Day 2, Part 2

After a quick lunch and refuel for the cars we parted from grandma & grandpa and carried on with our action packed day. Somewhere in the heart of the Black Hills National Forest is Rushmore cave. It was dug out by prospectors looking for gold (there never was any), then re-discovered by teenagers as well as the rest of the small town. It was a thing in the 20's to go in and carve messages on the wall of this one room. Later, a geologist came and further explored resulting in the cave that is today. It is now a 1/2 mile guided hike down into the cave. This was fun. My second favorite part of the day. Jake loved it. Small, dark, confined spaces, right up his alley. If they would have let him, he would have gladly ventured through the lesser explored spaces and probably gotten lost. This would not have bothered him at all. I would like to note how much I LOVE my husband for carrying the baby through this cave.

Some of the 80 or so pictures

The drive and scenery were pretty
Entrance to the property
Going down into the cave
This man is wonderful.

The original entrance hole
Jake in his element


Near the top of the path, quite far up with not much for safety

Coming down
My Elle
A column ruined by human hands. It will not grow anymore.
'Ribbons'

The pig's face
Another unexplored hole

Climbing back out

This was really fun despite the sometimes steep stairs and super narrow paths. And for the record, clumbsy me didn't fall! I did, however, manage to hit my head on headache rock while looking behind me to tell people to be careful it was slippery. I love my husband. Even if he did laugh really hard at me.

Labor Day Weekend, Day 2 - Part 1

Day 2 was jam packed so I am breaking this up into 3 parts.

We started off the morning driving through Custer State Park. The road from Keystone to the park was nothing but winding roads and one-way tunnels (honk your horn before proceeding. What???) up one side of the mountain and down the other. Those who know me well are already laughing because they know that I am a very motion sick person. I actually did okay. A little queasy but mostly fascinated by the fact that many of the roads in this area had signs that said, "No winter road maintenace, road closed in winter, turn back". Am I the only one who finds this weird? And I survived 2 winters in AK! I don't recall them closing roads there. De'Etta did they do that in Eagle River?

Anyway, coming down the mountain you entered into the park and it was cool. This was my favorite part of the trip. Not only was the drive and the land just beautiful, but the animals were cool. Wild turkeys, buffalo, donkeys, mountain goats, all roaming free as they please and usually in the road. The park fee was a bit expensive and then there were no more animals once you got into the heart of the park. Had we known we may not have bothered going any further once we came off the mountain road, and just been happy with the animals we saw. Live and learn (Hint, hint, Holly and De'Etta).

Pictures of the morning;

A view from near the top of the pass
Can you see the 2 or 3 curvy sections below us?
Tatanka

Lots of tatanka
Beautiful creatures but lots of signs warning to stay in vehicle, dangerous, do not approach. I was happy to heed the warnings.
In the road
Donkeys in the road. Hi Elle!
Loved the babies!

These guys were not shy but, once they sniffed and realized we had no food, they would move on to the next car.
This one was my favorite. He stayed real close to mamma
Jake and burro
Bekah is not so sure about that thing sticking it's head in her car

Stay tuned for parts 2&3

Labor Day Weekend

So, we decided at the last minute to head to SD for Labor Day weekend. Ben's newly retired mother and her husband were road tripping from Cali across America and were going to be in Keystone, SD that weekend and we decided to crash their party as it were.

Day 1

We left at 0 dark 30 to make the 7 hour drive. There wasn't much to see on the drive across SD so it was a good thing that the kids slept most of the way. Farm land, corn, cows, and repeat. If the signs didn't say SD I would think that we were still in NE. Baby did well on the drive. She got a little cranky towards the end but, then again, we all were cranky after 7 hours.

So for the American history & geographically challenged, Keystone SD is the home of Mt. Rushmore. Yes, we drove 7 hours with 3 kids to see 4 dead presidents carved into a mountain. It was cool to see and the history we all learned was neat. Grandma arrived shortly after we did early afternoon so we headed to the park on the first day. Photos, photos, photos...

The view from our hotel
At the entrance to the park

The family (I got rid of the cast earlier in the week, like my new brace?)

And again, with Bekah looking
It is awesome to have someone else wearing baby!
This is my favorite shot. One, I didn't pose them, and two, I feel like I can see their minds just working as they stare at this amazing thing. Or maybe they are just bored and wondering how long we are all going to look at this mountian. Either way, I love it.
Self portrait (of course)

Okay, we were trying to get a shot to prove to Beks later that she was there

Duh, why don't we have her siblings hold her? Love this one too.
Learning the history of Lakota Sioux
Jake exploring a small, confined space. Shocker.
A close up view

Still there Daddy

The view from the trail that goes up to the mountain
I had to put one of the 20 pictures Ben took in B&W or sepia. I thought the view of God's creation was beautiful.
I'm not sure this was comfortable
"Mom, I was sleeping"


Quit taking pictures of the dead weight on my back

Back at the base of the mountainMountain goats
Beks having her first saltine cracker...
...and wearing most of it
A good day. The park had a museum and an artist studio to show us the how and why of the Mt. It was neat. The kids participated in the Jr ranger thing in the museum. They each got a booklit filled with activities and they had to search the museum to complete it. Fun and learning, amazing. Day one was long but good.