Mt Rushmore is a one of the iconic monument in United States. As part of this trip, we also visited nearby Jewel Cave monument, a bonus!
Just as much as Statue of Liberty in New York, Mt Rushmore is equally significant monument in United States. Colossal statues of presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln were sculpted on mountain. For foreigners like me, only Lincoln and Washington are the only recognisable figures of those four :)
Granite carving of such colossal size is indeed an engineering marvel. That too for a time of early 20th century where technology is just about emerging. I've read somewhere that most of sculpting done using dynamite blasting! Amazing to get such a precision from dynamite blasting! I've grew up in a region in India where such massive sculptures are common to see. For example, statue of Bahubali in Shravanabelagola in India is almost same height as these Mount Rushmore sculptures. Statue of Bahubali is sculpted in 10th century C.E., just incomprehensible to imagine the engineering abilities of its sculptor!
Once we are there at the monument, there isn't much else to see or do. Just walk around a trail which gets little bit up close to the mountain. Also there is monument history museum and movie show explaining the history.
As we are done walking around the place, we decided to visit another monument at drivable distance, Jewel Cave National Monument. This is the place where there is third longest cave in the world. They have mapped over 173 miles underground caves at that region. We get to walk through the caves and see the calcite crystals deposited on walls and roof of cave. The crystals deposited on walls are truly spectacular, just as if beautifully placed by a craftsman.
This trip was short, completed over a weekend :). Here is the fridge magnet for our collection: