Written by Dave

Day 37 – July 4 – 45 Miles, 1,734 feet climbing (Custer to Rapid City)

Our night in the tiny cabin worked out just fine. I think that I was the only one who slept through the entire night but mostly everyone else slept reasonably well. The snorers did not disturb the non-snorers. The biggest issue really was that Curtis and both Nancy and I used our sleeping pads which make a bit of noise when you roll over. Chris reported hearing all of us moving in the night. So much for our pre-trip research – we did trying to find quiet sleeping pads.

When we departed the cabin we had about 2 miles to ride on the highway before we could re-join the Mickelson Trail. The highway was concrete, as opposed to asphalt. I suppose to aid drainage, the concrete surface is combed with lines across the entire lane. After a day on the Mickelson, with no car noise, the highway car noise almost deafening. We were quite happy to jump back on the trail at our first chance.

We only had to ride another couple miles before reaching the Crazy Horse Memorial. We arrived just as they were turning on the open sign. The car park was still almost empty by the time we climbed the two steep hills to reach the visitor center. The last time I was through these parts, 1967, Crazy Horse didn’t really exist. Today, it’s a pretty amazing complex looking out over a remarkable mountain being turned into a giant statue of the Sioux Chief Crazy Horse. We arrived at the center just in time to see an informative movie about Korczak Ziolkowski, the Polish-American artist who started the project back in 1947. Crazy Horse was started to help recognize and benefit Native Americans – to date they have taken little government money and done lots of good work, including establishing a Native American University. Third generational Ziolkowskis continue to lead the effort.

We left Crazy Horse and hopped back on the Mickelson. We’d ridden about 6 miles when Curtis declared that he couldn’t ride within 9 miles of Mt Rushmore and not ride there (we are driving there tomorrow or the next day). Curtis peeled off and the three of us continued on the Mickelson to Hill City where they were having a 4^th of July parade.  We were one street off the parade route, where some of the vehicles were routing back to the start. Several official vehicles seemed to have “throw Tootsie Rolls at parade spectators” as part of their duties. We got hit by a few, plus managed pick up a few for sugar hits.

We escaped Hill City before the parade ended but we also left the Mickelson at this point. The traffic was quite hectic, or at least it seemed to be to our bike trail adjusted minds.  The route from Hill City to Rapid City was mostly busy highway. We could have cut over to Mt Rushmore but we’d already made that decision. At Keystone, we were only about 3 miles away but we stayed the course.

At the Keystone/Highway 16 intersection, called the Keystone Wye, there are two pretty interesting structural glued laminated timber bridges. I thought that they at least merited a photo. Later alongside Highway 16, there was another building (Sitting Bull Crystal Cavern Dance Pavilion) that had similar arched structures. Later I discovered that the arches at the second sight had failed quality testing during construction of the bridge and they didn’t really have any use for them and turned them into roadside art. Our host tonight, Lynn, was in the area when they built the bridge and informed us that it wasn’t really a QC problem, but rather, when driving the arches out, the driver ran into a bridge and they didn’t know how to verify there was no damage to the arches.

Speaking of Lynn, wow, we are so lucky to have her host us. She’s treating us like royalty with more food than we can eat today and big feasts planned for the coming days. She’s a long time friend of Chris and Cindi and a real whipper snapper. She’s helped us with lots of forward advice, filled in blanks like the bridge story and also given the handymen in our crew a few chores to work on.

Tomorrow we are working on bikes in the AM and hope to head to Wall Drug in the afternoon. Yes, Lynn has graciously offered to let us use her car – like I said, treating us like royalty. Posts to follow as our schedule allows…