Days Eighty and Eighty One....

FINALLY got the hell outta Pierre on Saturday Morning......

....now, not that Pierre's a bad place or anything. Not at all.....just spent waaaay more time there then I had planned to.

Good, friendly folks there, but nonetheless, I was glad to see the back of it....

Headed due West on South Dakota State Highway 34 straight into Sturgis, South Dakota.....an easy 175 miles. Stopped off at The Knuckle saloon and had the obligatory pint at this Sturgis biker bar.

Decided that I wasn't done riding yet (plus I gained an hour going into the Mountain Time Zone) and headed off to Deadwood, and took U.S., Hwy. 385 through the heart of the Black Hills of South Dakota. Turned off at Mount Rushmore, and linked up with Iron Mountain Road, which, together with The Needles Parkway, makes it pretty clear WHY they have the huge biker rally in Sturgis every year.

After the cruise through The Black Hills, I went to Rapid City to catch up with my old friend Wrong Parts Jackson, who I used to work with in the auto parts field many, many moons ago.

He still has difficulty differentiating between a headlight and a carburetor, but he tries.....















(from l to r) Tracy, Wrong Parts, and the ASUS EEE pc.

Went to the Moose Lodge Saturday Night to watch Wrong Parts and his team in a nine-ball billiards tournament, and hung out afterwards until 2am......at which time the Meese kicked us out..... Then, on Sunday Afternoon, went down to Hermosa to stay with longtime friends Ma, Cowboy Frank, and Ann, as pictured below -



















Was still quite enraged at Dunlop for the defective tyre......this mishap pretty much cost me a lot of time I had planned to spend in Rapid City, and, because of it, I was only able to spend one day with Wrong Parts and Tracy and one day with Ma, Cowboy and Anne......really pissed me off......

Left South Dakota on Monday Morning. Was a bit saddened, as I really saw things that I didn't appreciate about the state when I resided here many, many moons ago. A few things have not changed, however. Such as the fact that most employers still pay absolute shit for wages and salaries (six of the eleven poorest counties in the United States are located within South Dakota), and I also remembered that there are two or three very religious folks in South Dakota....














Headed out of town through the Pine Ridge Reservation (Oglala Lakota), into the Town of Pine Ridge and then into Nebraska.













Took a quick swing by Carhenge in Alliance, Nebraska, and spent an uneventful evening in Sidney, Nebraska.
















Gonna hit Denver on Tuesday afternoon and see my Colorado Rockies play at Coors Field.

-E-