Spring Break Road Trip: Mount Rushmore and back

I can't say I love road trips, I mean, being cooped in a car with two kids and an impatient man....not so fun, but I do love the idea of road trips. Leisurely driving to new places, stopping at the local mom & pop to sample some local cuisine, snapping photos of out of the way kitschy tourist stops, it's exciting to think about, right? So, off we set, to Mount Rushmore, slightly planned stops along the way. Except, the midwest can be a lonely place. Seriously, how do people in the Dakotas not go insane? At one point, when the road was getting icy and I thought we might have to burn our luggage for warmth should we careen off the road, I wondered about my sanity, and I'd only been in South Dakota for a few hours! Moving on...

The Black Hills of South Dakota...and nothing else.

Omaha Zoo

We set out Friday morning with Omaha as our first stop. Specifically, the Omaha Henry Doorly Zoo. You've been to a zoo, you know what to expect. The highlight was when I found out they sell animal art. As in, it's painted by the zoo animals. I love that stuff! I bought one done by a tiger. Awesome. Best souvenir of the trip. I really didn't see much in Omaha to get excited about. Maybe it has some hidden jewels?




The next day upon leaving Omaha is where my plans got changed. I had planned to just drive, and stop wherever fancy struck us. We did, once. At the National Music Museum on the University of South Dakota. It was a worthy stop. They had many instruments I'd never heard of, and great explanations of instruments that I had heard of, but didn't know how they worked. You can pick up a wonderfully informative free audio tour at the desk. It even includes videos of people (professors I assume) playing some of the instruments.

The international room.

After this, my husband, who I mentioned was impatient, wanted to 'get on down the road'. (He's not a wandering free spirit.) Which means drive all the way there. Which was all the way to Rapid City, our hotel near Rushmore. Which was just over 500 miles. Yikes. Really though, it was sensible because this year of never-ending winter was bringing more snow, and we didn't want to get stuck in some dinky roadside motel with nothing to do. But it also precluded anymore stops. Do you remember how I said the Dakotas are a lonely place? Turns out, there really weren't that many stops to be made. There were a few places (okay, just two) we could have stopped, but we didn't. Most of them were also many miles off the interstate. So, our ice covered (yes! covered!) car rolled into Rapid City late that night. I remember looking at the few cars we passed on that lonely interstate thinking "Wow, it must be really cold for there to be ice on the car and it's not even snowing.". It never crossed my mind that we might have ice too.

The next morning, we waited for the snow to melt, and it turned out to be a glorious day for being outside. First, we went to Mount Rushmore, of course.

Mount Rushmore: What more is there to say?

Someone had told my husband about another monument nearby so after finishing touring Rushmore, we drove up the road a few miles to Crazy Horse Memorial. This has quite a story. Native American monument, funded by private donations only - no government money accepted. The sculpture was created and worked on by one man, Korczak Ziolkowski, who also lived on site with his family till his death and is still worked on by 8 of his 10 children with a few more additional people. His wife also still lives on the grounds. I cannot describe how massively enormous this thing really is. In the picture, that hole under what will be his arm is 30 feet high.

When completed, Crazy Horse will be sitting on a horse and pointing.

As it turns out, most of the many, many other tourist things around Rapid City/Rushmore area are only open during the summery months of April to September. We were a few weeks too early to sight-see much. The only other thing we did in Rapid City was visit Blacks Hills Gold factory and take a tour. It was interesting, and since we came in the off-season, we had a private tour and were able to ask lots of questions! We left Rapid City and headed for Sioux Falls, South Dakota. The reason? The hotel with the indoor water park. On the way, we stopped at Wall Drug. Once you enter South Dakota, about every 10 miles along the interstate, there is a sign for Wall Drug. Of course we had to check this out. It really wasn't anything to write about, though they do have tasty self-serve coffee for 5 cents. They had some stuff out back the girls played around on.

riding a jackaloupe

We made it to Sioux Falls and just spent the next day letting the girls play in the pool park. It wasn't anything that fantastic, but it had a slide that was the most awesome thing they had ever seen at the pool. It was kind of fun to go swimming while it was snowing, again, outside. This was absolutely their favorite part of the trip, Dad included.

Daddy catching her after sliding.

Before we left Sioux Falls, I wanted to see Falls Park. It was beautiful covered with snow, but very cold. I had to walk around alone while they huddled in the car. I managed to convince them to get out for one picture.

I don't why the little one is making crazy face.

We did make one more stop on the way home, which I will write about in a separate post. Fun times, fun times!