Road Trip Day Two...

We woke up at the Days Inn Sidney ready to face another day of driving! With one exception, a special detour we decided to take! The night before we left Dallas, we had a discussion about visiting Mt. Rushmore. It was too far from our originally planned first stop, Denver. What we realized was that it was only three hours further if we drove from Dallas. We stopped in Sidney because it was within a four hour drive of Rushmore. Good thing we stopped in Sidney too because there is zilch between Sidney and Keystone, SD (the nearest town to Mt. Rushmore).

We ate breakfast at the motel. Malted waffles! Yum! Don't ask me the difference between a malted waffle and a regular waffle because I don't know. What I do know is that the waffle was tasty!

We finally hit the road to Rushmore. This particular road passes through a lot of territory where those searching for gold bullion in the Black Hills during the 18000s passed. Apparently you can still see wagonwheel ruts in some areas. Don't know if I believe that or not, we weren't looking for any so I can't bear witness to that. We also passed through several historic trails: Oregon Trail, Lewis and Clark Trail, etc. You can also see Devil's Tower (we didn't, a certain person in our party was on a mission to Rushmore) and Car Henge (the US's version of StoneHenge) on this highway.

We did stop at a cute little gas station where a huge, friendly golden retriever lived to ask for directions. Our computer's air card couldn't get a signal out there in the middle of nowhere. Luckily, they had free maps for tourists of the area.

Finally, we made it to Mount Rushmore and we were just in awe! It's out in the middle of nowhere -- and has a huge parking garage discreetly tucked in front of it! You can definitely tell that it has tons of visitors and the National Park Service really takes care of it. Hubs says it was cool, but smaller than he would have expected. It is carved into the portion of the top of a mountain – he was expecting the entire backside of a mountain to be the faces. He says he probably didn't pay attention much to pictures he'd seen before because if he had, he would have known the faces didn’t encompass the entire side of a mountain.

The monument was jam packed this day! It was July 4th and it was totally cool to be there on this day! Tons of people were wearing red, white and blue and it just gave me a sense of pride for being an American. This is definitely the coolest experience I've ever had on the 4th! There's even a fireworks show there, but we didn't get to stick around for it.

There's a quick trail you can take to get up closer to the faces, and that was quite a sight! Mostly, you just get the chance to look up their noses! And you realize that their pupils are just rocks, a few of them cone shaped. Seriously though, it's really amazing how smooth their skin is and how intricate the details are up close, like Roosevelt's glasses. Hard to believe a lot the work was done with dynamite. We used Hub's binoculars (which became his constant companion on this trip) to check out the the features.

We left Rushmore and headed to Dubois, WY where we had reservations for the night at a bed and breakfast. We asked multiple people for directions since our air card still wouldn't pick up a signal, we were parked illegaly and had yet another run in with the law. We also saw lots of fire danger signs as we drove through several national forests...Smoky the Bear was doing his best to prevent forest fires. On the way to Dubois, we stopped in Shoshone, WY at a place called A&W Lanes. It was a combination burger joint (A&W) with eight bowling lanes! The lanes had the neon cosmic space theme. We had dinner here since everything in Dubois closes early.

Next post: Dubois, WY to Grand Teton and Yellowstone.


It was hot, hot, hot! Walking to the Grandview Terrace through all the state flags.


All the granite in this area had a beautiful silver sheen. Wonder how much this would be for countertops?


Us and the presidents. A woman from Louisiana practically laid on the ground to take this picture for us! Her entire family was decked out in red, white and blue and it was super adorable! We later ran into them at a pizza parlor!


He's so strong! The man can move mountains! Which is good because I have a tendancy to make mountains out of mole hills.


George's profile. Could you imagine the size of the dollar bill that this thing would fit on?


Pretty flowers at the gas station.


Old truck with a snow plow attached.


Dr. Denali, slightly like Dr. Pepper...not as good as the original.


The boys from the Grandview Terrace.


Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt and Lincoln (which I finally memorized on this trip).


Wyoming! The land of gorgeous lush mountain sides and desert-like bad lands. Oh, and make sure you get gas at every opportunity in WY or you will be stuck!


There was a snow storm about a month prior to our trip, and this little piece had not melted yet! It was totally cool to be in snow wearing shorts and flip flops...for a few seconds at least. Snow is cold even if the air temperature is in the 80s! This was on our drive through the Big Horn mountains which are incredibly beautiful. This particular area is called Powder Pass. Hmm, wonder why?


God's handiwork! Incredible, isn't it? Too bad my camera didn't do it justice. Snowcapped mountains, tree line and beautiful wild flowers! Plus, the fences in WY are really neat.


This cow was making a break for it as we were driving through Nebraska.


We've arrived!