There are four great national parks (more specifically, two parks, one monument, and one memorial, but who's counting) is the area around Rapid City, South Dakota. If you're going to be passing through the area, you'll want to plan a reasonable large amount of time to visit everything in the region. I didn't leave nearly enough time on my trip - and of all the places I went through on my trip (most of the continental U.S.) this region tops my list of places to which I need to return. I didn't actually get to visit the second two sites I'm listing here, but I'm including them for completeness.

The first park, and most famous, is Mount Rushmore. This gigantic mountain-side carving of the faces of four influential U.S. Presidents is perhaps one of the best known monuments in the nation. When you go to visit, you have to be prepared for the commercialisation that goes along with that fame. The site was recently (a few years ago) renovated, allowing visitors the experience of driving miles through most-pristine South Dakotan wilderness, only to come around a bend in the road and come upon a giant parking structure, accompanied by a line of cars during the popular summer months. I highly recommend parking elsewhere; there are plenty of nearby parking spaces that are totally free, and just a short walk to the monument. Some even come with a great profile view of President Washington. Inside the site, there's also a gigantic gift shop, which is probably larger than the sculpture itself. You should include a wide time window for your visit to the monument, since it can easily be shrouded in fog or precipitation for some periods of time.

Nearby (by South Dakota standards, at least) you can find the Wind Cave national park. This park contains the Wind Cave (who could have guessed?) which is a very large cave with a very small opening, resulting in a fairly strong wind which blows in or out, depending on changes in barometric pressure outside. The tourist demand has resulted in the blasting of a new, much larger entrance (suitable for visitors without spelunking experience) but this entrance is "sealed" with a revolving door, which preserves the wind. Inside the cave, there's a great deal of boxwork, a very rare calcite formation. Around the cave, there's a great deal of hiking trails, if you are so inclined. The visitor's center houses a number of displays about the cave, detailing the causes of the wind, as well as the various cave formations you can see in the cave.

There's also another cave in the region, Jewel Cave. As noted above, I did not actually visit Jewel Cave, so I don't have too much to say about it. It is, from the pictures I have seen, a very unique and beautiful place, which has yet to be fully explored (the explored portion is more than 110 miles long.)

Finally, there's Badlands National Park. This park is really the closest to the stereotypical national park, although it's geography is rather unique. The park itself is a good place to visit, because it is federally protected, and there are some well marked trails and park rangers available during the summer. The park is not really fundamentally different from the surrounding areas - you can see much of the same vistas and formations around Mount Rushmore, without making a special trip out to Badlands. A special note: from what I've read, you don't want to be visiting Badlands during the winter, unless you are prepared to survive entirely on your own for the duration of your visit.



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