Devil's Tower in Wyoming--May 21,2010

We left Spearfish and arrived at Devil's Tower. It was created by magma forced into sedimentary rocks above it and cooled underground. As it cooled it contracted and fractured into columns. It is 867 feet from its base but stands 1267 feet above the river and the area at the top is 1.5 acres. It is just this huge monolith out there. We went to the museum first and then walked up to the base and decided to walk the 1.3 miles around its base even though it was gloomy and chilly and eventually we finished in a misting rain. We saw a guy running up from the river in shorts and no shirt and it was in the low 50's. Talked to some people who were going to climb it the next day. Records of climbs have been kept since 1937. Approx. 5000 climbers come from all over the world every year. Over 220 routes have been used in climbing the Tower. It is also very important to the Indians still. They come and leave prayer cloths tied to limbs. Quite a place. We stayed all night in the campground on the premises. It rained. We've had a lot of gloomy, rainy 50's. We left there early to move on.