Sturgis, hmmmmm.

Wednesday morning our little group left the campground around 10:00 am. Niles led us through some nice back roads and eventually we arrived in Sturgis where we planned to spend some time walking around and seeing the sights.

The place was hopping and we were having trouble finding a place a park. During the rally the entire downtown is blocked off for motorcycle parking only but since we were a few days early the spots were all full with both cars and bikes.

We eventually found spots near the end of the "strip" and started walking. What a difference from when Rudee and I were here a couple of days ago. Most if not all the vendors were set up and open plus the crowd had arrived and the sidewalks were full of bikers.

We walked the entire main street and then turned around and walked back. Here are some photos:

I even spotted a celebrity, Paul Tuttle Sr. from Orange County Chopper:

We all made a few purchases and were all pretty pooped from all the walking. We only saw one scantly clad gal. She was selling beer from a booth and left very little to the imagination (I didn't know they made implants THAT big!!).

Niles then led us back to the town of Nemo where we stopped in a neat little restaurant for supper. The restaurant was part of the 4 T Ranch which is a guest ranch that has been in operation since the 40's. They had a lot of photos on the walls of the old days and the place had not changed much since then.
After dinner we rode back to the 5th wheels and relaxed around the campfire.

Thursday was to be our last day here :-( and Rudee wanted to try for the Bad Lands again. We headed out early and made a quick breakfast stop before passing through Custer State Park.

I stopped for gas just East of Rapid City and decided to stay on a side road instead of getting back on the Interstate. The road was nicely paved and had very little traffic. Rudee noticed that something kept hitting her foot as we rode. I stopped and that's when we saw all the grasshoppers. There were thousands all over the road!

Once we got to the Badlands I stopped at the first overlook and the front lower 1/2 of the bike was covered with dead bugs. We even had grasshopper pieces all over our shoes and our jeans, YUCK!

We had a nice leisurely ride through the park, taking our time and enjoying the unusual landscape.

The visitors center has a gift shop and full service restaurant so we had lunch there before heading back towards the Black Hills. I took the back roads home and on the way we stopped for a break at a gas station near Rapid City. I stayed by the bike while Rudee went inside and that's when a large group of about 15 bikers pulled in. I guess my old Cop senses were on alert because I immediately thought these guys looked like trouble. I couldn't put my finger on what it was but when they passed by me and pulled up to the pumps I saw why. They were all wearing their "colors" (vests with patches) that identified them as members of the Hells Angels motorcycle club. Luckily Rudee came out of the store about this time and we saddled up and headed out pretty quickly. I'll use the bathroom at the next stop, thank you very much! :-)

We arrived back at the 5th wheel around 4pm and loaded the bike back up onto the Freightliner. We then drove into town and had one final meal in Custer. We made a quick stop at the grocery store and another to top off the fuel tanks and were soon back at the campground where I got hooked on. Rudee busied herself getting things ready inside and I did all I could do the outside to get ready to leave Friday morning.

We are all traveling together on the way home. I am hoping we will get at least 500 miles in tomorrow so we can be home Saturday, I'll keep you posted.

Oh Hail !!

