We've already taken our one big summer road trip vacation and it was great. We traveled across the state of South Dakota, site-seeing along the way. We saw the Corn Palace in Mitchell, a great Sioux museum in Chamberlain and of course, Mt. Rushmore and the Crazy Horse carving, which was fascinating even though it wasn't finished. Even as a work in progress it has an extensive museum attached and was very informative and the kids loved it and well, isn't that what we are aiming for when we set off on these long voyages in the station wagon!! It certainly isn't the fancy motels or the screaming in the back seat. At the Crazy Horse museum I purchased a book called
Lakota Woman by Mary Crow Dog. Combining work with play I read it throughout the rest of the trip. Very good read about how our ancestors continued to be cruel to our original Native population through the 60's and 70's. Of course, most of us really smart people already knew that but this book helped me see just how senselessly cruel we were and are still probably. I of course grew up wanting to be a Native American...I wanted to belong to a tribe...I loved our family trip to Pipestone. And now I know that at the same time I was wanting to be an Indian, Indians were being subjected to awful abuses on their own small reservations. I recommend the book for anyone who wants to learn more about the Sioux Nation history including Leonard Peltier.
With all my ramblings I didn't even get to all the fun we had in Denver, CO for the second leg of our journey!!
