellencamp;
Crazy Horse: "Let's go Crazy" ~Prince
Black Hills: "Black Rock" ~O.A.R.

~Josh