The Arch

Here's the Arch as we drove by. We dead headed back home when we left the Badlands. We were ready to come home. We left on August 24th and came home on Sept. 24th. The Arch will have to be another trip.

Crazy Horse

This is what the monument will look like when it is finished.
The next pictures show where it is now. We don't think it will be finished in our lifetime.

Badlands 3

The land becomes level and there are canyons.
This is a Minuteman Missle site designated as a National Historic site.
Looking down into the silo.

These formations are called yellow mounds. They are the third type of formations.


This is the final formations. They went from this to canyons.

More Badlands

This area had different looking formations. There were lines through the formations.

Badlands National Park

This is what Badlands looked like at the beginning. It reminded me of the formations the kids made at the beach when they had wet sand and let it fall from their hands.

Wind Cave National Park SD

This was the original entrance to the cave. Wind Cave is a boxwork cave and has no stalagmites or stalagtites. There are very few boxwork caves in the world. There are over 100 miles that have been charted and they are still looking for more.











The wind coming out of the cave is quite strong. The sound was how it was first discovered. Alvin McDonald began exploring the cave in 1890. He had a candle and a ball of string. He kept a detailed journal of his explorations.

















This is the boxwork formation. The cave is 57 degrees and has no bats due to the low temperature.
I think I am going to call this the year of the caves. We went to two caves in TN and this one in SD.

Rock Formations in the Black Hills. We have seen so many kinds of formations which we don't see in the east. The next ones will be in the Badlands National Park.

Sept. 21,2008 Animals

There were bison were everywhere.
More pronghorns.
Mules. They come right up to the car and beg for food. We certainly have seen some different animals on this trip.

Mt. Rushmore

This was truly spectacular. John has now crossed it off of his bucket list. Did you ever notice that Lincoln does not have an ear? WWII was coming and they were running out of money. Borghum's son used the remaing money to smooth out the faces. He declared the project complete so that another person could not come later to finish Lincoln.

The stage below has a patriotic program every night, at the end they call up all service men. They retire the flag and ss they leave they say their name and branch of service. There were several WWII veterans the evening we were there.

As you leave the park you suddenly come upon this view. We had to stop and take this picture.
Mountain goats were given to the park by Canada and they escaped. They are not native to the area.

Ft. Laramie

Thought this sign was priceless.
The Fort Laramie Post was very active for 5 decades. It was on the Oregon Trail, the Mormon Pioneer Trail and the Pony Express. The fort was abandoned in 1890 and sold at auction. Many of the buildings were torn down by settlers and used to build their homes.
This was the Bachelors Officers Quarters.