Sure enough, as the sky grew lighter, I could see the eastern bubble of gold that preceeds the sun. Out here, it doesn't crest over a mountain top, it lights up about half the eastern horizon, which, like everything else here, is flat as far as you can see. As the sun itself crested the horizon, I had to stop and take a picture (which I will hopefully upload today, if not, I'll let you know..)

With the roads now lit up, and the highway empty, I let the bike pick it's own speed and headed west for a few hours. At about 85-90mph, South Dakota, east of Misouri takes just over a couple hours to cross.

Then you hit Misouri, and you stop to catch your breath. You head down a hill towards the river and you are dropped suddenly into the foothills. Of course, these pictures do little justice to the change. Even a movie wouldn't quite capture the feeling of plunging down from the neverending plains to see this.

Shortly after crossing the Misouri river, I left I-90 and headed south to catch route 44, the more scenic east-west road. A tip to anyone following my footsteps, do not proceed without sunscreen. The sun here is vicious. You can buy anything you may have forgotten right off the first exit after you cross the river. Al's Oasis. 5 cent coffee that doesn't suck too much, and free refills. It is still mostly flat, but the fields are more often golden than they are green out here, and there are rolling hills everywhere. The feeling is drastically different than the flatlands I've seen so far. The occasional green ravines with small, dried up rivers running through them, are reminders that I am now in the beginnings of the foothills to the rockies. The most notable thing for me however, was the wind. It is desperatly strong here, never letting you rest, comming in frequent, powerfull southern ghusts. Everytime you pass a hill, the wind not only cuts out, but reverses, forcing you to lean to the otherside for a second until you clear the hill and have to face the wind full on again.

There was a section of about a mile that was without any hills. I was leaning at nearly a 45 degree angle the whole time, just going streight. I must say, I'm glad my bike weighs as much as it does. I have no idea how I would have survived if I was on a smaller bike.

Keep in mind that despite a few rolling hills, this is still flat country. For hours and hours, I have half a dozen pictures that look like this, that I won't bore you with...

Occational hills in the distance remind you that there is hope yet of closer horizon.

These forshadowing ghosts of mountains pop up now and then, and dissapear into nothing. It is a long drive... remember, I was up at 5am this morning...

Through the Badlands

Finally, after cresting one more rolling hill, I get my first glimps. Jeff, Kristie, you have no idea how cool this feels. Welcome to cowboy country, this is straight out of a (non spaghetti) Western. This is a rough, desolate place. Jagged rocks with barely a shrub, ribbed cliff faces like hundreds of giant fingers clawing up through the gray sand. These low clifs are interspersed with rotted out plains, grasslands that are caving into themselves, crumbling into the rocky grey dust that permeates this place. It is in this place that I stopped in a small cowboy town. I needed gas, and this far away from civilization, I stopped at every rundown gas pump I found, never knowing if I'd have enough to make it to the next one. After choosing between 85 and 88 octane, I stopped for lunch at a bar that said "Biker's Welcome", and "Harley Country".

If it hadn't been so early in the afternoon, I would have stayed the night. This place would have been a blast at night, when the locals and the rugged travelers that camp at the local camping grounds meet in one of the 2 bars in town. They showed me pictures of what happens here at night that makes any spring break destination look mild.
It will have to be for another time though. Or maybe I'll find someting like it when I cross the Rockies again comming back east.

After the badlands, there was a brief return to the plains that preceeded them, only with deeper hills and odd patches of trees. The trees here are weird: they seem to have no trunks, and go directly into branches. Desolate trees for a desolate place I guess.

From Desolate to Verdant hills: The Black Hills

After following 44 through the badlands and comming out the otherside, I met up again with I-90 in Rapid City (Western flashback... how many times does this place turn up in those old movies?). Instead of going west though, I took route 16 south into the Black Hills. The Black Hills are a high mountains, with slopes steeper than most New England ones, mostly coverd in some kind of pine tree, but the occasional skinny berch tree seems to survive there to.

Of course, the Black Hills are also home to Mount Rushmore, and I figured I'd be a tourist and take a look.

Well, there it is. Just like in the picture books. Unless you're planning to stay for a few days in this area (and trust me, there are lots of reasons to do that, plenty to do and see), don't bother paying the $8 fee to see the carvings. You'll get some historical broshures that won't tell you anything you can't find online, and a chacne to walk around the carvings. If that's what you're into then by all means, go, but you can see them pretty well from the side of the road on a couple spots.

The black hills are beautiful, and well worth the ride. You can't go fast through most of them, but if you're like me and enjoy winding roads through forested mountains, you'll enjoy this place. The other nice thing is that despite the scortching sun, the trees provide constant shadow, so it is a cool, refreshing ride.

I followed the roads towards Needle Highway. The highway itself isn't very long, but it has so many hairpin turns that it takes a well over an hour to do. Stopping every few minutes to admire the view didn't speed my trip up either....

Comming into the Needle Highway from the north, you will be accosted at a rangers station to a $5 pass. I didn't see any such thing coming out from the southern end, so I'd recomming doing the route backwards, and save yourself $5. At the beginning of the highway, before you get any of the amazing views of the pointy rock peeks that give this road it's name, is a picturesque little lake, high up in the mountain as well as an overpriced tourist feeding stop. Then you start the highway proper. after winding for a few turns, you find the first pass through rock needles, more or less thin, but generally sharp looking. Here I am next to a rock phallus... Here's my baby next to a bigger one... I'll let the following pictures speak for themselves, though they are just a few disjointed snapshots and cannot capture the feeling of this place properly... I have quite a few more, but this is enough for now.

After spending a very long time covering very little ground, the day was starting to come to an end and I was no where near as far as I had wanted to go.

I sped out of the Black Hills towards Wyoming.

Northeastern Wyoming, and Biker Hospitality

I spead through the border, racing the sun to the horizon. It was winning. Low on gas and light, I stopped at an odd bar on the side of the road in, 30 miles from anything else. The hills here look similar to the blackhills, but a little less jagged, with wider valleys of grassland, and an occasional red rock. There are substantially fewer trees here however.

The bar had a gas pump, with unlisted octane. No matter, bad gas is better then no gas when it comes to a bike. I pulled my bike up next to a couple others, and walked towards the place.
A live band was playing something between country and heavy metal, and a bunch of people were surrouding the free barbeque. I found the owners of the bikes and chatted with them. I inquired within about where to stay, and was told I could camp out for $5 in the back.

On my way out, some girl who claimed I had pretty eyes bought me a drink, but felt guilty about it because her boyfriend was in the other room. I told her she could buy me as many drinks, as long as she didn't kiss me she'd be fine.

I hung out with the bikers, who gave me an extra beer they had. We exchanged stories, and watched the clouds roll over as the last light of the sun dissapeared. The clouds were dark and ominous, and I had no desire to get rained on for $5, and the temperatures were droping at an alarming rate. They told me they'd show me a cheap motel if I waited for us all to sober up.

A few stories later, we were on our way to Newcastle. I found the hotel and by 3 am I was asleep.

Thus ended the longest day I've had so far. Up at 5am, on the road for 14 hours (not counting meal/gas stops), awake for 22 hours.

I slept in that morning. I left at 10 am and made my way north towards Devil's Tower.


The hills get thinner and thinner, as I am leaving the rockies for a bit. Still no flatlands though.

I finally make my approach to the Devil's Tower. I stopped for breakfast right after catching my first glimps of the tower, and headed up for a closer look. It is pretty impressive. You can't really see how big it is from the pictures, but it is massive. I would have stayed longer, but I had to cross most of Montana, and I had slepped in late today, so I couldn't stay.

I hopped back on the road, and headed north towards the border on I-90 again.

Day and Night in Montana

Eastern Montana is flat again. Golden grassland, low, rolling hills. I've seen the stuff for hours on end in South Dakota and northeastern Wyoming, I didn't stop for photos...

After a long but glorious day riding yesterday, I was about due for some rain. It hit me about an hour into Montana. The first few times, it came from just a single low black cloud in the otherwise blue sky. I didn't bother putting on my raingear as it was actually kinda refreshing, and I rode through the cloud in about 10 minutes.

Then the road turned north for a bit, and into the mass of black clouds that had started to eat the sun, and it hit me hard. With no overpasses to take shelter under, I hastely changed into my raingear as the rain turned to hail.

I was aiming for a town about an hour south of Bozeman Montana. Viginia City, and old mining town, home to one Peter Sawyer who my mother knows from her time in Vermont.

Through most of the way, the highway is straight with occational ups and downs as it follows the hill's roll. The speed is 75 the whole way, and people go 90.

My friends, no place does "nothing" as well as Montana. I stopped at every gas station I ran accross. Mostly that means every 60 - 80 miles. There aren't really farms here, just burn grass. There aren't really trees here, just struggling shrubs. There really isn't anything out here at all. Moreso than South Dakota or Minnesota.

The rain came and went all day, alternating between blazing heat and cool rain. There are wind issues here to, but nothing like the last few days.

About an hour away from Bozeman, the sun started to set. This is unfortunate, because it is about when I started hitting the rockies again, and the highway (still I-90) starts to wind.

I hit Bozeman in a rainstorm in the dark. It wasn't fun, and I was driving really slowly due to all the winding.

I stopped to refuel in Bozeman. It had stopped raining, but I kept the rain gear on just in case. The ride to Virginia city was painful. Unfamilar wet winding roads in the dark, with totally unpredicatble gusts of wind. I was going 30 maybe 35 mph for most of the 72 mile trip. Oddly, the trip felt to be all downhill. My memory of it, lit only by a short cone of light, is of an interminable dive into the ground.

Bizarly, when I rode it in reverse today, it was all downhill back to Bozeman. Very weird. Downhill both ways...

Anyway, I stopped in Virginia city, and after a little difficulty locating his house, I crashed for the night at Peter's place.

After 2 rough days riding in a row, I took him up on his offer to stay another night, so here I am, in Bozeman, relaxing for a day before I cross the Rockies.

Tomorrow: I leave Montana, cross the rockies in Northern Idaho and stop in Spokane, WA.

Itinerary

SD: I-90 -> 47 -> 44 -> 16 -> 16A -> 244 -> 16 -> 87 (Needles Hwy) -> 16a -> 16 -> Wyoming WY: 16 -> 85 -> 585 -> 14 -> 24 (Devil's Tower)-> 14 -> I-90 -> Montana MT: I-90 -> 191 -> 84 -> 287