Back
to North Calendar
Meet The Riders
Bamacyclist Home PageBack
to North Calendar
Meet The Riders
Bamacyclist Home Page
Payback...a great day on the road with a 5
mph
tailwind that felt like a gale . . . yahoooo!
| ROUTE: Chamberlain to Mitchell, SD | DISTANCE: 71 miles | WINDS: Light westerly |
| WEATHER: Sunny, low 90s by ride's end | TERRAIN: A climb out of town (below) and then pretty tame | TOTAL CLIMBING: 1,150 feet |
RIDE OVERVIEW: Yep.
A great day on the road . . . and I'm in the van. Aw well, luck of the draw.
Josh radioed a good oldies station, so I tapped out the tunes on the steering
wheel and kept myself--and at times the riders I passed--rocking.
Riders were in very high spirits today as they pulled into the SS set up at mile 35 at a little A to Z rental store/gas station/motel. Everyone was grinning and happy. Amazing what a good day can do to recover the spirit. Because the day was short, this was the only SS. I chatted with the pleasant woman who ran the store, and she told me that she and her husband had Gold Wings and had toured many areas of the U.S. The Eastern seaboard was next on their itinerary.
Actually, this seemed to be a day for chatting
with the locals. I was parked on a dirt road at Mile 8 waiting for riders to
come by this 
morning when a guy
in a battered pick-up pulled up to my window. He had a sprayer in the back of
the pickup and had been hired to spray a sunflower field but got bored waiting
for the wind to change so tooled over to my side of the highway for a little
conversation. Then I ran the line and pulled over at another dirt road outside
of Vernon. A guy in a semi-sized cattle carrier stopped and wanted to know the
details about the bike riders he'd been seeing. I gave him an America by Bicycle
catalog. Wonder if we'll see him on a future tour? A migratory beekeeper (one
who transports his hives to farmers' fields for pollination) turned down the
dirt road too and I was hoping he'd stop for a chat as I once kept bees, but he
trundled his flatbed loaded with supers on down the line. I've been noticing
groups of hives set up in fields for the past couple of weeks now.
Today's route only reinforced my opinion of South Dakota as the state with the most roads that go off into nowhere. I know, I've said that before, but it seems to keep coming up. At least today riders saw some trees lining the roadway, but several times the road was so straight and flat that it seemed to go on forever. Over the course of the entire 71-mile route today, I think riders saw maybe 3 stores, until they arrived in Mitchell. It's really desolate out here. We have only one more day in SD before we have another day off. I'm ready and I'm sure the riders are too. Tomorrow is forecast to be another hot one, so I'm beginning my hydration program as I type (with a tall iced coffee, Bill). I know, I know, coffee won't help me hydrate, quite the contrary, but I promise to switch to water and juices after I've enjoyed this delectable brew.
Well here we are in "a-maize-ing"
Mitchell, SD, a little corn crazy prairie town (its radio call letters are KORN)
and home to the world's one-and-only Corn Palace. The citizens of Mitchell built
the first Corn Palace in 1892 when some of the early settlers decided to put
some of their harvest on rather than in the concrete reinforced building
with its dome and four turrets. Every spring following that, the exterior of the
building is completely covered with thousands of bushels of native South Dakota
corn, grain, and grasses arranged into large murals. Each color of corn (and
they use 11 different color varieties) is grown in separate fields so it
won't cross-pollinate. The Corn Palace serves as a tourist draw, as a huge
auditorium for touring celebrities, as a sports arena for the various Kernels
teams, and as the locus of Corn Palace Week, the high water mark of Mitchell's
yearly social calendar. Corn Palace Week marks the end of the harvest--and the
beginning of planning for next year's Palace theme. Last year's theme was Lewis
& Clark. This year's theme is "Life on the Farm." The Corn Palace has one more
title: World's Largest Bird Feeder. After Corn Palace Week ends and winter sets
in, local pigeons, squirrels, and birds make a feast of the murals.
Almost everyone got in early
today (some well before noon) and spent the afternoon sightseeing downtown. I
got to town early too, so decided to find a beauty saloon and get my hair cut. I
have a 2 o'clock appt. and hope I don't trade my present sheepdog look for a
poodle-do or worse yet, a hairless Mexican Chihuahua. Several are also planning
on attending the rodeo this evening. That should be a treat . . . all these
people with funny tan lines sitting in the bleachers watching others trying to
ride things that can buck them off.
Tomorrow we ride to Sioux Falls and our much needed rest day. See you then. Susan
HEARD ON THE ROAD TODAY:
 | "Chips Ahoy!" |
| "This is a good day on my manic-depressive swing." |
| "What would Josh do?" |
| Dianne: "JOHN, WE'RE HAVING LUNCH IN
MITCHELL BEFORE GOING TO THE MOTEL. DO YOU WANT TO JOIN US?" John: "The louder you talk the better I can understand what you're saying." |
| "Boy, today I felt like Eddy Merckx." "You feel that strong do you?" "Not really, he's in his 70s." |
DUH! OF THE DAY: Everybody gets a DUH of the day today, or just about everyone; about 95 percent of the riders went down a one-way street the wrong way after breakfast to get on route. 'Course the street was virtually empty, but nonetheless . . .
|
PHOTOS OF THE DAY |
|
|
Karen rode sweep with Me today and we had so much time on our hands that Karen took the time to help Farmer Fred in his father's freshly farmed fodder field. After pulling Mike all morning, this was fairly fun. |
The welcome at the motel was special today for Larry...how did they know?
|
|
In the "Don't try this at home department," Karen and I went playing today and just couldn't resist one of the hay bales along the road . . . let's see, this is how the "X-games" folks do it.
|
There! Made it! Piece of cake!
|
|
The thrill of victory!
|
Maybe I should have given the dismount a little more thought or I should have read the "How to ride down" instructions more carefully...oops! Dang. And just after I uttered the famous last words of a Redneck, " Hey Bubba watch this!" Don't worry, I'm OK! I think. |
