Back to my recent South Dakota trip! On our first day in Rapid City, we went to Mt. Rushmore, and then the Mammoth Site in Hot Spring.

Rushmore was really impressive to visit – pictures don’t really do it justice. But here are some of mine anyway 🙂

You start seeing the monument right as you are walking into the visitor center gateway. As you enter, there are information centers, gift shops, and interpretive centers. Then you go down a walkway lined with flags from all the US states, and then there you are. In addition to just looking at it, there are also hikes, the sculptor’s studio that has the sculptor’s working model and other items. We did do a hike that gets you closer to the monument, though you are still pretty far away, and went to the sculptor’s studio. Later on in the week we came back for the evening lighting ceremony.

That was a very moving event, though right as the lights went on, a massive thunder and lightning rainstorm burst right over us, and everyone ran for cover, and then our cars. But at least now we have a story to tell!

After we went to Mt. Rushmore on the first day, we went to the Mammoth Site in Hot Springs, around an hour south of Rushmore. If you are at all interested in fossils or prehistoric times, I highly recommend this site! The location was once a sinkhole that became a watering hole for mammoths and other creatures who would fall in and then not be able to get out. Over thousands of years the skeletons piled up and eventually ground filled the sinkhole. in 1974, the land owner was leveling the ground to build a housing development when he started seeing bones. And it developed from there. There is a large building over the dig, which is ongoing.

Of course, if you are not interested in any of those things, feel free to give it a miss.

Next travel post will be about Devil’s Tower and some hokum I talked my husband into detouring to see!