Three stops today...all in South Dakota: Mount Rushmore, the Crazy Horse Memorial, and our sleeping destination - Deadwood.
You might have heard about the town from HBO...or that Wild Bill Hickock was killed here. I know it as a place with good steaks, a good bed, and a casino! Jim and I ate a great dinner, and then I decided to sit down and play a bit of blackjack. I put $60 on the table, knowing full well that I would lose it in a matter of at least half an hour. What I knew full well, though, turned out to be false. I played for about 45 minutes, and cashed out with $50. Good times cost me $10. I call that a win!
Mount Rushmore is actually pretty surreal. We've all seen pictures of it on TV and the inter-tubes...but to actually BE there was something else. It's easy to describe what it IS - four faces carved into the granite of the Black Hills - but it's something else. I'm not an overly patriotic person, but to stand there and see the mountain with my own eyes filled me with a sense of pride. It's really quite serene. You should go there someday.
The Crazy Horse memorial is a different story. I know about Crazy Horse - Indian, medicine man, etc. He was a hero to his people and all the American Indians of the time. He deserves recognition. However, that recognition doesn't need to be in the form of desecration of their sacred lands in the name of a big f***ing rock with his face carved in it. But what really bakes my noodle is that the project was started in the late '30s. It's now 2010, and all they have completed is the dude's face. Really? 80 years, and all you have to show for your work is a face? Way to honor the guy.
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