Tyler took her over there and showed her the ropes. He has a picture just like this with other mission newbies standing by this sign and sticking out their feet. (Um...let me do some research on this. I'm not sure why that is a thing. Maybe they are showing off their shoes before they have holes in them from all the walking. Okay, Tyler just says it is to show off the cool socks you wore to the MTC. Um...should we tell Mom she forgot her socks?)
Interestingly, when I had talked to Mom much earlier, I had asked her who was taking her out to her mission. She needed her car and although she had already met her companion, they both needed a car so they had to drive separately. But they couldn't drive alone. She told me that Tyler was going to take her and I instantly knew that it should be me. Not sure why? I just knew. So I told her so. And luckily, she was fine with the idea.
Mom had only a few days in the MTC. Since she was speaking English, she didn't need too much training. She still had a few very exhausting days. One afternoon she came over to say Hi and fell asleep in our chair for an hour or so. Poor tired Grandma. Friday rolled around and it was time to go. She showed up in her
I had mapped out our trip. Grandma was happy to let me schedule things. She was just along for the ride. I only reserved a hotel for the first night. After that, we would have to find lodging where we stopped, although I had a good idea of where we would go. The first leg of our journey was very smooth. We went quite a ways into Wyoming and stopped in Rawlins. It was super windy. But that didn't matter. We had dinner at Mi Casita. Very tasty. Of course we checked in with Tyler so he knew we were safe and we sent him a photo.
It was a nice hotel and we slept well and got up right on time to be on our way. Saturday was a big day and I had some sightseeing plans for us. Who knew if I would ever drive this way again? I wanted to make the most of it. We stopped for snacks and hydration supplies and we were back on the road.
We had a pretty smooth system the whole time. I drove and we chatted or Vicki slept. I have always felt comfortable driving. I had my GPS, Pishaw. Vicki's car had its own navigation system. I quickly named her Kimber. Kimber had different views from Pishaw. Sometimes they didn't agree. It was a little strange, but we always figured out where we needed to go...eventually.
(Maybe I should call Mom, Sis. Cazier. She was an official missionary at this point, tag and all. I'll try to get it right.)
So we spent much of the day driving. We stopped for lunch and the only place we could find was a pub. We skipped the drinking obviously and the food was quite good.
We finally breached South Dakota. I had steered us so we could go to Mt. Rushmore. Once upon a time Tyler and I made plans to go see the monument, but that was when Vicki fell and got chemical burns on her arms while lying in the paint stripper. Now I was going to go see it after all, just with a different Cazier. As we neared the lovely trees and mountains that make up the famous area, we passed a sparkly wall. The light caught my eye and I turned the car around to go back. I'm glad I did. It seemed to be a marble like rock with layers of feldspar in it. Pieces and chunks had flaked off, so I gathered a few pieces for the kids.
Sis. Cazier had been to this area with her boys many years ago. So when we came in sight of Crazy Horse, she wasn't surprised. I was very startled to see this strange shaped mountain. Of course we went up for a closer look.
Crazy Horse is a very different monument than Mt. Rushmore even though they aren't very far apart. Rushmore was funded by the government and went up fairly quickly. Crazy Horse boasts that it has NEVER used government funds. The sculptor of Crazy Horse, Korczak Ziolkowski was approached by some Indians and asked to do the mountain sculpture of Crazy Horse. We went in and watched a video all about it. What you learn is a whole lot about the sculptor and basically nothing about Crazy Horse. The whole area is a monument about Korczak. It is still pretty cool. There are several large buildings. One is much like a museum with many native american objects. I believe the goal was eventually to make an entire campus/school dedicated to Native Americans, although probably with plenty of emphasis on Korczak. I loved this collection of beads they have. I have a weakness for things organized by color.
The nature gates outside were pretty cool too. I don't actually know what they are for. You didn't go through the gates at all. They were just there and you walked around them.
We toured around quite a bit. There is a wall showing the progress throughout the years. It has been a slow journey. Pretty much only the face and some of the arm is completed and the rest will take at least another fifty years. Most likely it will not be finished in my lifetime, unless they come up with some cool technology to help speed it up. This is what the finished product will look like.
They have drawn a rough sketch of the horse head on the mountain. Can you see it up there. They said those lines would be wider across than a person could reach.
We took the $3 bus tour to get a little closer. It was totally worth it. Now you can kind of see his face.
They told a lot of stories about the sculptor and his family. They had something like ten kids and all of them helped work on the mountain. In fact, besides the ones who had passed away, all of them live within 50 miles of the mountain and several of them run the business now. They told a story about a tractor that fell off the mountain when one of the boys was driving it. Luckily he got out just in time and only the tractor took the fall. Amazingly it still ran after, although it has since been retired.
Mom's digging the nice weather.
You can pay something like $100 or more to take the bus all the way up to the face. It looks something like this close up. (This is a picture inside the museum. We did not take the VIP tour.) I have to agree with the wife though. I think after Korczak died, she decided to focus on the face and finish it. It is pretty cool, and probably draws a lot of people. Good choice.
From Crazy Horse, it was on to Mt. Rushmore. It was really beautiful. Crazy Horse is right off the highway, but Rushmore is snuggled up in the mountains. It's a scenic drive and then suddenly you are there. I admit that I thought the faces would be bigger. But that was probably because I was warped by Crazy Horse. He is HUGE. All the faces of Mt. Rushmore could fit up where his hair will be carved. They are still majestic men.
The presidents are awesome. (Lincoln is my favorite.) I mistakenly thought Jefferson was Adams. (I didn't really know who that fourth guy up there was...ahem. Now I do.) The area is lovely and it wasn't over crowded the day we were there. Sis. Cazier said it has changed a lot since she last visited. She described lots of stairs, but we just had a smooth path that gradually ascended; not even steep. We took some pictures with these great presidents.
My head is way bigger than theirs.
We stayed until it got dark so we could see them lit up at night. It was pretty cool, although harder to take a picture. On the left here is the sculptor, Gutzon Borglum. Korczak studied under him.
When we left, there is an area where you can see a profile. We hadn't seen it on the way in, but we snuck a peak on the way out.
I bought some cool earrings at the gift shop. (Red/orange leaves.) It was a very fun, relaxing day. By evening, we were quite tired. A dinner at Perkins was filled with giggles as Vicki couldn't find the handle for the door. She just stared at the glass door in confusion. It was just a panel. The door was a little farther down. We were a little slap happy by then though. We got a box of delicious muffins to share in the morning.
There was quite a bit of hassle with the motel room. (Remind me to skip Motel 6.) We were going to go somewhere else but Tyler had reserved a room online while we were driving. We couldn't get out of it. They didn't have any non-smoking rooms, but they eventually found one with a single queen bed that we could share. We opted for that, but as soon as we entered the room, the strong smell of smoke hit us. It was too late to worry about that. We crashed. Sharing a bed with Vicki was fine, but man she SNORES! LOUDLY! I sometimes would wake up, but not often. I'm a pretty deep sleeper. I would call this day a resounding success. So fun to spend the time with Mom.
I think I was 10 years old when we visited Mt. Rushmore. That would have been in 1960 so I imagine it has changed quite a bit since then. I wish they would add FDR, but there might not be enough mountain space for that. Crazy Horse was considered a joke when I was younger, but apparently it's turned into a big deal. Wonder if it will have to wait until the Millennium to get finished.
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