BIG SKY COUNTRY....WYOMING AND SOUTH DAKOTA

Leaving Yellowstone National Park, we were almost immediately in the Bighorn National Forest filled with mountains, canyons, valleys, and picturesque rivers. Here we encountered our first tunnel of the trip, which was unusual considering all the mountains we had traveled around or over.

We visited the Crazy Horse Memorial and were astounded at the magnitude of this memorial both in sheer size and the scope of the dream. The following plaque explains the project, which is funded solely by private funds and donations. This is a fitting memorial that demonstrates the importance of America's Indian heritage. The sculpture pictured below is what the mountain will look like when completed. It is noted that this memorial will dwarf in size Mount Rushmore.

The following photos were taken at the Mount Rushmore Memorial. There a walkway exhibiting a flag of each state. We snapped a photo of the Tennessee flag.

After viewing the Black Hills and the Rapid City area, we headed East skirting the Badlands and stopped at Wall Drug Store in Wall, South Dakota. 

We also stopped at the Corn Palace (used as a convention center) in Mitchell, S.D. The building is decorated by using colored corn kernels that are replaced with new designs each year.

Jessie, this is for you! We ended our day by spending the night in Omaha, Nebraska. On to Fayetteville, Arkansas.

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK...WOW, WOW, WOW!

We thought the Grand Canyon would be the highlight of our trip but for all three of us, it comes in second behind Yellowstone. The Grand Canyon itself is perhaps the single greatest WOW but the diversity and overall splendor of Yellowstone is out-of-sight awesome. The waterfalls, the canyons, the mountains, the sparkling and pristine rivers, the buffalo, elk and deer, the Yellowstone Lake, the myriad of geysers and the vastness of the park where all of this could be experienced in a couple of days just staggers one's imagination. The following photos provides a small taste.

       

       

       

      

      

      

          You really can hear this geyser roar.

      

     

     

         This is for you Grace. All over the big sky portion of America, horses play a major role. We saw towns named Crazy Horse, Wild Horse, and others. Of course these are Western horses and we saw thousands in ranches that were adjacent to the highways.

     

     

In 1988 there were numerous fires started by dry lightening. These fires decimated huge tracts of Yellowstone's forest. Trees were reseeded but the evidence of the magnitude of the destruction is still present. This evidence is shown above.

     

     

     

     

This is a fly fisherman's paradise. We saw hundreds of them casting away in the sparkling and fast running streams.

     

     

We went to the Old Faithful Inn for lunch and did see the Old Faithful geyser erupt. It was quite a show. After a delicious lunch, Nancy had a brownie which was served on a dinner plate along with ice cream and whipped cream.  Obviously Dwain and I had to help her eat it.   

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

   

     

     

     

     

     

     

While passing the Yellowstone Lake, traffic was stopped for about a half hour due to road work and Dwain worked on his still masterpiece shown above.  

     

     

Next we are headed to the Wild West Country and towns of Cody and Sheridan, Wyoming.