Black Hills, South Dakota

This past week I went to the Black Hills of South Dakota for a Housing Conference.

Day 1
My coworker Kevin and I got in around 8ish at night and we were starving. So we start driving around looking for a place to eat. I joked with him that we could go to McDonalds but then he saw a place called the Golden Corral and was like we can go there Bronson just let me know. So I agreed and boy was it a good decision. It was an all you can eat buffet place so we filled our famished selves and probably tried everything they had there. I probably put on 5 lbs from that meal alone. haha.

Day 2
We got up early as we had to head to Sylvan Lake Lodge to meet the rest of the attendees for the conference. On the way however we decided to stop at Mt. Rushmore. It was a beautiful day and when we got there it was just soo amazing to see the site. We took the walking tour and were able to see the faces from different angles and take numerous pics. It was just a really enjoyable experience.

After seeing Mt. Rushmore we headed up to Sylvan Lake Lodge where our conference was being held. There was a 6.5 mile hike scheduled for the afternoon on Harney Peak so we were looking forward to that. I had never really hiked before so I didn't know what to expect. Boy was I in for a rude awakening. Besides trekking through slippery snow for 5 hours and having to always be careful not to fall down a cliff or bust my butt too bad I had to navigate my way down the mountain. My partner and I in the hike almost got lost..Luckily there was someone with much more knowledge who we ran into that helped us find our way back down in due time. I really enjoyed the experience though because reaching the Harney Peak summit was a real challenge and it felt great to accomplish that while dealing with adversity a lot of the way.

Day 3
We went to the Crazy Horse memorial. This was incredible. We were able to drive up onto the arm of Crazy Horse and see the face of the monument which is now pretty much complete in full. To give you an idea of how big this monument will be the Mt. Rushmore monument could fit inside the head of the Crazy Horse Memorial. Usually people are only able to walk out onto the arm of Crazy Horse one day a year in June so its flooded..We were able to go out on the arm by ourselves in our own group which was really special.

Also the Mercury Morris discussion at dinner was HILARIOUS!! If you would like to know the story please contact me personally :)

All in all our stay in the Black Hills was great. In addition to meeting new people from the midwest states and discussing housing issues, we were able to see sites that were incredible and that were a joyful experience.