Today we needed to get out for a bit so we decided to drive the wildlife loop in Custer State Park. The day started out a little overcast and cool, in fact I had to put on a heavier jacket before we left. Hopefully this will mean more animals would be out.
There is a $15 charge to enter the park but it is good for a week so we can go through again. We didn't see as big of a variety of animals as I remembered from the last time we were here, but we did see animals. We saw a lot of bison, a couple of pronghorn antelope, some deer, burros and prairie dogs. Also a bunch of birds were sighted. We are here in the prime time for seeing baby animals.
See the pronghorn that is laying down?
We spent about 3 hours on the drive as well as seeing great scenery. One funny thing is the burros. They own their section of the park and let you know it. They are very well "trained" to get food from you. We knew we would be seeing them so I brought our carrots with us. This also has the advantage of using that item up and getting it out of the cooler. Here is what you see when you enter the burro area.
A burro obstacle course! Once we got closer and they realized we had food they came closer and closer and closer -
There was one really cute baby burro who was bouncing around and frolicking.
We eventually moved away from the burros and continued our tour. On the way out of the park and into Keystone you have a drive through a bunch of tunnels and turns.
Exiting one of the tunnels you get a great view of this -
At about this time it started sprinking on us so we didn't go into the Rushmore monument. We will do that later this week. We drove into Keystone to get some lunch and stopped at a restaurant called Peggy's Place. We stopped there as a bunch of locals were eating there, including some firemen. The food was good and the service was great. If you are in the area stop here. After lunch we walked through town, which had covered walkways, yeah! We also did a bit of window shopping before heading back to the base. All in all we had a good day. I hope you did too. Here are all the pictures - Remember you can double click on the pictures to go to Picasa and see them full size.
1 comment:
I tried to add comments to your photos but it would not work. Oh well. I loved them. One burro looks like he was smiling! The pretty pink flowers are wild roses.
We have lots of them growing here in the wild. Love photos of Rushmore. Wish I could be there in person!
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