South Dakota

After leaving Denver we headed north to see Mount Rushmore. On the way, we had to check out Carhenge, a replica of Stonehenge made from old cars.  It was a hot dry drive,  but it was fun to see the car sculptures, fish, and dinosaur as well. They had all 50 states license plates  in their gift shop, but I told Emily she can

Only count Hawaii on her car state check off.  She is in the lead,  with 5 states left to see.

We arrived at Mount Rushmore in the evening but still with plenty of light.  We were just barely able to sneak into the sculptures studio just before closing time at 7 to see the 1:12 model of Mount Rushmore and read up about the history of the artist and the sculpture itself.  Did you know George Washington was supposed to be wearing a jacket?  The rock proved to be unstable enough to do his original design.

Our hotel for the night was in Rapid City, and it had a wonderful indoor waterpark.  One of the water slides had a giant funnel.  Josh and I went on that one only once together and of course I ended up going backwards in the dark tunnel.  I was really afraid Josh went flying through the air when we landed,  but he said he was ok, thank you life jacket!!  We really enjoyed playing there in the morning before we headed to Wall Drug's, bison burger, yummy homemade donuts,  free ice water, mining for fossils and gemstones, before we drove through  Badlands National Park.  The views of the rocks were truly amazing.