Devil's Tower National Monument

We started out early this morning in fog and drizzle.  As we drove North to Belle Fourche, SD then West to the Devil’s Tower National Monument in Eastern Wyoming the sun soon came out.

Towering 867 feet above the valley floor the monolith is visible for many miles along the Belle Fourche River.  It has been a landmark and navigational fix for General Custer’s Cavalry, and wagon trains headed west.  Richard Dreyfus in Close Encounters of the Third Kind memorialized this place in the 70’s as the place where we (Earth people) met aliens.  We watched several climbers headed up the south face this morning.  Not to be outdone, Joy wanted to head up also but only got about 10 feet up the wall.  See the proof below.  One of the things we have loved to do is find a special place for a picnic lunch and today was no exception.  A baby prairie dog came near to see what might be for lunch.

After leaving the Park we headed back down toward Sundance, WY – picturesque little town that it is.  Joy was disappointed not to see Robert Redford living there.  It does share a bit of history though with the Sundance Kid.

After his release from the Sundance Jail in 1888, Harry Longabaugh acquired the moniker the Sundance Kid, which entered the popular imagination in the 1969 movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, which won several Academy Awards including Best Original Screenplay. Robert Redford, who portrayed Longabaugh in the movie, later named the Sundance Ski Resort, near Provo, Utah, and the Sundance Film Festival after this character. A sign visible from I-90 proclaims that Sundance is "where the kid got his name."

Well, we headed home early today for a little housecleaning and other details before our departure in the morning westward to Hardin, MT to visit the Little Big Horn Battlefield where George Armstrong Custer met his untimely end.