Out West 2016 - Day 5

May 31, 2016 (Tuesday)

Custer State Park

Custer State Park was $20 for a week long pass. True to the map, we saw all the animals indicated in the areas shown on the map! The free-roaming bison (buffalo) were awesome – they crossed the road right in front of the car!  There were a lot of little ones for our viewing enjoyment! It took us about two hours to drive thru the loop road.

The new Visitor Center recently opened and it was great!  There was a large variety of interactive displays and a lovely film showing different aspects of the park. 

Wind Cave National Park  "boxwork"

Our next stop was the Wind Cave National Park, which is the sixth longest cave in the world! There are 140 miles of discovered corridors covered with crystals. We were lucky enough to nab the last four tickets for the next available tour. We opted for the Natural Entrance tour ($12/adult). The tour took about an hour and 15 minutes and had us trekking about 3/4 of a mile. There were 300 stairs, most of which that went down (classified as moderately strenuous).  The Wind Cave is unique as it is one of the few caves that has “boxwork”. Boxwork looks like paper-thin intersecting veins which form box shape. There are many other cave tours available at this site. The cave temperature is 53 degrees year-round.

Needles Highway view

Once we left the cave site we drove to Mount Rushmore via the Needles Highway – some awesome views!

We found ourselves at Mount Rushmore in the late afternoon.  2016 is the 75^th anniversary of the Borglum’s masterpiece!  During the early 1920’s South Dakota Historian Doane Robinson envisioned the granite spires of the Needles to have Old West heroes. In the mid 1920’s the state reached out to Gutzon Borglum to carve the granite. Borglum thought that four presidents better represented 150 years of American history and would be more appropriate subjects for carving. Borglum also let it be known that the Needles were too fragile for carving.  By 1927, the final location for the carvings was determined. It took 14 years and 400 workers to complete the work. It really was awe inspiring to see the rocks up close and personal, much more spectacular than expected.  The video at the visitor center was excellent.  There is a parking fee at the site $11. We were told that once the loan for construction of the parking decks are paid off the fee will be removed. Interesting fact: Jefferson was originally supposed to be on Washington’s right side, but the rock was unstable. If you look close you can kind of tell that there was a head supposed to be there!

Mount Rushmore

It would have been nice to check out the back side of Mount Rushmore, but we kind of forgot about it when we were leaving and we were getting tired out. We did remember to get the Thomas Jefferson’s original recipe vanilla ice cream before leaving!  President Jefferson is credited with bringing the first written recipe for ice cream to the United States back in 1780! A large bowl was $6, a little expensive but it was yummy! 

Back near the hotel (Best Western Buffalo Ridge Inn) we had dinner at a place that my sister had recommended – Buglin’ Bull Restaurant and Sports Bar in Custer.  Most of us had to buffalo burger – not too impressed – it was overcooked and did not have much flavor.