South Dakota--Day 7--From USAF to Crazy Horse

We are out of Hart Ranch and now set up at the FamCamp at Ellsworth Air Force Base. We arrived here yesterday after spending most of the day at the diesel repair facility. As expected both fuel filters needed replacing. This is normally done at the time of an oil change, which we will be having done when we get back to Oklahoma. Also, we had a fuel lifter pump that was bad. This also had to be replaced.

When we arrived at the base the campground was full so we were sent to the overflow area. This is basically an old parking lot on the opposite side of the base, next to the air strip, out in the middle of nowhere. They have put in 12 electrical outlets with 30 AMP service but with no other hookups. First thing this morning the campground host called to say she had a spot for us in the main campground. We are now set here for the next two weeks.

Today we did some more sightseeing. We went back to Custer State Park and drove what is called the Needle Scenic Highway. This is a fairly narrow and winding road over one of the mountains in the Mt Rushmore area. This road had three very narrow one lane tunnels. At the last, and smallest one was a hugh semi-trailer truck that was stopped along the road. Now these tunnels are just over eight feel wide and just over ten feet tall. There is no way this truck was going to get through the tunnel and no one really knew why he was on this road. There was no place to turn him around so the authorities were kind of in a quantry of what to do. We did not stay around to see what happened.

Of the three scenic roads through Custer State Park the Needles is the best. It rises higher than the other two and has some beautiful rock formations. To the left is a picture of the Cathedral Spires. We stopped numerous times to get out of the car and hike up to get a better look at some of the rocks and to take pictures.

Afterward we drove down to Crazy Horse Mountain where the memorial to the Souix indian Crazy Horse is being built. This project has been going on for many years and is many years away from completion. When finished this will be the largest mountain carving in the world. Much work has been done since we were here in 1992. The completed project will show Crazy Horse with his arm stretched out over the head of his horse with both Crazy Horse's hair and the horse's mane flying in the wind.