Crazy Horse & Custer State Park

The uncompleted & probably never-to-be completed carving of Crazy Horse is about 17 miles from Mt. Rushmore in the Black Hills of SD.
Lakota Chief Henry Standing Bear commissioned the memorial to be sculpted by Korzcak Ziolowski in 1948. The monument is being carved out of Thunderhead Mountain , considered scared ground to some Native Americans. It does not come without much controversy - It is a not-for profit undertaking & even though the federal government offered Ziolowski $10 million, not just once, but twice, he refused to take it. Ziolowski died in 1982. His wife & their 10 children remain closely involved in the project.

This is a scale model of the completed momemorial carving.

To learn more about the Crazy Horse Memorial click on this link www.crazyhorsememorial.org/

Later that same day we went to Custer State Park & wildlife reserve. The park is South Dakota's first & largest state park, named after Lt. Colonel George Armstrong Custer. The park is over 71,000 acres of hilly terrain & is home to many wild animals including a herd of 1500 free roaming American Biscon.

As we drove through the park we saw pronghorn antelope & bison.

This lone buffalo was trapped, so-to-speak, outside the fence, unable to get to rest of the herd. He was making a moaning noise, kinda like crying... so sad. Liam just stared at him. I think he wanted to help him.

Further down the road we saw several prairie dog towns and ferro burros roaming the streets begging for food. These two stuck their heads in the back window & scared Liam half-to-death.




This poor couple was surrounded by burros, unable to escape.

We weren't going to let that happen to us - No way Jose!

Scout dog Tazzy spotted a couple of domestic Wheaten Terriers and a elk crossing!

On our way back to Rapid City I got this shot of Mt Rushmore through a break in the trees.

Don't forget, click on photos to enlarge.

Until next time...

Rush No More & Mt. Rushmore

Left my driver's license expire - OMG! So without a current license we can't get our new coach registered. And, OH Yeah!, our car registration is also due by the end of this month. Guess that means we're heading up to South Dakota where we have our mail forwarding address service. But first I have to get a new Social Security card - I left mine in Asheville. Nothing is ever easy.

We left Amarillo on the morning of September 26th, so we have only 2-days to get to Rapid City so we can get our SD driver's licenses... since mine has expired, I will probably have to take a written exam - Yuck! Better get studying.

We decided to go up through Colorado, into Wyoming & across to SD. We stayed in Fort Collins, CO, then pushed our way to Ellsworth AFB FamCamp in Box Elder on the evening of the 28th. That's just west of Rapid City.

State law requires that you must show proof of residency (a receipt to prove that you spent at least one night in SD). Got that now. Next, we stopped by America's Mailbox to make sure we had all our paper work completed. We only have one day left to get everything accomplished.

The next morning, the 29th, we went to the DMV. Surprise! Surprise! Some things are easy... I didn't have to take the written exam. I had my new SD license in less then 5 minutes. Joe , on the other hand, forgot to check if he had his SS card, which he didn't, so we had to go to the SS Administration to get an affidavit stating that he indeed has a SS #. Now we are both official residents of Rapid City, SD.

We rushed back to the America's Mailbox office before they closed - they needed copies of our driver's licenses & a check to cover the fees for both vehicle registrations. Thank goodness they will go to Pennington County office tomorrow morning to get our new plates. Now we can relax & do a little site seeing.

We went to the 9 o'clock history & light show at Mount Rushmore. It was great, but we knew we needed to come back during daylight to really take in the Majesty of the carvings.



The weather was mild & sunny, not at all what we expected at this time of the year. So we took full advantage of it & went back to Mount Rushmore. WOW! It is indeed spectacular.
Click on photos to enlarge.








Until next time...

Smooth Sailing

We did get to do a bit of site-seeing on our trip from Tucson back to Amarillo. This is the Agave Gulch RV Park where we spent our last night in Tucson. It's beautiful here.

We drove past the White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. As you can see, the sand is indeed pure white.

