On the afternoon of our first day in South Dakota, we drove down through Custer State Park and Wind Cave National Park and headed to the little city of Hot Springs. We went because that was one of the areas Stephanie served in while on her mission and also because we wanted to go to the Mammoth Site. The Mammoth Site is basically a building built over the top of a sinkhole that exsisted 26,000 years ago. Discovered in 1974, today it is the world's largest Columbian Mammoth exhibit. They have found close to 60 mammoths in it so far as well as a giant short faced bear, various camels, llamas, and other animals. They only dig for 7 weeks a year and the rest of the year they process what they find but it was really neat to walk around and see all the bones they have found so far. I'm sure it'll be an active dig site for years to come. The boys really loved it!
One of the most complete skeletons they have found so far.
A tooth
Mammoth footprints in the dirt that filled the sinkhole back up.
We walked around and had to listen to our tour guide on these telephones.
They had a museum to walk though after our tour of the sinkhole and of course a gift shop. The boys, including Dad, all came home with shirts. We enjoyed it and learned quite a bit.
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