Rapid City, SD

Hello from Rapid City, SD! We arrived here last night after battling those swirly, side-tailwinds!! But let me start from where we left you last in Presho. We had a nice breakfast at a cafe (the ONLY cafe in Presho) and headed out on the "mystery road" along I 90 west again. It was a great road. Hardly any traffic, we really had it all to ourselves. Another hot, sunny day. Let me see if I can describe the terrain.............there's nothin out here except green grass, wheat or corn fields and a few horses and cows. We do see the occasional ranch. We stopped in Vivian at a truck stop and talked to two couples on beautiful Honda Goldwings with matching trailers. They said that they were on their way west with another couple on a goldwing but in Custer, SD they had crashed trying to miss a deer. The lady on the back ended up being flown to Sioux Falls, SD for surgery to repair her broken leg. So they were on their way back. What a way to end a trip. We were not sure if the "mystery road" continued or not, but we something that looked like it so we took it. We had been told it went all the way to Murdo, SD. In Murdo we stopped for milk shakes and tacos. They were healthy tacos of course, cause they had tomatoes on them. When we asked about our "mystery road" several people in the dairy bar said mmmmmmm no, not sure. So we stopped at a gas station and they said sure it does, but it is on the south side of the highway. So we found our road and headed west. Have I mentioned how hot it is?? In the 90 something. We had our friend the sidewind again. We saw some signs for an 1880's town that had some props from "Dances with Wolves" so we decided to stop. This movie had been made in S. Dakota. So THAT'S why it looked familiar. It cost $8/pp to go through it. It was very interesting and the "props' were kind of cool. They had Dunbar's (Kevin Costner's) cabin, one of the teepees, the fake buffalos that were killed, and the fake horse that was killed. They also had Dunbar's horse (Buck) that was one of the horses in the movie along with the wagon that he took out to his new "post". I think it was fun to see but I think it was more like $5 fun not $16 fun. Oh well..... We headed out on our rode to Belvidere our stop for the night. Since there wasn't a campground we decided to stay in the only place in town, the Belvidere Motel. Let's just say our friends Bill and Jill wouldn't stay there...........But it had AC, a shower and a TV that we could catch up on the news. We went down to the ONLY gas station and got vegetable soup, corn and green beans for dinner. We had a microwave that we heated them up with.

The next morning as we were getting ready to leave we saw five cyclists outside on the corner. I went out to talk to them and it turned out to be a family of five, the Talbotts. http://www.talbottadventures.com/. Dad and FOUR daughters ages 16-23. They were headed cross country going east. We had a nice chat with them. They were on two tandems and one solo. They told us that the "mystery road" went all the way to Cactus Flat. So we headed west. The terrain is becoming more rolling. We had a southeast wind, so at times it was a tailwind, and sometimes it was swirly sidewind. Todays temps were 98 degrees. But as one lady told us at lunch it was a DRY heat! We picked up our mail in Kaduka and sent home a few things. Thanks George for the mail!! And thanks to Mary from Alpha One for the cards that she sent us from Alpha One that give info about Alpha One to people we meet. It is really hard to explain Alpha One to someone in a 45 second conversation but were tryin. In Kaduka we stopped for lunch. On the wall was a signed picture from the BIG RIDE that is put on by the American Lung Association. It is a cross country ride. We couldn't read the signatures, so if anyone out there was on that ride let us know. We're just curious. After leaving Kaduka we road to Cactus Flat and stopped at a visitors center. We also went into the Minuteman Missle Museum. These missles were placed in South Dakota during the Cold War to protect the US. It was really interesting. Here is where we had to get back onto I 90. It really wasn't bad riding on the freeway. We had our own lane. Most drivers went by gave us plenty of room and even waved or blew the horn. All along the Interstate for miles and miles we have been seeing signs for Wall, SD. Carla back in Madison had also mentioned be sure and stop in Wall for free ice water. WHAT?? We finally got into Wall and went to the drugstore. What it turned out to be is a huge building that you could buy anything S. Dakota in it. And yes, Carla, we did have our free ice water! It was sortof fun just to walk through and look at the old pictures and history of the place. You can check it out at http://www.walldrug.com/. We stayed at the Sleepy Hollow Campground. We picked up food, mac and cheese and salad for dinner. We also got our laundry done. How many times can you wash the same three pair of bike shorts?? We are doing a scientific experiment to see how long they last. We met Jim, Karen and Maggie (Brittany Spaniel) that were camped next to us. In spite them being from Michigan they were ok and loads of fun to talk with.

