Devil's Tower, Dead Wood and Sturgis

It was a 300 mile day.  We started at 7:15 am from our hotel in Buffalo, WY.  After gassing up, we got on Rt. 90 for about 90 miles.  Julie had instructed Cindy to keep it at 65 mph but after a few miles, Julie wanted to go 70 so she took off and passed all the Bikes and roared by Cindy hoping to communicate she wanted to go faster.  Cindy thought Julie just wanted to lead and see the wide open road.  We figured out signals when we stopped at Burger King to take a rest from the highway.  We got off road to go to  Devil's Tower which was really an awesome detour (thanks Carol!).

The road to Devil's tower was full of curves and a cool ride.  The cool thing about it is the legend.  There were 7 girls who were running from a bear and they jumped on a rock praying to God to save them.  God answered their prayer and made the rock grow.  The striations on the rock are from the bear claws trying to get the girls.  The rock went all the way up into the sky and the 7 girls became the constellation Pleiades!  It was a very awesome ride in and out.

After Devil's Tower, we made our way to Dead Wood.  There were lots of bikes there since it is so close to Sturgis.

The street was lined with Bikes on both sides.  The noise was deafening and the parade of bikes was constant.  We had lunch in Dead Wood at Kevin Costner's place the Diamond Bar and Grill.

After eating, we went to the Harley Store and walked the streets looking at the bikes.  The next stop was the Sturgis Ralley  Scott took this picture from his bike.  I'm the rider with the pink coat, Danny is ahead of me, then Bill is behind the mustang.

.  We rode in and stopped at the BMW store to look around and get a t shirt.

Now, Scott wants to write something.  Take it away Scott....Okay, now I can admit that there was an issue with my Beamer. During transportation, a burr on my front fork caused a ratchet-strap to fray and snap. The bike fell on Julie's Harley and broke my front brake assembly. Thank God, Bill discovered it early before any real damage was done.  He used his engineering experience and fixed the problem with multiple ratchet straps.  At first we thought I was done for but it turned out that I had little to no brakes only for the first two minutes after the bike was started each time. That still sucked because sometime I would forget about it after leaving a gas station, etc. I also had no cruise control at all. (I know, I was really roughing it). BUT, after two days of fiddling with it, I figured out a fix and with 2 tie-wraps that I had, and a rubber band and electrical tape that supplied by Bill, all is as it was; I had full brakes and cruise control. The BMW dealer said it would cost $519 to replace it but Danny found the part on eBay and bought it for me for $44!  Thank you Danny!

 After seeing what Deadwood was like, I opted out of driving into Sturgis.  I left my bike at the BMW dealer and rode into the fray with Scott.  It was like nothing I had ever seen.

By some miracle, Bill, Danny and Scott were able to find a parking place.  Cindy and Maria went a block off the main drag and parked at a church.  There were blocks and blocks of bikes.  The people watching was nothing like I have ever seen.  There are pictures I can't post on line of some of the people.  Let me just say painted bodies and let your mind take it from there.

We left Sturgis and headed for Hill City which was about an hour ride through the Black Hills of South Dakota.  There were so many Bikers and the people watching was great on the road as well.  Since my top speed is 70 I could tell it was killing Bill who was riding ahead of me to have these Hogs go around him, his BMW was chomping at the bit.

We pulled into our Hotel at 6 and walked to the "Rooster" for dinner and enjoyed some live music from this Jiu Jitsu fighter guy who played a mean guitar.  Seriously, he was going to Las Vegas to compete.  In addition to his theatrical playing he could have kicked everyone's ass in the bar simultaneously.  You can't make this stuff up.

I went and took a hot tub at the Hotel and we watched the sun go down over the Black Hills.

What a beautiful country.  As Danny said, the people on each coast may have the oceans but the Creator made some beautiful sights for the middle of the country!