Monuments, Museums, and Mammals

In Nebraska, we headed to Alliance to see another famous landmark on the Oregon Trail.  This one was Chimney Rock. It is quite tall and could be seen for a ways before we reached it. We went to the Visitor's Center and saw displays about the Oregon and California Trails, and looked at the rock. We found out that the Indians called it Elk Penis.  It was the white pioneers coming through who gave it its current name.

Our next stop was Carhenge.  It was an interesting display of old cars in the shape of stonehenge.

Next we went to Dobby's Frontier Town in Alliance.  This was old buildings from the town put together to represent how the town looked way back when it was first begun.  There were several buildings, and it was fun exploring them. There was a funeral parlor, a dentist office, a house, a garage, and even a saloon with sawdust on the floor and a bordello upstairs!

 We left that corner of Nebraska and headed north to South Dakota.  Our first experience in this state was at Custer State Park.  It is a beautiful, huge, forested, and grassland park.  It is in the Black Hills, and is full of wildlife.  We saw lots of buffalo, elk, wild turkey, white tailed deer, mule deer, prong horn antelope, big horn sheep, and lots of birds. 

The next morning we visited the Crazy Horse Memorial.  It was a little disappointing.  The memorial itself is a great beginning, but nothing has been done since the original sculptor died years ago, except to build many buildings of displays.

Next, we visited Mount Rushmore National Memorial.  This was really exciting after having heard about it so much.

We then drove into Keystone to see the National Presidential Wax Museum.  I really liked this.  They had all the Presidents from Washington to Obama, and told a little bit about each one.

From there we went to Rapid City to see the Journey Museum.  This was a really fun hands on museum.  It started with a dark room full of stars and progressed through the ages from the dinosaurs to the cowboys. 

The next day we drove past many signs leading to famous Wall Drug store.  It is now a huge complex. 

Our next destination was Badlands National Park.  Throughout the park are various areas that look like the surface of the moon, tall cathedral spires, beautifully colored cliffs, and prairie grassland. We saw lots of buffalo, big horn sheep, and prairie dogs. We decided to spend the weekend here,camped in a prairie area of the park. There are buffalo wandering through our campsite at various times!