Onward to Mt. Rushmore

After a great time in Yellowstone our vacation then continued with a long drive to Mt. Rushmore. We ended up pitching our tent at 11 PM. We were that late because we stopped at the Battle of Little Bighorn for a few hours. That site was pretty neat to see. It was good to hear the reports of how that battle went. It makes me wonder how things would have gone for the Native Americans if they had not decided to plunder the soldiers after the battle. Sitting Bull apparently claimed to have a vision that they would be able to conquer the white man, but that they should not plunder any of their stuff.
This is a monument that was placed just above the hill where Custer and many others fell.There is a national cemetery their just like the Arlington cometary that is in Washington DC.

Yellowstone

After the family reunion we went to Yellowstone. We had some pretty good luck while in Yellowstone; we were able to see many things that we have wanted to see in the past, but have not had the opportunity to see. The first neat thing we saw was the erruption of Grand Geyser. It is found in the same area as Old Faithful, but isn't as famous as Old Faithful because it only erupts about every 7-15 hours.
The neat thing about Grand Geyser is that it is the tallest predictable geyser in the world. We also saw 9 bears one evening as we were driving around! That was awesome, we have always wanted to see a bear up there, but have had no luck in the past. This time we saw quite a bunch of them. We also saw mountain goats, bighorn sheep, and either a wolf or coyote. We have never seen the mountain goats, bighorn sheep, or a wolf before either.
This is the first bear that we saw, a nice big grizzly. It was really near to the road as well.
This is a cub that we saw up in a tree. The mother was down below in the grass on the ground.
We had a lot of fun together in Yellowstone, and that was just the first part of our vacation. Our vacation was definitely off to a good start.