SOUTH DAKOTA & MT RUSHMORE

We drove to South Dakota to see Mount Rushmore

Curtis and the family is very Patriotic and

it just seemed we needed to go see this monument.

It was soo worth it and the kids really thought it was amazing.

This is the view from the back

which is cool to see Washington sticking so far off the mountain.

This is entering the Monument.

It doesn't seem as big up close.

Until you drive far away and you can still see it.

Then you grasp how huge it is.

We took the walking audio tour.

The kids loved hearing the stories of how it was built
and why those 4 were chosen.

We stayed for the lighting ceremony.

It was so amazing.

They did a full military lowering of the flag.

They had all the veterans come down on the stage.

We watched a video talking about why we fight for freedom.

It was one of the most Amazing things we have ever been too.

Then they lit up Mt Rushmore!

I wish I could have gotten a better picture of it lit up.

It is pretty COOL!

CRAZY HORSE

The day we went to Crazy Horse it was raining and foggy

We could still see it but no work was being done due to the fog.

It was still huge and Amazing!

TRAIN

We got up and took the train from Keystone to another small town.

It took you threw the mountains.

It was an hour there and a hour back.

BEAR WORLD

We drove through Bear World which the kids loved.

Dad didn't cause it costs a fortune!

It was worth it though.

This was the only wolf out.

The others were sleeping in the tall grass

and hard to get a picture of.

This was funny the big horned sheep.

Sleeping in the food crate

There were sooo many bears.
We showed up right at the right time.
A big truck with the bed of the truck filled
with hamburger and hot dog buns.
The bears all came together to eat
and fight over the food.


These two huge bears were fighting right by our car.
Like Curtis could reach out and touch them.
Yes I was freaking OUT!!!

Then we had to go to the baby area.
You could walk through this and it was super cute.


Baby sleeping fox!

All the pictures of the baby bears turned out blurry :(

Stupid camera!

KEYSTONE

We stayed in the little town of Keystone.

It was pretty cool.

Had tons of things for the kids to do.

They had gold panning, a train, a alpine slide,

wax museum, and lots more.

This was a guy from the Wild West Show.

We didn't go to the show but he was like 8 feet tall

and they boys wanted their picture taken with him.

Of course Conner still wants to play.

This was at dinner and we were goofing off.
All acting goofy!

Coltin wearing a turban!

CUSTER STATE PARK

We got up Saturday and drove through Custer State Park!

On the way to it there were some pretty Amazing things!

They has these tunnels you drove through

and when you drove threw them you could see Mt. Rushmore

in the distance!

I was pretty Amazing!!!

When you are up close to Mt. Rushmore

it doesn't seem so big, but

when you are far away it looks massive!

Love this picture!

(Tender!!)

The home of the Buffalo and Donkeys!

(Donkeys? I know right!)

Just like in Yellowstone.

The Buffalo thought they owned the place!

Cute Babies!

These mountains were called the Cathedrals.

More cool tunnels

This was Needles Mountain

Then there was Donkeys!

We weren't going to get out due to signs

that said don't feed the donkeys.

Then some people ahead of us got out.

So since we follow the crowd we got out.

The kids loved this.

One of there favorite things of the trip!

We found out they really really liked Cheetos!!!

This is the donkeys climbing in our car to get some chips!

WIND CAVE NATIONAL PARK

We barely made it to Wind Cave National Park

before it closed.

We booked the last tour of the day.

It kind of sucked because

we didn't get to go into the visiting center.

This is the original opening of the cave.

A 14 year old boy found this opening ages ago.

He used it to play in.

Then some other guys found it and started exploring.

There is over 136 miles of passages.

Crazy!

This cave also has the most speleothems formations in the world.
It was really creepy looking.

We didn't see the sign til we were leaving!

After this we headed home :(