Fun Filled Trip to South Dakota!

We took off early Memorial Day morning to head to South Dakota. We though it would be fun to go over and show my parents the beautiful state of South Dakota, since they had never been! It was lots of fun! The first thing we did when we got there was go for a drive through Custer State Park! It is beautiful country with lots of wildlife!

Custer State Park

We got to see lots of buffalo!
We also saw some wild burros, that came right up to the cars!

Needle Highway
Another beautiful drive through the mountains!

. . . with very narrow tunnels!

and beautiful lakes!

Crazy Horse and Mount Rushmore

Next we went to see Crazy Horse! If they ever get it done, it will be pretty amazing to see!

Then we went to see Mt. Rushmore
Grandpa and Tay

Fort Hayes Chuckwagon

For dinner that night we went to eat at the Fort Hayes Chuckwagon! They have an old house there that was used in some of the filming on "Dances With Wolves." So we got to go in and look around and do some other fun things there before the dinner started!

The show after dinner was really entertaining and enjoyable!

Bear Country USA

The next morning we went to Bear Country! I got to see lots

and lots of animals (especially bears)!

Elk
Reindeer (see the babies)!
Wolves
Big Horn Sheep
Baby Sheep
Rocky Mountain Goat
Big Buffalo!
White Buffalo
Lots of bears!
This bears name is Cherokee, and she was so cute!

She would sit down and wave to people passing by! Here is a video of Cherokee waving! If you want go down to the bottom of the blog and turn the music off, so you can hear the audio that goes with the video!


This is a video of a bear we saw. He came up to another bear and chased it off so he could have the tree to himself, to scratch his back! Sorry, the video changes position in the middle, but it is still very funny! It looks as though he was dancing to the music we had playing in the car!

And our favorite! The cubs!!
We got to watch them play and wrestle around with each other! We got to watch them eat and get in "milk fights!" They were just plain adorable!
This little guys name is Casanova! He was by far the smallest little cub there. And because of his size he got picked on a lot by all the other cubs! When all the other cubs went to eat, Casanova ran over to where we were and just looked at us, as if to say "Save me! Take me home with you! Help!" He was so so so cute. and if I could have I totally would have took him home!

Reptile Gardens

Then we went to Reptile Gardens where we saw lots of snakes, frogs, alligators, bird, turtles, lizards, and many more!

Huge Turtle
Lots of Gators

After Reptile Gardens, we headed to the little town of Keystone at the base of Mt. Rushmore, where we ate lunch and then headed home. On the way home we drove through Deadwood, but it was just too cold and rainy to get out and do much there! But all in all we had a great time!

Tay and Uncle Bryten! She is getting the hang of riding her bike!

We have had so much fun having everyone here to visit us!

Thanks everyone for coming! Love you guys!