West trip 2019 #24 Custer South Dakota

Sept. 17-19th
    We will only travel about 50 miles today as we head for Custer, SD.  We decided to camp at Comanche Park a Black hills national forest campground.  However, there are no hookups or water available so we will need to dump tanks and fill up with water before heading to the campground.  We got there around 11am and the campground was closed except for a couple sites outside the gate.



   I am glad we got there early as in the afternoon several campers came in to find the sites occupied.  We offered to scrunch over to make room on our site but no takers.  Guess I better take a shower..haha.  After setting up camp we headed to the Needles highway.
   On our way to Needles highway we stopped to see the Crazy Horse memorial from a distance.  They are making progress but have a long way to go.

The needles highway was awesome and very scenic.  We stopped along the way for some very short hikes (walks), but mostly just drove through and stopped for pictures.








74 year old rock climber  :o and grandson 




   Back to camp for some dinner and a goodnight rest.


    The next day we decided to take in Mt. Rushmore.  Unfortunately the main plaza area was closed so your picture ops was from the gift shop area or hike around the sides up to the top.  It was nice but basically  a tourist area although maybe if we had hiked it would have been a nicer experience.  It is amazing that they were able to create such a large sculpture and the area was beautiful.




   Afterwards we headed back to Custer for some lunch at Purple pie place :)


Next we head for Custer state park to explore and ended up driving the scenic drive.  Along this drive there are Bison , Antelope and wild burros.  We are not supposed to feed the burros but many people tend to ignore the rules...



We tried to see Jewel cave and Wind cave but both were closed for no electricity.  Disappointed but I guess a reason to come back again.

   Well tomorrow we head for Badlands National Park.

See Ya There,
Tom, Pat and Kira


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