We're Off Part 2.... AZ-WY-MT-SD-AZ

[AzScorpion]

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[AzScorpion]

This scaled version of Crazy Horse is outside in the courtyard behind the visitors center. On the bus tour the guid said eventually the plaque you see will be sculpted into the mountain and the letters alone will each be 3' tall. To grasp the size of Crazy Horse all 3 Presidents heads on Mt Rushmore will fit from the tip of his nose to the rear (left) where you see the crevice. That area will be where his hair is flowing.

The way he's tucked in the corner you can't get the plaque in this next shot. You can see Crazy Horse from this area so I got a couple pictures where the scaled version and the real version are together. Here you can see how much is done and how much is still left to do.

The guide said there will be a 44' high feather on top his head. He said Crazy Horse never liked to wear a full headdress and only wore one feather. Inside the feather will be a lightning rod place through the center. Being where he is he gets struck by lightning all the time and luckily there's been no damage. They have already taken all the granite from the mountain to construct the feather and it's cut into four 11' pieces. The whole mountain is granite with a very high iron content.

Here you can see how it will get carved out.

 

[AzScorpion]

 

[AzScorpion]

This area had a lot of the old tools and blasting equipment they used in the beginning.

 

[AzScorpion]

This was from the base of Crazy Horse on the bus tour. The yellow rope is the diamond lace rope they now use to cut through the granite. I asked him how much they go through and he said all he knows is they buy it in 400' spools and they go through a lot of them.

The hole you see use to be used as an access tunnel There was a road going down the side of it but it was very steep there and became to dangerous. Now they constructed a longer road up the other side. The hole will eventually be the space between his arm extending (pointing) out over the horses mane.

This was a worn out piece of the diamond lace rope which he passed around so we could see it.

 

[AzScorpion]

When we got back from the bus tour we forgot to go through one small building that was out behind the visitors center.

As you exit there's a plaque and a steel plate from the Twin Towers from 911 out front.

 

[AzScorpion]

Hill City is a cool old town and they have a small downtown area with restaurants and of course shops. Annie needed her fix so we walked around for a few hours. This place is on the corner and is really cool with all the wood carvings. Check out the giant Smokey The Bear which is a good 2.5 stories tall!

These pieces aren't cheap either but there is a lot of detail and work that goes into them. Gen. Custer was $2,500.00

Next year I'm hiring these guys to guard my house!

 

[canyonslicker]

So I didn’t see lineage tree displayed there, it’s actually quite comical on some of the names like crazy woman etc.. a real document…

 

[Stevedbvik1]

Hill City is a cool old town and they have a small downtown area with restaurants and of course shops. Annie needed her fix so we walked around for a few hours. This place is on the corner and is really cool with all the wood carvings. Check out the giant Smokey The Bear which is a good 2.5 stories tall!

These pieces aren't cheap either but there is a lot of detail and work that goes into them. Gen. Custer was $2,500.00

Next year I'm hiring these guys to guard my house!

Too bad you couldn’t back the rear tires of MP2 onto Smokey’s hands. Would’ve been the all time money shot of Rangers

 

[Synfulz]

What amazed me is how small Mt. Rushmore really is based on your perceptions of pictures. Crazy horse is amazing.

 

[KJRR]

We were at Crazy Horse years ago and check in on the progress on thier website every few years. Always have to go back to our original pictures and compare to see the progress. There was a recent dirty jobs episode on it. Quite interesting.

 

[AzScorpion]

What amazed me is how small Mt. Rushmore really is based on your perceptions of pictures. Crazy horse is amazing.

When you're standing at Mt. Rushmore it looks huge. I mean it is until the guide told us this and it makes you realize just how large Crazy Horse is. You can take another guided tour up to the top of Crazy Horse but it's $125.00/each. Seeing as I flew right up to it in a helicopter last year I was good with the lower tour. lol

 

[AzScorpion]

We were at Crazy Horse years ago and check in on the progress on thier website every few years. Always have to go back to our original pictures and compare to see the progress. There was a recent dirty jobs episode on it. Quite interesting.

I was comparing the pics I took just last June to todays and you can see they've made good progress. The guide told us of a video online to watch but I habit had time to look for it yet. It shows how they use the diamond lace rope to cut through the granite.

 

[AzScorpion]

Too bad you couldn’t back the rear tires of MP2 onto Smokey’s hands. Would’ve been the all time money shot of Rangers

Yeah with another picture of me in the Hill City Popo lockup. lol ?‍?

 

[AzScorpion]

When you pay to see Crazy Horse you also get a re-entrance ticket for the laser light show. It's held every night at 10:00 pm and the ticket is good for 3 days only. Make sure you ask for this at inside the visitors center at the information booth. We only knew about this because the guide on the bus tour told us. I'm sure most don't know about this and last night there were only about 50 vehicles there.

The pictures turned out grainy because I was messing with the exposure before it started. It looks like I had it perfect by the first couple of pics of Crazy Horse under white lights. So maybe it's the lasers that threw it off but I couldn't stop to readjust it because the show goes continuously. You can watch it from the upper parking lot or inside from the courtyard. We chose the parking lot because it was cold (47*) and I could stay inside the truck until it started. What a great show and it's narrated (there's speakers) throughout the show which last 30 minutes.

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