Thursday 27 June 2013

Day 13

Well today was my last day here, and all I had on the agenda was to ride all the great roads here on more time. I started by pounding pavement to Spearfish, where I headed down the Spearfish Canyon road. I figured it would be nice to ride the roads in the opposite direction, just to give me all the different views.

I tried to avoid the construction zone between Lead and Hill City, but ended up running out of pavement road. Not knowing how long the stretch of gravel would be, and not having cell service to check on the map, I turned around. It did give me a look at some new country I guess. 

The day before yesterday I didn't take the time to visit the Crazy Horse memorial site, so today I included that. It's incredible to think work has been taking place since 1947, but it is a big project. It was very interesting to walk around and look at all the old photos and all the different items on display. From there I headed down to Custer, hoping to take the Sylvan Lake road up to Needles highway. It was closed due to construction, so I back tracked up the way I came. 

The Needles highway, and then Iron Mountain road are my favorites from this area, great country to ride through with lots of corners. Riding through the tunnels in this direction was great, especially on Iron Mountain, where I got my last looks at Rushmore. 

It was after dinner by the time I got back to the hotel, but I had to pack up once again. Tomorrow I'm back on the road, and even though I know it's time to turn west again, I don't know what route I'm going to take. I will probably drop down into Colorado and across to Utah. I would like to see the Tetons on the way back, so I will see how to fit that in. 

Time to do a little more packing so I can have a relaxing start to the morning. Not many pictures today, as most of it was a repeat from Tuesday. 

Cool bike in the Crazy Horse building
It's a start, but at the rate they're going, it won't get done in my lifetime
That's what it's eventually supposed to look like
Cathedral Spires 
Looking west from Iron mountain

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