Saturday was a perfect day. We had beautiful weather. The sky was a vivid blue with only a few wispy clouds. The temperature was in the mid 70's and we had a very nice breeze. Our first stop was at the Wall Drug famous for free ice water and 5 cent cups of coffee. If you haven't heard of wall drug look it up on the internet and you will learn about this amazing business venture. They have been featured on Good Morning America and in many magazines.
From there we went to the Badlands. I won't try to describe what we saw; it was just too breathtaking and words would not do it justice. However, I will tell you that we went on 25 mile loop with one short detour to see a prairie dog town and it took us four hours. While we were stopping every few minutes, we found that two men from NYC were stopping right after we did. At each stop we would discuss what we were seeing and agreed that we were thrilled by each new sight. Finally, we stopped for lunch at a viewing point and shortly they pulled in and stayed and talked with us while we ate. We introduced ourselves and chatted more and I asked what they did for work. Ted explained that he was a Broadway actor and that his name was Ted Keagan. He had performed in several of Andrew Lloyd Webber productions and knows him well. He also knows Stephen Sondheim, Bernadette Peters and many other notables that I asked about. I was so excited that I exclaimed, " This is more exciting than seeing prairie dogs!" He replied that he thought that was fantastic and would add this comment to his website. We also discovered he played the Phantom in the performance I saw at the Wang Theater.
Well, I will show you some pictures of the Badlands. All I could think of was the hymn "How Great Thou Art." See what you think.
Then we went to see Mount Rushmore. It is inspiring and makes you so proud to be an American. I enjoyed the information about Borglum, the sculpture, and that he did this because he believed that a country as great as the United States needed a fitting monument that would awe all who saw it. He wanted to reflect all that American stands for and has accomplished. We viewed everything we could then went to have dinner. We returned for the show in the evening in the amphitheater. It started with a presentation by a park ranger about the constitution and was followed by a movie that depicted the a brief background of each of the four presidents and why they were selected. Then the faces were illuminated and they sang "America the Beautiful." After this all of the people in the audience who had ever served or were currently serving in any branch of the military were called to come to the stage. The "Star Spangled Banner" was sung and the flag was folded by 4 volunteers from the group on stage. The ranger then had them each place their right hand on the flag and say their full name and the branch of the service in which they had been. It was very touching and there were at least 90 people on stage. The oldest person was a man who had served in the U.S. Army Air Force and had parachuted in during D-day. It was a very moving experience.
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