What's worse then looking up a President's nose! Looking up 4 President's noses

Drove to Mount Rushmore to see the four President's faces carved in granite. I thought it was a great sight and I realise the huge difficulty in carving these faces on the side of a cliff...BUT....all my life I had the impression that they were huge and in reality they were only 60 feet tall. Now....I know if you are suspended from a rope with a hammer and a chisel, bashing away into a sheer cliff carving out cheeks and noses and eyes etc you would think 60 feet is plenty. It's just I thought they were bigger. I did enjoy seeing the setting for Cary Grant's movie "North by Northwest"....one of my favourite movies.

Next we drove to a similar site where they are carving out the face of Crazy Horse. This is a work in progress and was very imposing. Loved the tourist centre on site which has an incredibly detailed history of the Indians and I am embarrassed to say history and the movies have changed a few facts into fiction.

On to a town called Keystone - beautiful little place - where we went down a gold mine. This is one off the bucket list for me as I am claustrophobic and I actually went through the hour tour (200 ft down) with only a couple of OMG's followed by a quick WTF. Once again very intresting. Took them almost 30 years to drill this mine and really didn't get a lot out of it. Seems every time things looked promising someone would jump in and buy the claim right next door so they couldn't proceed. :(

Then we drove to Hot Springs (still in South Dakota)...Lonely Planet gave this town a good write up but I wonder exactly what Planet they were on!! Scrappy little place....ugly in places...biggest and best buildings are the old folks home, the courthouse and the jail. We did have a very nice filet mignon in a nasty looking place - only cost $8.95.  Have back tracked 5 miles now and in the KOA RV park just out of town.

Total miles today only 145.4 (233 kms)  Bugs #526