We had much better luck the next day when we went to visit Mount Rushmore National Park and the Crazy Horse Monument. We started off my driving through a very scenic portion of hill country in Custer State Park. In several places, the road shrunk down to an 8 foot wide hole carved through solid rock. We had to pull in the mirrors on the truck to keep from scraping them against the sides of the tunnels as we slowing drove through those tunnels. But the views of the rock pinnacles and spirals were worth the effort. 
Moreover, on the last tunnel we went through, we had Mount Rushmore framed in the mouth of the tunnel as we drove through. There was no need to turn our headlights on in this narrow one lane tunnel as the constant flashes from Jo’s camera alerted oncoming traffic to our presence. 
It was awesome to be seeing in person the figures on this carved mountain of which we had seen images over the years since our childhood. We were surprised to learn things in the Visitors Center that we had never heard of before. Apparently, Theodore Roosevelt was a late addition and not part of the original plans for the monument. The original plans called for George Washington to be in the center, with Jefferson to the left and Lincoln to the right. However, when they started to blast away the rock to carve out Jefferson’s head they found deep fissures in the rock which would have been difficult to deal with. Accordingly, the sculptor blew away that portion of the mountain face and moved Jefferson to the right, thereby leaving space to add in Roosevelt as well.