Sunday morning we woke up to cloud cover and some light rain showers. Once we were both showered and dressed the rain had quit but it still looked pretty iffy. We decided to head into town in the freightliner and grab some breakfast.
When we came out of the restaurant the clouds were starting to break up and it looked like we may get to do some sightseeing on the bike.
Once back at the camper I decided to wash the muck off the back cap of the 5th wheel. I use a product called Protect All. You pour a cap full into a bucket and then, using a car wash type brush, wash an area and then just squeegee it off. I follow that up with a quick buff with a dry towel and it looks pretty good. Doing it this way you can wash using only a bucket of water and are not spraying the trailer with a hose since a lot of campgrounds don't like you doing the "car wash" type of hose downs.
Rudee helped me do the washing and I even got the ladder out and cleaned all the windows. We did stop with the back cap though and will need to do the roof and sides too. I'll save those for another day since to do the roof we will need to get the hose out and spray it down.
Once we got our chores done we decided to take a little ride. Niles and Ron joined us but their girls stayed home this time.
The skies were clearest to the west so I headed towards Wyoming. We rode to Newcastle Wy which is around 40 miles and stopped for gas. We had a couple of choices on the return trip and decided to head north east and loop back into South Dakota through Lead where we would turn towards home. We had plans for dinner and needed to be back by 4:30pm. Mike and Les Kennedy had invited us all to their rig for a Mexican meal and Rudee wanted to bake a cornbread cake to take over.
As we rode back towards South Dakota we were all keeping an eye on the clouds building to the east of us. They were large white billowing clouds and all I could think of was "oh no, here we go again".
We made it back to Lead S.D. and turned to make the 50 mile trip back into Custer when the clouds seemed to turn from white to black :-(.
They were still pretty far off in the distance and I thought we had a chance to make it back home and still be dry............. I was wrong .............. again !!
The rain started about 10 miles north of Hill City but it was not real heavy. We didn't even need our rain suits on and it was nice that the rain had cooled the temperature down.
Once we got through Hill City the rained increased and the temperature decreased, I was getting downright cold! Custer is only about 12 miles further so on we rode.
As we were approaching Crazy Horse Mountain (about 1/2 way) the rain started stinging a little more then usual. That's when I realized it was Hailing ...... OUCH!
The hail got bigger and more plentiful so I pulled off to the side of the road. Niles and Ron rode on.
Rudee grabbed her jacket from the saddle bag and we too got back on the road since besides the hail there was a lot of lightning and I really didn't want to just sit on the side of the road and get hit by either hail or lightning.
We rode about 4 more miles with the hail bouncing off us but when we finally made it into Custer both the hail and rain had stopped. Rudee and I both had some welts on us from the hail stones and were sure we would have some bruises.
I can cross "riding a motorcycle through a hail storm" off my bucket list now, not that it was on there in the first place :-).
We did have a nice evening at the Kennedys. Les made a Enchilada Casserole that was out of this world. We all gathered at their place and had a great meal and talked into the night before we finally called it a night and headed home. Thanks for a memorable evening guys.

Monday we were up early and, since the skies were clear, wanted to get an early start. The rest of the gang was just starting to stir so Rudee and I headed out on our own.
When we were here 5 years ago we started towards Devils Tower Wyoming but never made it. We were going to change that today. I retraced the route we had taken yesterday and we were soon back in Newcastle where we continued west on US 16. In downtown Newcastle we stumbled across a historical marker that denotes the spot where a cowboy named "Slim L" was hanged. Seems as though Slim murdered his neighbors because they owed him some money. The local Sheriff got suspicious when the neighbors were missing and questioned Slim who eventually confessed and led them to the bodies of his former friends and neighbors. While Slim was awaiting trial a lynch mob formed and took him from the jail at gunpoint. They proceeded to hang Slim from the railroad bridge in the center of town near the spot where the marker was. This all happened in 1903, I guess the old west was still alive then.

Devils Tower is an unusual volcanic formation and can be seen for miles.

The Indians thought it was a very spiritual place and still have ceremonies here. The National Parks Service does allow rock climbers to climb the walls (against the Indians objections) but we did not see any today.
We did see a guy who had parked his motorcycle on the side of the road and he was playing his bag pipes. Was a little strange to see a huge guy all dressed in leathers standing on the side of the road playing bag pipes, but I guess the differences in us all keeps things interesting :-).
We spent a little time at the visitor center and then loaded back up and retraced our steps out of the park.
We turned towards Huelet Wy and stopped at the Ponderosa Bar and Grille there for lunch. We shared probably the best cheeseburger we have had for a long time ......... ummmm good.
Once lunch was over we pointed the bike towards South Dakota again.

