RV Lifestyle Anyone whose route ends in Keystone certainly needs no introduction to the Mount Rushmore National Memorial, which lies minutes away. Seemingly content with the superb vantage point from the Grand View Terrace, the vast majority of park-goers don’t follow the halfmile-long looping Presidential Trail whose wooden stairs drop and rise again and get you right below the talus slope. Instead, they take in the extensive displays in the visitor’s centre. You’ll have a close-up of the presidents all to yourself at various viewing platforms to suss out just where Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint dangled from and scampered down those granite faces. Head west back to the town of Hill City, stop and sample what at Prairie Berry Winery will surely be your most unusual wine tasting ever – that is, unless you have already tasted rhubarb wine or their raspberry-inflected Red Ass Rhubarb blend. They have a brew pub as well for that mango IPA you never knew you wanted. Taking up a huge house that you wish you could live in, Hill City’s Alpine Inn restaurant was built in 1884 as a hotel serving the mining and railroad companies. The lunch menu is ample but, for dinner, it’s just two sizes of filet mignon or spaetzle primavera followed by a massive homemade dessert selection. It’s cash-only and it’s wildly popular. A massive site off of the highway between Hill City and Custer, The Crazy Horse Memorial mountain carving is a truly odd slice of Americana. Still far from completion since sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski began blasting rock away in 1948, the work depicts the warrior whom Oglala Lakota people knew as Tasunke Witko, famous for his role in the defeat of Custer at Little Bighorn. Funded by donations and entry fees and finally advancing quickly with newer rock-carving technologies, the memorial now includes the chief’s hand pointing in the distance, to go along with his long-ago finished head. The memorial museum is filled with artifacts and art from many Indian nations across the continent. One wall display that you might not expect is made up of small, early 20th-century advertising illustrations of romanticized Indian and Western figures and scenes that were made for a gum company by Winfried Reiss, a German-born artist recently rediscovered for his murals in the Empire State Building and Harlem Renaissance portraits. Rapid City is now well-known for its nearly life-sized bronze statues of presidents around town. Back in the 1930s, the Works Progress Administration (WPA) – an American New Deal agency – erected a truly delightful curiosity on a hill outside of town where the life-sized concrete creatures in Dinosaur Park have fared remarkably well in the near-century of their existence. You can expect the unexpected in this southwest corner of South Dakota. Custer Park offers a unique and unforgettable experience. I hope that this guide helps you plan your adventure and that you’ll soon discover the magic of this park. CSANews | SUMMER 2024 | 21
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