Red eye and all!

We had a big day planned but was slowed down a little when Doug woke up looking like he had been in the ring with John Cena.

He called the doctor and described it to the nurse and she said it was probably just a busted blood vessel and as long as it didn't hurt and his vision was good, not to worry about it.  It will take a couple of weeks for the blood to be absorbed by the body.  Looks bad doesn't it?
First off let me catch up on the pictures and post our camp site.

 I really like how they have us facing each other with two covered picnic tables between us.

                                      This is just a shot looking down the road from us.

We have had great weather since we have been here.  It has been warm during the day but not too hot and very low humidity.  At night it cools off and we have a nice breeze.  I think I am in love with the low humidity.  It will be hard to head back down south.

After talking with the nurse and getting the dogs settled in the motorhomes for the day, we headed out towards Crazy Horse Monument.  The drive was beautiful.  We decided to take the long way and go through Keystone, SD.

                                         As you can see, it's a very tourist oriented town.

 We had lunch at one of the family oriented cafés.  I can say that it wasn't very good.  The food was cold.  Oh well, you can't pick winners every time!

When we left Keystone, we headed for Hill City.  It's another little town making its living off of the many tourists.  Some of these businesses will close at the end of the month.

Leaving Keystone,  one of the first things we saw were these turkeys.  They crossed the road in front of us and we had to wait on all of them to get out of the street.  Better than having buffalo stopped in the middle of the street impeding forward progress.

                                        The road to Hill City was like looked at a postcard.

                          

                                                          The pictures look like postcards

                                       Hill City, like Keystone. is full of tourist attractions.

I wish this picture was clearer than it is.  This was one of many sculptures around town.  It is an eagle soaring in the sky.  It was very pretty but we had to move on.  There is more to see.

 Our next stop was Crazy Horse.  I knew very little about this monument.  I must say that it moved me more than I thought it would. There is a lot of interesting memorabilia and  Indian culture.  The story of Crazy Horse himself was a sad one.  He was killed at the age of 35 by a soldier during a
truce.  He was stabbed in the back.  Chief Red Cloud had said of the white man, "They made us many promises, more than I can remember- They never kept but one; they promised to take our land and they did. (1891)

 In the monument the straight line will be his outstretched arm pointing. When asked where his land was, he pointed and said, "My lands are where my dead lie buried".

                                          This is what the finished memorial will look like.

The size of this sculptor is mind boggling.  You can fit Mount Rushmore on Crazy Horses head.
There are no government funds backing this project.  It is paid for completely by donations, admissions fees and estate gifts.  Government had broken too many promises to the Indians.  Sounds familiar doesn't it.

                         If you get the chance, I highly recommend you visit this wonderful place.

 Heading back through Hill City, here are some more pictures.  I wanted the man to move but he couldn't read my mind.  This horse was beautiful.  It was pieced together using a little bit of everything.

 There were wood carvings all over town.  Large ones done with chain saws.

Again my camera just doesn't do these things justice.  This bridge was made of wood.  It was very pretty.  All in all it was a great day.  I even got to bring home a rock from the blasting.  Just a small one, about the size of a cantaloupe.  :)
Later