We rode through some small towns and eventually made it into Sturgis.

The rally does not "officially" start until this Friday. There were several vendors there setting up and a few of the bars were already open. We did a quick drive through and then decided to head towards home and find a place for supper on the way.
We ended up coming all the way back to Hill City before stopping at a bar and grille. We shared a steak and still brought 1/2 of it back home with us.

We were both pretty wiped out when we made it back to the 5th wheel. I built a fire and Mike and Les came over and had some s'mores with us. The rest of the gang soon pulled in (they had taken an evening ride) and we were soon swapping stories around the campfire.

No real plans today, just going to "wing it" and see what we can get into and of course I'll keep you posted.

RV Dreamers

I have followed the adventures of Howard and Linda Payne for a few years now. They started fulltiming shortly after we got the bug. Howard writes a daily blog and has started some small business' to help fund their travels. They even started having a rally once a year for "rv-dreamers" to get together. The little on line community they have developed has grown over the years. We have not had the chance to attend any of the rallies and have not met any of the others except by email or through the on line forum on Howard's web site ( http://www.rv-dreams.com/) until this past week.
Niles and Deb introduced us to Mike and Leslie Kennedy. They are a fulltiming couple from New Mexico and travel in the same floor plan Montana that we have.
Mike and Les are a great couple and fit right into our little group here in the "Hills". We got the chance to spend some time with them on Friday when we accepted their invitation to go to Deadwood.
We all rode over in their Chevy dually pick up truck. Mike wanted to do a drive through of Sturgis so that was our first stop. Well we really didn't stop because the only thing going on seemed to be a bunch of tents getting set up for the big rally. We were both hoping to see some "debauchery", from the safety of the truck of course :-).

We got to Deadwood and it was getting close to supper time so we scouted out a place to eat. The Silverado Casino was advertising "all you can eat" Crab Legs and Prime Rib and we quickly decided that was it. The food was really good and we all had our fill.

After dinner we did some gambling and people watching as we walked the "strip". None of us were big winners but Les did find a "hot" machine that kept her playing for a long time and she even cashed in a little bit and treated us all to an ice cream with her "winnings". Thanks Les!

We made it back to the campground around 11:00pm. The rest of our group had already turned in so that's what we did too.

Saturday we did some more riding and sightseeing. Here is a photo of Ron being "King of the World"

We rode to Wind Cave National Park to get a stamp in our passports. We bought these passport books a few years ago. They list all the National Parks across the country. Each park has their own stamp with the date on it and you can stamp your passport book when you visit. We have done several of these in the past few years and always keep the book in the bike. The stamps are usually in the visitors center at each park and are a cool way of commemorating your visit.
After looking around the displays some we continued on to Hot Springs S.D. which is a neat little Town in the Southern Hills. We had a nice lunch and then did a ride through town. The temperatures had really heated up into the upper 90's (Niles' bike said it was 99*!) and none of us really wanted to get off the bikes to walk around in that heat.

We continued our ride and ended up at Jewel Cave National Park for another stamp. This cave is huge with miles and miles of tunnels. They are still discovering new passages and "rooms" in this cave. They do have tours of various lengths but were booked solid when we were there. The cost of the tours are a pretty good bargain varying from $4 - $8.

We headed back towards Custer where Rudee and I stopped in town to grab a few groceries. Niles offered to do the cooking tonight on his grille and we picked up some thick pork chops for him to toss on for us.
As we were grilling the daily thunderstorm rolled through. We huddled under Nile's and Deb's awning trying to stay dry and it brought back memories of the four of us on that patio a couple of days ago :-).
The rain quit before the meat was done and we were able to enjoy a "dry" meal.

This morning it has been raining off and on and looks like it may be this way for awhile. We may need to get the Freightliner out and do some "touring" in it. That will be a first for us, it usually just gets to pull the 5th wheel around and then sits, neglected, at the campgound until it's time to head home. I'll keep you posted.