One of the best trips we made in 07’. Left Denver right after work on a Friday drove straight to a town just south of the park called Custer, SD. Took about 5 hours, but it’s an easy drive. Leaving early the next morning it was just a short 20 minute drive to Mt. Rushmore. Getting there right after the park opened meant we avoided the crowds. (Note: BRING CASH! The park entrance doesn’t accept plastic…in the 21st century no less.) The park is not real big, and the trails are paved and easy to walk. There are lots of good vantage points to see and shoot the monument. Late April, and early May are great times to go as the weather is excellent. Make sure to see the sculptor’s studio near the end of the trail (if it is open). From the park, we drove to Deadwood, stopping briefly off the side of the road to see the Crazy Horse monument in the distance. This place is not really worth the steep fee to see a monument that is only 15% done. Once in Deadwood, we had lunch, shopped a little and then were back on the road to Devil’s Tower, WY. The Black Hills of South Dakota, and north eastern most part of Wyoming are very pleasant to look at, and very clean. (Highways are maintained well and there is no trash or unkempt areas to be seen)
Once we got near the tower, it can be seen rising ominously out of the ground in the distance. Nothing in the area looks like the tower, so it does appear as though it was placed there from somewhere else. The park is not very crowded. I have been here twice, and both times the crowds were light, and the weather was great. The trails going around the monument are pretty easy to walk. On the backside, the trail skirts the side of the monument and is worth seeing as the monument looks different from each new angle. You can climb the boulders all the way up to the tower, but it’s not easy to do and carrying expensive camera equipment nixed that idea for me.
Heading due south back towards the state line, we stopped off at the re-built but still old and historic Ft. Laramie, near Goshen Wyoming. This was an old outpost on the Oregon Trail back in the late 1800’s. Most of the structures are not original, but some of the remnants of the old buildings are still here. A nice side trip on the way to the Pawnee Buttes. There was a fee station, but nobody was working it that day, so we practically had the place to ourselves. Worth the visit if your in the area, and like historic places. From here it was just a couple more hours to the Pawnee National Grasslands and the buttes. The buttes are situated just 35 miles east of Ft. Collins, CO. in the middle of nowhere…or near the dinky town of Keota, CO. Getting here is not hard, but the last 11 miles are all dirt road. Pay close attention to the signs, as it would be easy to get turned around out here. Once to the butte parking lot, it’s a fairly easy to moderate hike to the buttes. We only hiked about half way, as it was very hot, and I only needed to get shots of the buttes at a distance. There is no fee to get in here, and since its location is rather remote, not a busy site either. The buttes stand in stark contrast to the surrounding grasslands, and look awesome against the sky as the sun is going down.
