Day 18 Mount Rushmore

We started our day by traveling into the Badlands of South Dakota.  These rolling hills are appropriately named and we enjoyed watching the landscape change.  At the  “wall” of the Badlands is a community called Wall and a store called Wall Drug.  Famous for its free ice water and 5 cent coffee, we had to stop and see just how tacky it was.  And we were not disappointed!

                                                          

 

Our next stop was the highlight of this first leg of our journey.  Mount Rushmore is a National Monument in the Black Hills of South Dakota.  It is a majestic sight!  Completed in 1941, it was meant to be a reminder to the world of the history of the United States and the four Presidents responsible for its “foundation, preservation, and continental expansion”.  

Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt, and Lincoln’s heads are 60 feet tall each and set high atop the Mount called Rushmore.  We were thrilled to be able to take a short walk closer to the statues.  And the Visitor Centre is an impressive display of the methods used by Gutzon Borglum to sculpt the monument and the life of the men who carved into the mountain.

 

 The landscape of this area is also breathtaking with its “needles”, outcroppings, and  wildlife.  The Black Hills get their name from the bark of the Ponderosa Pine trees that cover this region.   

Unfortunately, the last five years have seen the destruction of many acres of trees by the Mountain Pine Beetle.