Day 21

Day 21 started out with the normal coffee and tea. Then it was off to breakfast.
Peggy's Place was a bit expensive for what it was, but the food was good.

On to Badlands.

After a couple trips through the Badlands, it was obvious that this was one of those places that was best seen once.


The Missile Control room was next on the agenda. Doug wanted to see a real missile silo. It turned out, you couldn't see a silo near where we were, but we could go down to a missile control room.

 The gates at the Missile control base.

Above are some of the antenna for communication.

We went into the building housing the control room. The control room was 30 feet below ground and is reached by elevator. There is an 8000 lb door to the control room.

 Above:  Wall drug for free water Whoopee!
Doug, Jim Sandy and Pam head to the airport at Rapid City for a night in a hotel before the flight home in the morning. I rode the other direction to the KOA to get a campsite for the night. 

 Doug and Jim showed up about 9:30 or 10.
Tomorrow we'll be on the road again.

Day 20

On day 20 it was a ride around the Black hills and Custer Park.
 We took a wildlife loop around the park. We saw many bison, prong horns, sheep and, of all things, mules, mules looking for a hand out.

From Custer we drove across Needles Highway toward the Crazy Horse Memorial
This was a very cool road to ride across. Narrow, winding, sometimes separating into two one way roads, then recombining again after a few hundred yards.

 Below:  The eye of the Needle

Crazy Horse

The head of the horse will be larger than Mt Rushmore.

After Crazy horse we went back to the KOA and then took the bus to Mt. Rushmore for the night lighting of the statues. It was a pretty moving thing to see, and participate in.
During the lighting ceremony at Rushmore there was a ranger who was the speaker for the program. Again a very knowledgeable speaker.

The ranger doing the presentation at one point asked that all veterans come down to the stage. I'm in the back on the left.  Jim is to the right several people over against the wall.

He thanked us all for serving and then had us retire the flag. Pretty awesome. We got to be up front and on site for the flag lowering ceremony. One of the Vets lowered the flag, then six of the Veterans folded the flag. I was impressed, it was an excellent and properly folded flag.

After Rushmore  it was back (by school bus) to the campground to prepare for tomorrow.
So until tomorrow,

Day 19

Wow, where to start... the last few days are almost a blur. We have to keep looking for pictures to tell us where we were on what day.

Ok we left Devils Tower and headed for the Black Hills in South Dakota. We traveled to Deadwood and took a bus tour to Wild Bills grave site. Whoopee! We did learn that wild Bills wife is buried in Springrove Cemetery. During our time in Deadwood there was a car show setting up in the town square. There's a picture of a Chevelle that Jim wanted Jack to see.They're everywhere!




Doug thought this was classy.

    
After Deadwood we went to Sturgis. The bike rally has been over for a week or so. That's ok, we didn't want to be there during bike week anyway. We stopped in several shops. Bought a few small things then left and headed back to the KOA at Mt. Rushmore.
At the KOA we had a tent site a half mile back at the end of the property. We had a stream with a rock bridge. I'd show you a picture, but I can't load pictures anymore today. Jim almost fell in. No problem, we would have found him inside 30 minutes. Takes that long to finish the beer.
After dinner and some laundry it was time to settle in.
Till tomorrow

Day 18

I hope I'm doing the right day, Gotta check the pictures. 

Today we left wherever we were.......oh yeah, Harden KOA. and headed towards Devils Tower. You know.... the rock used in the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

Once again the trip was pretty rough. Not as bad as yesterday, but a very tough ride all the same.
Our destination was The Devils Tower, but we did have other stops in mind. We first headed for the Memorial park for the Battle of Little Bighorn. Also known as Custers last stand. We have lots of pictures from the park, but we can't load them again. The battlefield is also home to the Custer National Cemetery. This cemetery has soldiers and others from the 19th century American West up through the present day. It was started from the Battle of Little Bighorn.  There are only 50 private plots left in the cemetery. If they want to expand, congress must approve.
While here at Little Bighorn, we heard a presentation from a Ranger of the events of the battle at Little Bighorn. This was very interesting and he was extremely knowledgeable on every aspect of the battle. He said he studied it for 25 years.
We viewed some of the monuments and the grave sites of the soldiers and warriors from both sides.
 Including the monument to 39 horses found dead on the hill. Custer himself is buried at West Point.
From Little Bighorn, we traveled to Devils tower.
I don't remember all the highways we traveled getting there, but, we did get there. All I know is I followed the guy on the black bike and before I knew it, we were there. That was another rough ride. The wind beat the stuffing out of us all the way.
When we got to the Devils Tower Sandy, Jim and Doug went up to the tower for a mile and a half walk around the base. From the path they could see the campground. Jim mentioned that the campground property was used in the movie. It was not the KOA at the time. 
We stayed at the KOA at the bottom of Devils Tower. At the KOA they show the movie, Close Encounters every night at nine.
Doug and I were working on the blog in the restaurant when some lady came in and asked us how to get in touch with rescue at the tower. She had seen some lights on the tower walls, she shined her light at them and they shined their light back. She thought they might be in trouble. We informed her that they were climbers and they wanted to stay on the wall for the night. They would not appreciate a rescue attempt.  She seemed surprised.

