Mt Rushmore and More

Monday and Tuesday August 15 & 16, 2011

We are in Keystone, SD in a small campground called Kemp’s Camp.  A little challenging to get to because of narrow roads and hills.  Boy, been putting my little truckey to work now!  Had a climb out of Rapid City that required 3^rd at 4500 for a couple miles.  Put the tranny up to 220F, and the fans were howling, but we held 50+ mph.  This engine seems to be a winder.  I am very glad I put that 4.3 gear in it now!

After getting settled we went back into Rapid City, needed gas (big surprise!) and Keystone was close to 4 bucks, gotcha.  I needed a truck wash to get off all the grasshoppers from the Badlands.  Lynn even got smacked in the face as we were driving with the window down.  She freaked out! 

When I went to dump tanks in Interior, I discovered one of my tank valve handle and shaft loosened and fell off, so I went looking for an RV parts store, found a Heartland dealer, but they didn’t have the part.  The guy says, yeah we get a lot of requests for those, Dah! Maybe you should carry them!  And finally, Lynn’s watch needed a battery.

We then visited a museum about Gustov Borglum which was interesting.  That guy was a genius!  Have to remember its the 1920s when he started the Rushmore faces.  Besides an accomplished sculptor, he had to know the geology of the granite, engineering for the hoists, cables, and tools; and be project and labor manager.  I have often said that if you can leave your mark in some way that future folks will remember you, that would certainly give you a sense of accomplishment.  The museum was self guided with audio headsets.

We then attended the evening Mt. Rushmore program, which was OK but nothing that special.  Returned today to take in several Ranger led programs, and took a guzillion pictures.  A couple are shown below.

After driving the twisty scenic roads we headed to Hot Springs, a mammoth excavation site is there.  Apparently a wide swath of tropic seas covered an area north to south including the Badlands and Hot Springs.  The dumb mammoths would go into these muddy lake areas and then couldn’t get out.  The site contains many of the critters remains which they enclosed in a building.  The picture below is a mammoth head.

We are having a good time, couldn’t ask for nicer weather.  On toward Cody, Wy tomorrow.  We want to stop at Devils Tower so we need to get a really early start.