Tazzy was taking in the view & doing some critter watching. We both love the wider, softer passenger seat. I call it the "One and a Quarter Seat". Perfect for the two of us to sit side by side.

Look Taz!

Some prairie dogs!

They're so cute!

I know, I know -you would love to chase them, catch them & eat them.

Passing through Roswell was fun.

This town really likes playing up the whole alien thing.

Until next time...

Pick-up Trip

We left for Tucson on the 26th to pick up our new 40' RV, a 2005 Alfa Gold (site unseen). Joe drove the 750 miles in 2-day - Trust me that's a lot for him. Our plan was to take one day to move all of our belongings from the Tiffin into the the Alfa and take two more days to get back to Amarillo. Well, you guessed it, those best-laid plans didn't quite work out the way we wanted them to. After we did our initial walk-through of the Alfa, Joe found 16 items that needed to be fixed before he would sign the papers. We ended up staying 3 extra days waiting for everything to be replaced or corrected to Joe's satisfaction. And, because we didn't tow our car, we didn't have any transportation - We were stuck, all day long, every day, from 8am to 8pm, with the dogs in a tiny office. It was like torture - no food, no where to go, nothing to do, but sit & wait. And the weather was the hottest it had been in Tucson for over a decade. The asphalt temperature was 200 degrees. The dogs didn't want to walk on it & I didn't blame them. I have to say, they behaved incredible well under the circumstances. Joe, on the other hand, festered into a raging bull. He wanted to speak to the owner of Padata RV Sales, Mr. Padata himself. He had enough of watching the grease-monkeys (and I do mean grease-monkeys) traipsing through the Alfa covered from head to foot in a black oily filth. touching everything, standing on the beige leather chairs, & walking on the carpet without covering their shoes or putting down some sort of protection. We watched the carpet change from light gray to charcoal gray. Joe told them that we took pride in our Tiffin & presented it to them in great condition & he expected the same from them in regard to the Alfa. Needless to say, they were glad to see us leave when everything was finally taken care of. It has now been a month since we got back to Amarillo. The drive back was so quite & smooth -rather pleasurable. Now, after a thorough interior cleaning on my part, we are happy with our new motorcoach. By the way, they sold our Tiffin in under a week!

Toot'n Totum

We are all familiar with the gas station convenience store concept... depending on where you live there's Turkey Hill, Wawa, 7-Eleven, Circle K & Am-Pm. In Amarillo, the convenience stores are called Toot'n Totum. I've been told that in the beginning of there existence, you would drive your car into the parking lot, toot your horn and a clerk would come out to take your order. He would go back inside, gather your items and tote them out to your car, hence the name Toot'n Totum.

Also, as we all know, in Seattle there is a Starbucks on every corner. Here in Amarillo there is a Donut Stop on every corner & most of them have a drive-through window.

Tornado Alley

Well... little did we know that we set up camp in the notorious Tornado Alley.

We knew a storm was headed our way, but had no idea what to expect. The wind picked up a bit before we hit the sack at 11pm. An hour later, I woke up to sirens blaring nonstop. I looked out the window to see a lot of campers heading into the clubhouse. By this time the wind was blowing even harder & it started to rain... sideways. Liam was having one of his a panic attacks, so Joe stayed in the RV with the dogs while I ran across the street to find shelter. The sirens were still blaring. About 30 people were huddled inside watching the weather channel for storm updates. A tornado was headed in our direction. It started to hail... grape-sized hail! Shortly thereafter, the sirens stopped, the hail stopped, and the rain stopped, but the wind kept blowing. The tornado veered off to the east. We never did see it, except on TV. Just the way I like it.














Some pictures of the dramatic evening skies in Amarillo.

What's Up with that Black Bird

I've had several people visiting the RV Park ask me about the peculiar black birds with the tail that looks like a fan. What do I know? Turns out these noisy birds are called Great-Tailed Grackles. You see, their tails are as long as their bodies and they are indeed "'V" shaped so they do look like a fan. They have bright yellow eyes and they whistle... loudly!