Race day started early and ended around 10:30 with lots of fun in between! Of course some of the fun was the race itself!!
While waiting for Camden to finish handing out medals, I ran into Bigfoot!
We were both hungry after the race, so we headed to Custer to get lunch. I wanted something with fries!
We had to stop to take pictures with my medal!
Another view of George Washington!
We then went down to Wind Cave National Park. We arrived at 1:30 and were able to get a tour for 3:30. While we were waiting, we walked around the prairie, thought about what Laura Ingalls' life would have been like, and did some sitting!
We finally got to go in the cave for our tour. This is a unique cave and very dry compared to most. Therefore there were no stalactites and stalagmites. There was boxwork....which is what this cave is known for.
After the bus tour, we had enough time to watch the video of the project, look in the museum, and then watch the light show.
Camden sitting Indian style in the teepee
The Natural Entrance to the Wind Cave
Wind Cave was found when two men heard wind blowing and found that it was blowing from a hole in the ground. Depending on the air pressure, sometimes the air blows out and other times it blows in. As stories go, one man's hat was sucked into the cave when they looked at it the second time! It was blowing out the day we were there. Fortunately, people made another entrance to the cave so we didn't have to squeeze in this hole!
Views of the prairie...not much there to be honest. Camden didn't want to know that people who lived on the prairie used buffalo chips to warm their homes!
More boxwork
We finished our tour and hurried to the Crazy Horse Memorial. We got there just in time to catch the last bus to the base of the mountain. The memorial was started 70 years ago and there is still a lot to do! Korczak Ziolkowski was asked by Native Americans to carve a memorial to their heritage that rivalled Mt Rushmore. He refused to take any government money because he thought it would be an insult to the Native Americans who had had so many promises broken. Therefore, it has taken a long time to get as much done as has been finished. His family is carrying on his legacy.
What the memorial will eventually look like.
The light show used the stone as a backdrop for a laser show that paid tribute to Native Americans
We were tired and hungry after our long day so we headed back to the Powder House Lodge to eat dinner. The waiter was very nice and gave any runners free ice cream for dessert!
One more full day of adventure in South Dakota....
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