Day Three. Today has been a full day of sightseeing. First was the Badlands National Park. The scenery was amazing: vast expanses of multicolored rocks formations.

We got out of the car to stretch our legs by walking along the roadside and we came upon turkeys, many turkeys, strutting through the grasses.

Family members striking poses whilst sightseeing.

These yellow flowers dot the sloping grassy hills that exist right up until the dramatic shift to this (below)…

We've entered a more mountainous terrain: no more flat farmland.

Next was on to Mount Rushmore!

Stepping nearer to The Mount Rushmore National Monument.

There was a short walking trail that leads down around the monument. We, of course, took the trail and got to see the four presidents' visages from a different angle.

And then we made it to Wyoming! More blue line! (For years now we have been tracing the roads we've driven across the U.S. on our United States wall map in permanent blue marker. On this trip, we will forge a lot of new blue line as the roads and highways we are taking have not yet been added to the wall map.)

After we crossed into the state of Wyoming, we passed several places still with snow on the ground, though today was the warmest yet.

We ran into a lot of mist during the drive today, so much moisture was hanging in the air.

The third and final site was Devil's Tower, but before we got to the colossal stone that is Devil's Tower, a field of hundreds of prairie dog dens and the little furry animals drew us to a halt. It was the first time any of us caught sight of a prairie dog, though we've read about them diaries of Laura Ingalls that my dad used to read to my brothers and me when we were younger.

The prairie dogs scampering and calling to each other. It was a little rainy and windy, so I had difficulty keeping the camera still and focused while zoomed in so close.

Reaching the Devil's Tower and finding it shrouded in fog. 

This is what it is supposed to look like.

But the cool mist was an incredible refresher since the walk around Mount Rushmore was a little warm. Our 1.3 mile stroll around the entirety of this monument exercised our stiff muscles from hours in the car and  filled our lungs with chilled moist air.

We kept up a good pace and returned to the parking lot soon damp from the fog.

We couldn't see what we had come to see, but the surrounding landscape was well worth the drive as well.

Tonight my family and I find ourselves in Gillette, Wyoming. We've crossed two time zones so far, so we are all feeling it as we get tired earlier in the day and it was only six p.m.! yesterday was 25 hour day for us--crossing into another time zone gave us an extra hour. Right now, we are all counting down until a decent time to sleep.

Tomorrow we will head into Montana. Perhaps we will reach Seattle the day after tomorrow. Oh, the unknowns ahead! I love these kinds of uncertainties! 

Good night!

じゃあね！