Yesterday morning we ate breakfast in Wall at the Cactus Cafe. When we were getting on the bike several motorcyclists started talking to us about our ride. It was fun talking with them also. I didn't ge their names, but we did talk to them about Alpha One and gave them one of our new cards. We stopped at the visitor center on the way out of town. Our mystery road has dissappeard so we are now riding on I 90 again. The shoulder has gotten alittle narrower and to make it more exciting there is NO SHOULDER on the bridges! Wouldn't want it to get boring. We had a nice downhill outside of Wall but you always have to pay for that. We had a huge climb after that. An interesting thing happened as we were climbing. A motorcycle went my, pulling a trailer and dragging a gas can. We could smell the gasoline. We didn't know if we should expect a big fireball or not. A short way down the road they pulled over through the can in the ditch and kept going. We stopped at an information center and asked about a paved road off the interstate but they didn't seem to know of any. So we kept going. As we were riding on the interstate we looked over and saw a side road so we pulled off the interestate. Hap flagged down a rancher and asked if that road was paved and where it went. He said he thought to Rapid City. We took the side road. It was alittle more hilly but it was nice to be away from the traffic. We stopped in Underwood for lunch. The girl said there were five cyclists in there a few days ago. It turned out it was the Talbott's. The wind today was interesting. Swirly, side, rear, front................. Temperature 98 degrees DRY! We got close to Rapid City on our side road and then we couldn't figure out where to go. We could see I 90, we were on the side road. We asked someone and they didn't know how to get to the side road. Mmmm....well, all we can do is take that entrance ramp onto I 90. So off we go up the ramp, just around the turn what do we see....the little side road! We also see bumper to bumper traffic on I 90, and construction! Abort...Abort.....there's a hole in the fence let's go over on the side road. Great now were on the side road and now we see the ROAD CLOSED sign in front of us....oops. We can get around that Hap says. And yes we could. But once we got around it we see that the construction means that our little side road is now the off ramp to the HUGE TRUCK STOP and Information center. Which means everyone including their brothers and anyone they know is on the same little single lane we are on. We make it into the truck stop for a What do we so now break??? We get out a phone book, the best way to get a decent map of a city. Because if you asked someone they always say just get on the interstate and............ It looked like if we could just get on the bypass and go over Interstate 90 on the bridge there was a side road that went where we wanted. The problem??? The construction was ON the bridge so there was NO shoulder and two way traffic at a major interchange. See any other way?? NOPE?? READY?? YEP?? As we were going over the bridge traffic got backed up behind us but they were actually pretty good about it. We got over the bridge, made our right turn and got out of the way. We had decided to head to a campground on Rt 16 just south of Rapid City. We made our way through the city, made our left turn onto Rt 16 and immediately started climbing. This was the major rode to Mt Rushmore. It was a four lane road with bumper to bumper traffic and a small 3 foot berm/shoulder. The shoulder needed some work, it was very bumpy and full of holes. The wind was swirly, the traffic was close and Hap was having a heck of a time going straight. It was a bit climb but the biggest problem was all the other stuff. We stopped alittle way up trying to decide if we were going the right way for the campground. Wouldn't that be funny???? We started again, turned a corner and there was our campground, the Lazy J. Yeah! It was a nice campground, very clean, showers and even rented movies. They even had pizza delivery! So we ordered a pizza and sat in the family room watching a movie on the computer. It was a good day!! Until next time!