On Saturday morning, July 5, we woke up in the motel we didn’t want to stay in. As there was no continental breakfast, we drove into Custer and ate at the Cowboy Restaurant. It was decorated all around the room with deer heads and steer horns, and I teased the kids that we would be eating those animals for our breakfast. Then I noticed that there was also a large number of cowboy hats on the walls. Yikes!
After breakfast, we drove to the Presidents’ Campground to get our lodging arrangments straightened out. To their credit, they admitted their mistake in giving away our room, lowered their rates, and upgraded us to a nice cabin that sleeps 6. It is #18, the Thomas Jefferson cabin. I liked that, because my great-great-great-great-great grandfather was a friend and admirer of Thomas Jefferson. The campground has a big outdoor pool, a hot tub, a free miniature golf course, and an arcade with a "Star Trek: The Next Generation" pinball machine! We were all set! After we transferred all our stuff to our new cabin and did a little grocery shopping, we enjoyed the camp’s amenities in the early afternoon.
Around 3:00, we decided it was time to go to Mount Rushmore. We drove through Custer State Park and saw a big herd of “tatanka”. We drove a veeerrry windy, twisty road called the Iron Mountain Highway to Mount Rushmore. It was cool because there are small tunnels you drive through which are designed to perfectly frame Mount Rushmore as you come out of them. There are also sections of “pig tail bridges” which wind around so much that you go 270 degrees and end up driving under the bridge you just crossed. The kids enjoyed a scenic overlook where they could crawl around on the rocks that looked and felt like they were made out of iron. Here they are in a small tunnel of these iron rocks:
After breakfast, we drove to the Presidents’ Campground to get our lodging arrangments straightened out. To their credit, they admitted their mistake in giving away our room, lowered their rates, and upgraded us to a nice cabin that sleeps 6. It is #18, the Thomas Jefferson cabin. I liked that, because my great-great-great-great-great grandfather was a friend and admirer of Thomas Jefferson. The campground has a big outdoor pool, a hot tub, a free miniature golf course, and an arcade with a "Star Trek: The Next Generation" pinball machine! We were all set! After we transferred all our stuff to our new cabin and did a little grocery shopping, we enjoyed the camp’s amenities in the early afternoon.
Around 3:00, we decided it was time to go to Mount Rushmore. We drove through Custer State Park and saw a big herd of “tatanka”. We drove a veeerrry windy, twisty road called the Iron Mountain Highway to Mount Rushmore. It was cool because there are small tunnels you drive through which are designed to perfectly frame Mount Rushmore as you come out of them. There are also sections of “pig tail bridges” which wind around so much that you go 270 degrees and end up driving under the bridge you just crossed. The kids enjoyed a scenic overlook where they could crawl around on the rocks that looked and felt like they were made out of iron. Here they are in a small tunnel of these iron rocks:
We arrived at Mount Rushmore around 4:30 and promptly found the cafeteria. The food was good, but expensive. Debbie and I had chicken, Bethany pot roast, Daniel spaghetti, and Katherine had a buffet off all our plates.
Then we spent several hours exploring the Mount Rushmore area. We went down to the Visitor Center with its museum, 2 theaters and gift shop. Then we hiked the Presidential Trail around the base of Mount Rushmore. Very cool. We went to the main gift store and then got settled in our seats around 8:30 for the evening program which began at 9:00. It was very patriotic and stirring and culminated with the lighting of Mount Rushmore at 9:30. It included a film in which we saw many highlights of America we had seen earlier on this trip, such as the Arch and Old Faithful. Since the line for ice cream had been so long after supper, we took this opportunity to get some big cones and enjoy the night air and the lit-up sculptures. We had a contest of seeing what we could sculpt out of the ice cream on our cones. The people at the next table thought we were crazy! It was a little bit like encouraging our children to play with their food.
We returned to the campground (via a different route than the Iron Mountain Highway!) and arrived shortly after 11:00 and got settled for bed.
Still no Hawaii plate. We had figured that Mount Rushmore was our last best chance to get this plate. Will we ever find it??
2 comments:
Hi -
It sounds like so much fun. And I think seeing some Mexican and Canadian plates could make up for the Hawaii one...don't you???
Love,
Patti, Adam, and Addison
PS - We are glad you made it home safely, but we'd still love to hear about the rest of your adventure! :-)
All right, I recognize foreshadowing when I read it. Of course, you found Hawaii! But please keep blogging. We want to see more pictures, too. Glad you're home safely and we'll see you soon!
Love, Judy and the gang
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