6/28/13
I drove 430+ miles today. That is equivalent to driving from Lowell, MA to Washington DC
View Day 8 in a larger map
The first 1/2 of this drive was awful.. The wind was wipping me back and forth. I was hunched over my gas tank most of the day and having to constantly be gripping the handlebars. This is now the second day in a row like this my shoulders are tense and tight, my neck is sore, and my wrists hurt from having to be gripping the handle bars securely waiting for the next gust of wind that I have to react to.... NOT FUN.... I can usually ride for atleast 90 miles if not 150 without getting off of my bike... I was going 30 to 40 miles and just getting off to relax (both yesterday and today)
2/3s of the way to the Missouri River I started seeing sign for the worlds only Corn Palace
I couldn't help myself and I stopped in Mitchell, SD to get a look at whatever a corn palace is.. It turns out it is a giant building and the entire facade (exterior of the building) is made up of corn plant parts, either the stalks, the corn itself, leaves etc...
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Whoops! I put it on the wrong day! Again here you go but in the correct spot this time...
Entire facade made of corn (excluding the bricks that are exposed on the bottom portionof the building)
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After about another hour and a half from Mitchell, SD I started to approach the Missouri River... No bear in mind that literally the entire day has been going through flat windy farmland... and I mean flat.. I feel like you can see for days!!
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| Notice the land is flat |
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| Suns going down... Still flat |
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| Yup you got it... still flat |
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| ....and it's still flat..... |
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| My neck was getting whipped around so much that I turned the video on myself Dont Mind all the bugs you see on my hemlmet, jacket etc... its just part off life.. Definitely don't breath through your mouth!! I try to ride with the visor up sometimes for air flow (it's hot) and I had a bug explode in my nose!! it was disgusting... I took my glove finger up to my nose to wipe anything away while making sure not breath in... It was a nasty sulfur yellow... ughhhh gross!!!! |
I was so thankful my good friend Sean got me some bluetooth headphones cause I am pretty sure I would have lost my mind a long time ago on the road.. Especially with all this repetitive flat farmland... there are only so many corn palaces in the world to stop at to break up the monotony... :) How much more flat land becomes the question???
Eventually the road starts to climb slightly, and I am figuring like every other time I've climbed a slight hill that I am going to hit the crest and again I'll see miles upon miles of flat farmland... This time was different though! I crested the hill and all I could see is this river in the distance and the most amazing looking rolling hills! It was gorgeous.. Now I am not sure if it would have been as amazing if I hadn't been riding for over 2 days of basically flat farmland... Regardless, I thought it was amazing.. It was at this moment that everything changed!
I cant find that portion of the video but here are a couple pictures from a bit past that...
Cattle grazing in the grasslands. The further west I went in South Dakota the more all of the land became just grasslands!! NO MORE CORN !!
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| As you can see in the right hand side there is rolling terrain that goes on for miles!! It was gorgeous.. The shadows that were cast on the land were unreal!! |
Thankfully I changed time zones and that bought me some more time before sunset.. Now where I am it is two hours early than what it is in Lowell, MA.
I eventually got to my hotel in Rapid City as the sun was completely behind the mountains that are west of Rapid City... Biggest downside of driving west is that every afternoon the sun just gets more and more in my eyes as the day goes on!!
