Custer area ride & Mammoth Site

The first shot is Chief Sitting Bull, and I will admit that I am more impressed with that mountain than Mt Rushmore.  The fourth shot is of Rapid City as we approached it from the south.  The two in the middle just shows what the area looks like.
We were scouting out a back entrance to the buffalo roundup but it didn't pan out so we continued on to Hot Springs and the Mammoth Site where 26,000 years ago woolly mammoths were trapped in a pool along with other critters of the time.  Their bones were discovered in 1974 during excavations for a housing development.  The site is now enclosed and the dig continues, it is estimated that they have only gone down about a quarter of the way to the bottom of the pit.
These animals were VERY big, I was impressed when standing under a skeleton.

Deadwood, Lead & Spearfish Canyon

Today we went about an hour north to Lead to checked out the huge 8000 foot deep Homestake gold mine.  George Hurst bought it for $70K in 1877.  It produced 40 million ounces of gold and 9 million ounces of silver.  Big bucks!  It's been closed since 2002 but we got a good view from an observation deck.  There are also deep shafts going underground.  The nifty large house is across the street from the mine. 

We then went to Deadwood, 5 miles if that, and hiked up to Calamity Jane's and Wild Bill's graves to pay our respect.  Boy, this is hilly country.

We returned home via the Spearfish Canyon and I'd have to say it was a spectacular drive with the trees turning yellow and gold.

Bye bye Custer, hello Hermosa

Here's a group picture of most all the Custer, SD rally attendees.  We have now moved 22 miles through Custer State Park to Hermosa where we'll spend 9 nights (at a campground half the price of Custer) waiting for the annual Custer State Park buffalo roundup.  They do this to ensure the buffalo are healthy, branded and reduce the herd to about 1000 which the park can support over the winter.  The animals that are removed are sold to private buffalo ranches in the US and Canada.