Cross Country Trip #2: Day 7 – Badlands

Date: 9/3/2019

Miles: 250

Where do I start?! Haha. We did so much today! It was the best day yet! We left Murdo and were heading to the Badlands then on to Mount Rushmore. We traveled down I-90 to save some time and it wasn’t much different than taking back roads. We actually crossed into the Mountain Time Zone, so we gained an extra hour!

On the way to The Badlands, we motored down the highway where we saw so many signs for the 1880 Town. We never stopped, but I used the GoPro from the highway to catch some images. I actually saw a real live camel too! It was odd! And of course Gabe and Christian missed it. Typical!

Shortly after, we got off the highway on our way to the Badlands. But, Christian WHACKED a bumble bee on his glasses, and ended up splattered on the inside edge of his helmet. So, we pulled over into the parking lot of a helicopter tour business. We saw a sign for cheap rides and we inquired about it. Long story short, we payed for a flight over the Badlands. It was an amazing experience. It was also my first time in a helicopter. I think I now have a new goal in life! haha I really enjoyed it. It was so much fun and we saw so much from above. It was really awesome!

Afterwards, we rode through the park and made some stops to take photos. Once we got to the point where we decided we had enough, which was really difficult, we headed towards Rapid City. The Badlands park is a place where every turn has something more unique, always leaving you in awe. I don’t think you can ever get enough photos! Although we didn’t see any bison, we were lucky enough to see some big horn sheep too!

On the way out of the park towards Rapid City, we traveled down an 8 mile dirt road. This wasn’t too bad, but there were some areas that were sketchy. We even stopped to take some photos.

At the end of the dirt road we cruised along and then my bike started causing issues. It was sputtering at low RPM’s and I was getting pretty worried. At this point we were in the middle of nowhere. When I accelerated, Gabe and Christian could see black smoke come out of my exhaust. We were talking using our Scala headsets and we were trying to identify the issue but to no avail. We thought I was running really rich (too much gas, not enough air intake). It was most likely my Power Commander V. So, I didn’t want to stop in case I couldn’t get started again. I made it about 100 miles before running out of gas. I actually had to use Gabe’s spare gallon of gas. Luckily, we were 5 miles from Rapid City, which is a populated area.

After filling up with the spare gas, it seemed to help and solve the issue. So, we got into Rapid City and filled up. Then we got some lunch and gambled a little. A lot of places here have casinos and electronic slots. We didn’t win anything. We were hoping I could win and buy a new bike haha. But afterwards, we stopped and got some octane booster and headed to Mount Rushmore. The bike seemed to perform normal, but I was still worried.

We got to Mount Rushmore and took some photos. They were doing a lot of construction, so there wasn’t too much else to see or do. But, we were amazed to see the faces. They worked on this between 1927-1941. It was interesting thinking of the labor involved and the “technology” they had at the time to keep the faces to scale. I can barely scale a stick figure on a piece of paper! Hahah.

After a short while there, we decided to head towards Custer National Park and ride these amazing roads in Black Hills. Along the way, some folks suggested we take Needle Highway and Iron Mount Road, so we did! There were some amazing views, scenery, tunnels, and the turns were so much fun. It’s been a while since we were able to hit turns like that. We got to go through some little tunnels and hit a couple corkscrews, if you will. At one of the tunnels, were were even held up by some Mountain Goats which was so cool!