I'll load pictures when I can
Till tomorrow.

Day 17

Today we woke up in Great Falls Montana. First stop was the Harley dealer for a light bulb for my bike. The light bulb didn't fix the problem , so I have some work to do when I get home. From here it was on to breakfast at the 4B's restaurant. Food was ok and we were fueled up for the trip.
We made a couple of stops along the way, not too many because the ride was just brutal. at least 50 mph winds mostly from the south and west made riding very hard going. It was a relief every time we stopped for gas. We stopped here simply to rest and found this place

This guy had  little of everything. As he said, excuse the mess, but I started when I was six.
He should be on American pickers.
The riding was difficult all day.Very few pictures were taken, it was just too hard. We, at times actually had to lean the bikes a couple degrees just to stay in a straight line. This kept up for a couple hundred miles. All together we rode 320 miles.
At times the wind was so bad I was worried about losing my glasses. So, every couple of minutes I was poking my glasses back to a more secure spot on my nose. About every third time the wind would catch my hand and I would end up poking myself in the forehead. So every few minutes.....thonk....Must have looked strange to any oncoming traffic.
While riding we try to keep an eye on each other just for safety. Watching Jim a couple times was interesting and scary. I was riding about 80 to 100 yards behind him. I saw that he was having to lean a couple degrees just to go straight. All at once he was flipped straight up and shoved into the middle of the oncoming traffic lane. Fortunately there was no oncoming traffic. Knowing I would hit the same wind, I moved to the right side of the lane. When it hit it shoved me all the way across the lane. I was able to hold the bike in my lane but it was a real struggle. After about 50 feet, the wind stream went back to the normal 50 mph. That was weird! 
I'm no meaty urologist so I have no explanation for what that was. (Ok, I'm a tad meaty, But I"m not a urologist)
We stopped at Harden Montana to camp for the night. It was a huge relief to stop riding and shut down for the night. I think that was just flat a hard ride.
Till tomorrow

Day 16

This morning we broke camp then went up to the community building for breakfast. Again, all standard stuff, eggs, bacon, sausage, toast, pancakes, coffee. After breakfast it was back to business. We were headed to the Going to the Sun Road in Glacier. We stopped at the McDonald House so I could see it first hand. It is indeed impressive.
From here we started our trek across Logan Pass via the Going to the Sun Road. We made a stop at the Glacier viewing area. It is set up with a wooden boardwalk that runs up into the mountain about 1.5 miles. This takes you onto the glacier and the surrounding mountain side. Doug, Sandy and Jim hiked the whole way to the top. There they had encounters with Mountain goats.

Sandy and the kids.



 Doug had a rather close experience with a mountain goat. Apparently the goat didn't care if Doug was there or not. He had places to go, and goats to see, and he was going.

 Jim and Doug in a pocket in a glacier.
Below a view from the top.

Once we were back at the bottom of the board walk, we mounted up and were off again on the Road to the Sun. This would prove to be a very interesting ride.
The views from the road are just fantastic.

Every where you looked there was something different to see.
At times the road had a small stone or wood guard rail, other times it had none.

 

Small waterfalls seemed to be around every bend, and there were lots of bends in this road.

 This one below is known as Weeping Wall.

 Below is the "helmet heads" That tenacious group of bikers that just keeps on going.

 Around some bends in this road, however, there were to be some surprises.
Construction was everywhere. Many sections were one way only. except, sometimes they weren't exactly clear on where the one way ended. Sometimes you weren't sure until the cars showed up coming at you.
 Notice, the road is hard pack dirt with some small amount of gravel tossed on top.

 Remember, we're riding this road that is narrow, winding and very high in the mountains, sometimes with a guardrail, sometimes not.

 Notice here that one side is wet. In this location, only one side was wet. Other areas the whole road surface was wet. That's because, someone,(this has to be a govt. job) decided that it would be a good idea to SOAK DOWN THIS HARD PACK DIRT AND GRAVEL ROAD! What happens when you add water to a hard packed dirt road? All together now....IT GETS REAL SLICK! That's what. Some genius decided that it would be a great idea to soak down this high, narrow, winding, mountain road. You know, the one that might or might not have a guard rail on the steep mountain drop off side.
Speaking of this guard rail, mostly it was a stone wall about 18 inches high, sometimes a wooden rail about the same height. Let's think about this, on a motorcycle that's just below the knee. Now they water down the road. With this guard rail, the bike slides on the wet road surface, slides into the guardrail breaking the riders leg. Now, without the guardrail, the rider just plummets over the edge, has a nice comfortable drop of 300-700 feet then smashes into the rocks. The end. Think about it, with the guardrail at this height, instead of a comfortable fall, the rider is now in excruciating pain for those 300-700 ft. of falling, of course, ending the same way.
Who designs this stuff. Must be a govt. worker some where.
Any way, we made our way across the Logan Pass and down the eastern side of the Continental Divide. 

We stopped at some of the interesting sights along the way

Me and Doug somewhere on the eastern side of Logan Pass.

Day 16 ended here at Great Falls KOA. The spot was very comfortable. A couple of Moose Drool Beers and burnt popcorn, we were all set.
Until tomorrow.