mt. rushmore

last night, we ended our day of driving in rapid city, south dakota.  before today i had been to 46 states, missing only the dakotas and the carolinas.  so i was able to cross another state off my list.  craig said he would take me to the carolinas, but i think north dakota will be hard.

i found a wonderful hotel in downtown rapid city that was built by alex johnson, an old railroad tycoon.  i also learned that this particular hotel has been featured on ghost hunters and has a reputation for being haunted.  i requested a room on the 8th floor, the haunted floor.  sam was really, really mad at me, and jake texted me one night asking me to turn off the light because he was too scared to get out off bed.  sam said he heard a female voice one night and jake said he felt a hand on his back pushing him down, but other than that, we didn't have any encounters.

our main reason for going to rapid city was to see this awesome national monument:

then we meandered over to the crazy horse monument.  they have been working on this monument for years and years, and only the head of the american indian leader has been finished.  they talked in a movie about the monument about how they refuse to take several million dollars from the u.s. government to help them, but i think they should take the money and finish the project.  it will not be finished in our lifetime.

this white statue is what the mountain will eventually look like:

rapid city was quaint and i'm glad i got to see it.  this alley next to our hotel is dubbed art alley.  it had a lot of really cool graffiti.

after taking a break in rapid city for an hour of walking around and shopping, we drove an hour to the badlands, a national park in south dakota.  it looked a lot like bryce to me.  it was hot, but definitely cool.