NEVADA, Mo. — Two men from Nevada, Missouri, have just completed the trip of a lifetime: They arrived at Mount Rushmore, making the entire trip by horseback riding.
People visit Mount Rushmore from all over the nation by car or plane, but two men didn’t like either option.
“They decided that this is the summer to take a trip from Nevada, Missouri to Mount Rushmore, South Dakota,” said Donna Rodriguez from Nevada.
Cris Rodriguez, recently retired, and Forrest Drury, an eighth-grade history teacher, have been travelling across the country for 51 days. Why?
“Because Cris is one of those guys that if you say, ‘Hey, let’s go do something.’ He would drop what he’s doing and grab a clean pair of shorts and take off. He’s an adventure soul. And, Forrest is just a fantastic young man,” said Jed Umphenour, a family friend of Rodriguez.
Umphenour and his family put Rodriguez and Drury up during the fourth day of their journey. The pair happily obliged as they thought they’d be camping the rest of the way.
“People would stop and see them. They would bring them grain, they would bring them water. They would tell them where they could stay. These are strangers. These are people that would show up and say, ‘What do you need?’” said Julie and Dave Mader, family friends of Rodriguez.
Dave Mader went 100 miles with the duo before his horse ran into some trouble and couldn’t finish.
“I can’t wait to see them. I just can’t wait. I keep looking down over the hill thinking, ‘My God, I hope they show up pretty soon,’” the Maders said.
Eventually they did, and they hopped off the saddle.
“Ground feels good. It feels good to get off of the saddle,” Rodriguez said.
It was all about what comes next.
“We had a job to do each day. And we got it done. We were saddled up and ready to go each day,” the two said.
It all started on the first day they were planning to camp. Where right off the bat, they ran into problems.
“That was the one night we kind of thought, ‘Uh-oh,’” Rodriguez said.
Where they’d thought to camp, they couldn’t. Distressed, a family came up wanting to pet their horses. After telling them their story, they offered them a place to stay. From then on, the people they stayed with would set them up with others along the way, always having a place to stay under a roof or the stars.
“Every day was like that, and then they knew somebody in the next town, and they knew somebody in the next town. The whole trip was that way,” Donna Rodriguez said.
“There’s a lot of good people out there. Everywhere we went people took care of us,” Donna Rodriguez said.
“We had our moments. We have no black eyes or anything like that. We never duked it out, but we thought about it!” Cris Rodriguez said.
They left on June 1, Cris’s birthday. He’d been dreaming about this trip for 40 years. He said it’s been in his blood. Also, Cris taught Drury how to ride.
“It sounded like an adventure that I definitely wanted to go on. His wife Donna said he couldn’t go alone. So, I figured I’d come and keep an eye on him.” Drury said.
“I’m thrilled to see my wife that I haven’t seen for a while. So, that feels really good,” Cris Rodriguez said.
“It’ll be nice to have a pillow again,” Drury said.
“We left on June 1, went out the Driveway and didn’t turn around,” Cris Rodriguez said.
