Mt Rushmore and Caves

April 11th - 12th:

After spending a solid day inside catching up on sleep and sorting our gear, we ventured underground for some caving fun. First stop, Jewel Cave. The 3rd longest cave in the world. And secondly to Wind cave National Park, the 2nd longest cave in the world. Mexico only just took the record when 2 caves joined up 2 years ago.

We took a an elevator 30 stories underground to this adventure.

Not a dirty Cave, But well tracked with scaffolding. 

Included in the tour was a visit to a current active archeological dig site, this was the location of an old sink hole where Mammoths fell into an drowned.

The building itself was built around the perimeter of the sinkhole. The scientists believe they will continue to dig down another 160 feet.











 
Well preserved Mammoth Scull and tusks. 









Mount Rushmore after a long few days waiting around for the snowy roads to finally open again.

We were expecting Mt Rushmore to be just like every other National Park pull out or lookout that we have visited along the highway, until we arrived at this

3 Lanes of Traffic control pay stations and a Bus/RV lane. This is luxury.

Just when we thought we had seen it all. We drove up the hill to this, A multi level Parking facility.
Is this the Mall?

Mount Rushmore National Memorial

A view down the Main strip

Each Pole on this photo represents a state and when each of the states became a state of the US

Just after a heavy snow fall




























 

Crazy horse: 
We believe this is the Indian rip off on Mt Rushmore. 
It costs $27 per car to drive closer, thats $17 more than Rushmore and its not even finished. It will eventually be a warrior riding a horse. 

I pulled out my big Zoom Lens for this shot from a distance

Our Next few days will be spent driving to Minneapolis - Minnesota