Tour the amazing attractions & natural areas of the Black Hills of South Dakota
updated Apr 2023
Visitors to the continental United States usually head to California, Florida or New York. However, the Black Hills in southwestern South Dakota is an extraordinary place that visitors to the U.S.A. often overlook. This amazing area contains seven federal parks, monuments, historical sites, forests and grasslands.
Mt. Rushmore National Monument
Mt Rushmore is the only place in the Black Hills that is crowded. The monument gets more than two million visitors annually.
Mt Rushmore is a fantastic carving of 60-foot (18 metres) high sculptures of four United States presidents. The faces of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln take up the entire side of a mountain.
The faces were carved out of the rock by a Danish-American named Gutzon Borglum. It was begun in 1927, and the faces were finished by 1939. Borglum died in 1941, and the finishing touches were done by his son and completed in late October of that year.
Along with the Eifel Tower, the Taj Mahal, the Statue of Liberty and a few others, this is one of the world’s most famous landmarks. You have to see it in person to appreciate the grandeur of it.
National Park Service – Mt Rushmore
Badlands National Park
Click photos to enlarge
Aside from Mt Rushmore, the Black Hills area of South Dakota is little known internationally. While the Black Hills are mostly forested, just to the east of the area are prairie and badlands, and I have included them for this article. Badlands National Park is 242,756 acres (98,240 ha) in size. There are several so-called “badlands” in North America. This refers to an area where wind and water have severely eroded the softer rock, clay, and soil. As a result, an area of rugged and dry canyons, ravines, gullies and other strange formations such as hoodoos remains. The minerals in the geologic formations are often colourful and make for scenic photographs at sunrise and sunset.
Badlands NP is a mixture of badlands and mixed-grass prairie. The park is home to Bison, Pronghorn Antelope, Bighorn Sheep, Badgers, Prairie Dogs and other wildlife. Things to do in the badlands include touring the scenic drive for photo opportunities and wildlife viewing, hiking and camping. The rugged beauty of the badlands is a great place to spend a few days or more. I love it.
National Park Service – Badlands
Jewel Cave National Monument
With 173 miles of unground passageways, Jewel is the third longest cave in the world (after Mammoth Cave in Kentucky and Sistema in Mexico).
The cave is lined with calcite crystals and aragonite frostwork, which are typically brown in colour but clear in some places. A tour of Jewel Cave is fascinating and well worth the time and money.
National Park Service – Jewel Cave
Wind Cave National Park
click photos to enlarge
Wind Cave is the sixth longest in the world. The park was established in 1903 and was the first cave in the world to become a national park. It contains many rare calcite formations such as popcorn, frostwork, boxwork and flowstone. The cave tour is amazing, and I highly recommend it.
One thing I like about this park is that it is much more than a cave tour. The area above ground is one of the few remaining areas of natural mixed-grass prairie and is well worth a visit in its own right. The park contains a herd of free-roaming Bison, Elk, Pronghorn Antelope, Prairie Dogs and much more. There is a beautiful scenic drive, and the park is excellent for hiking.
National Park Service – Wind Cave
Custer State Park
Named after Lt. Colonel George Armstrong Custer, the park is more than 71,000 acres (287 sq km) in size. Wildlife include a herd of more than 1,000 free-roaming Bison, deer, Mountain Goats, Pronghorn Antelope, Mountain Lions, Prairie Dogs and feral burros.
I recommend taking the scenic drive around the park.
Lots of things to do and see here. You can even buy a Bison! The park can sustain only about 1000 animals, so each year, excessive Bison are rounded up and auctioned off. You will have some competition, though. Usually, about 10,000 prospective buyers attend the auction.
National Forests and National Grasslands
National Forests and National Grasslands are not parks but protected areas. Logging, resource harvesting, and hunting are allowed but only with the federal government’s permission. These areas are protected from private exploitation, and priorities are to conserve water, forest and wildlife.
Black Hills National Forest and Buffalo Gap National Grasslands are great places to get away from it all for some very nice hiking and camping opportunities. Black Hills National Forest contains Harney Peak, which at 7244 feet (2,208 metres), is the highest point in the U.S.A east of the Rockies.
Crazy Horse Memorial
The largest sculpture in the world, it features a statue of Crazy Horse on horseback. Crazy Horse was a Lakota Indian warrior. The figure is on private land and operated by a non-profit organization, including the Indian Museum of North America. The statue was begun in 1948 and is still not completed, but if you are interested in Native Americans, it might be worth a visit.
Minuteman Missile National Historic Site
A visit here will allow you to see a Minuteman missile site. Unfortunately, you cannot enter the underground complex, but you can look down into the silo to view the missile. This is an obsolete Minuteman II type missile that Minuteman III has replaced. Very interesting.
Summary
The Black Hills of South Dakota is a lovely place with fascinating attractions and outstanding natural areas. I thoroughly enjoyed my visit there. For snowbirds who spend their winter in the south, it is worth heading north a few days early in the spring and making a little detour to see the area. You will be glad you did.