We were up with the sun (5:30AM) this morning for the start of an ambitious travel day. Our first destination was Custer State Park where we were lucky to spot pronghorn antelope, wild burros and had to share the road with a herd of bison. My craving for pancakes was more than satisfied at the Blue Bell Lodge which we happened upon just as hunger was surpassing my interest in photography (not something that happens often). After breakfast we followed the Needles Scenic Highway through the “Eye of the Needle,” a very narrow tunnel carved through one of the granite spires (the so-called needles).

Surrounded by magnificent rock formations, Sylvan Lake was our next stop as we made our way to the Crazy Horse Memorial. This massive mountain carving, is a tribute to all Native Americans and will dwarf Mount Rushmore in scale when it is completed. At this time only the head of Crazy Horse has been completed and that took more than half a century. Pictured below is a scale model of the sculpture with progress on the actual mountain shown in the background.

Our final destination in South Dakota for the day was the Wind Cave National Park where we took a 90 minute tour of the most complex cave in the world which includes some 140 miles of explored passage ways. Each year an average of 4 miles is added to this total, the result of ongoing exploration. The cave is notable for its displays of the calcite formation known as boxwork. Approximately 95 percent of the world’s discovered boxwork formations are found in Wind Cave.

Fortified by pancakes, I was determined to make it to Devil’s Tower in Wyoming in time for golden light. The effort was worth it and I could not be more pleased with the images I made there.