Yesterday we got up at 6 am, which I think was 5 am back at home, the timezone I'm still in. It was early for the road too, we only saw a few cars over the next hour. Plenty of animals though: moose (10's of them), a few mule deer, maybe an elk or two, a herd of cows, a pen of horses and later in the day some antelope. These were all on top of the Big Horn Mountains, around 9000 ft. It was pretty flat, so the edges of the mountains are the really interesting parts.
Soon we headed down the side, and saw few more of those ancient stones that make these mountains so interesting to me. See a picture down below.
We headed for Mt. Rushmore, stopping in Gillette, WY for breakfast at Lula Belle's Cafe. When we got to Mt. Rushmore, I wasn't too excited about it. We had passed through Keystone, the biggest tourist trap we'd seen yet. On top of that, the people were doing there tourist thing at Mt. Rushmore, and jingoistic things kind of put me in a foul mood. It was really crowded too. Soon it was threatening rain- we heard thunder overhead. The crowds disappeared once the first drops fell. At first the rain was light, which was okay, but when it really picked up, we sought shelter in the sculptors studio. I started to notice more of an openness in the crowd- they weren't all aloof. I didn't really think about it then.
The rain let up and we continued back toward the car. Soon it picked up again and were forced to seek shelter in the information center. It was really coming down! Hail and cats and dogs! We waited it out for about half an hour before getting impatient. "Just five more minutes, and then we make a break for it" we said. It didn't let up, so we ran. We got soaked! I felt one of the pea sized hails smack my thumb. We dried out eventually.
The rest of the day, briefly: Badlands and South Dakota Prairie.
Here is our route for Monday:
View Larger Map
Here are some pictures:
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| road trippin' 2008 August 11 |
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