Day 6: Billings, MT to Keystone, SD (Rushmore)

Today was NOT a good day. I think we are all lacking on sleep and unfortunately, each one of us woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning. The girls were extra whiny and demanding, and when the tolerance level is already low (almost non-existent) for us as grumpy and tired parents… let’s just say the drive wasn’t near as enjoyable as those of the past few days. Regardless, we stopped at Little Big Horn National Monument and Devil’s Tower before getting a good nights rest in preparation for Rushmore and the surrounding area tomorrow.

Little Big Horn National monument is the location of the last big battle between the Native Americans and the U.S. Army. It kind of memorialized both sides I guess you could say:

This is the National Cemetery for the U.S. Soldiers that fell. (It was really windy and cold).

Where Custard took his last stand.

A memorial for the remains of the U.S. soldiers. There are markers indicating where a soldier fell, but their actual remains are below this memorial.

Grave markers are placed where the Native American’s fell too.

A memorial for the Native Americans was added recently… and that’s what I meant about how this monument is for both sides of the battle. The Native American’s won this final battle, but as part of American history, the Native Americans were ‘savages’ that needed to be forced back onto their assigned reservations. Because of this popular thought at the time, the U.S. soldiers were heroes for trying. So now it today’s time, both sides of the ‘story’ are remembered.

At last the girl’s fell asleep, which offered some peace and quiet. At the same time we crossed into Wyoming, and here is an official sign.

After nearly 4 hours we made it to Devil’s Tower. It’s a huge volcano. The outer part corroded and left behind basalt pillars that crack off with time. It was amazingly huge.

This is random… but the girls found a secret door that they were more fascinated about at the visitor’s center, LOL.

So… I asked a guy to take a picture of us. Um… he’s totally missing the tower!

We found another random stranger with more sense.

We let the girls burn energy and climb rocks.

It’s a pretty amazing monstrosity. And the legend behind it is pretty cool. You should look it up.

At last we crossed into South Dakota. Now we are really starting to feel far from home. And on top of the stressful day, it was kinda sad as it all settled in.

A Teepee at the rest stop.

Just for memories sake:

[Just to top off our crappy day, we skipped the nearest town’s food exit (20miles away) to get to the hotel in Mt. Rushmore so that the girls had plenty of time to swim. The hotel messed up our reservation, so I had to stress over being a mean upset demanding lady, then after swimming, we go to find food, and there is none to be found anywhere close by that is open! Aaron was so kind to head to a tavern outside of town and order us some grub. Meanwhile, I’m back at the hotel and can’t get my computer to work. So frustrating because I want to blog! But alas, he finds our DVD player cord and makes that work to charge my computer. All in all, I’m feeling like tomorrow ought to be a better day since it seemed to end on a positive note. Phew! (Plus, we aren’t going anywhere but the sights around the area, so it will be nice to have a break from long rides in the truck). We might just have to take it easy!]

Day 5: Rexburg, ID to Billings, MT

 

*Picture overload from Yellowstone!*

We knew today would be a big day when we planned to drive through the entire loop of Yellowstone AND still drive nearly 4 hours afterwards to Billings, MT in order to at least feel like we made a little headway towards our final destination. It was a beautiful drive towards the park, and we were really happy to know that we would get to go with Matt and Kylee. Also, we totally owe Anton for his detailed map of must sees! He’d be so proud to know we hit nearly all of his recommended hot spots.

The drive towards “Yellow-Rock” as the girls called it was pretty and scenic. We followed alongside a mountain range in the distance.

Before Yellowstone we drove through this national forest. It kind of reminded us of home, except the trees were different.

We hit some construction. Instead of cones, they have ‘pilot’ cars to take you through the area… But, it didn’t look like anything was going on to me.

We left Idaho and crossed into Montana! This is the first NEW state ventured into for all of us.

We entered Yellowstone through the West Entrance.

We crossed over into Wyoming, this was the best sign I could manage on such short notice. (So far we’ve been through WA, OR, ID, UT, MT, WY).

We were excited to see our first real bison (buffalo)! They actually seemed a lot like cows.

Our first stop was in the Lower Geyser Basin where we walked on the Fountain Paint Pot Trail. This was probably our most favorite part since there was so much activity and so many different colors. We had so many pictures that I kinda went through and picked some of my favorite ones of just the scenery.

The Grand Prismatic Spring was our next stop, but since it was still a little cold, there was too much steam to really see it’s beauty.

We then went to Old Faithful and managed to get there just in time to see the Geyser go off, without even waiting! Just perfect if you ask me, but, the only downside is my pictures have a ton of other people in them. Oh well.

Allie had fun being a big helpful cousin.

After the crowd died down, we were able to get up close to Old Faithful (she’s puffing in the back).

Here’s the group of us. We had so much fun with these guys and are super thankful to their hospitality!

The girls fell asleep and we stopped at a view point for West Thumb Geyser Basin.

Since the girls were asleep, Kylee and Henry watched the truck.

Here’s a view point of Yellowstone Lake.

Just some scenery of the drive through the loop. It’s actually pretty long. Took us all day to drive, including our stops.

We then went to see the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone, which included upper and lower falls.

This guy was so random. He liked the attention, that’s for sure. I never saw him paint. He mostly just stared at the tourists walking by. It was kind of funny to sit and watch. I speculate whether he even really painted this.

We said goodbye to Matt and Kylee and headed towards Mammoth Hot Springs which is up near the North Entrance. On the way, we nearly hit a bison (I could have touched him from the truck) and by the time I got my camera out, he was already well behind us because Aaron was fearful he’d head-butt our vehicles and didn’t want to stop to see if that would happen.

So, we turned around and followed the poor guy into a more open space. They are HUGE up close!

We didn’t get to see a whole ton of wildlife other than Bison, but did stumble upon a herd of mule deer.

More pretty scenery. It was amazing how much the landscape changed through out Yellowstone.

Our final stop was Mammoth Hot Springs. It was nice to wear the kids out again with another hike since they took a nap in the car. We knew we would be driving late into the night and wanted them to sleep in the car. But, so far… it’s about 10pm and the kids are STILL awake. Not exactly how we planned it, but no real complaints yet!

(look at how Malia crosses her legs… such a poser!)

These flowing hot springs were just beautiful in the way they carved their path through the landscape. Nature can be so amazing!

close-up…

Look what the girls found!

It was a pretty drive towards Billings, MT as the sunset on our lovely trip to Yellowstone. Tomorrow we make a significant dent and will make it all the way to South Dakota!

Today we hit over 1500 miles so far on the trip. Forgot to mention in yesterday’s post that we hit 1000 miles. Only about 1/2 the miles completed so far!!!