About Rapid City  South Dakota

Map courtesy of Mount Rushmore Information

Patricia's route takes her north on US-385 and past Mt. Rushmore enroute to Rapid City from Hot Springs.

Riding the open range...

At first glance this sign looks like a "Prep School" but upon closer attention it is a correctional facility

Tight Rope Walking Goats.....

Now I've seen it all....

Photos

Well, maybe not right away...but there needs to be a woman on Mt. Rushmore anyway, so why not Patricia?

Photo alteration by www.photoenhancers.com

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Comments from Gabriel

Hi, ...Rattlesnake Gabe here, ...

I thought I would take a little time away from the temporary roadside stand I've set up along the route to pedal some of my "Fine Collectibles", (I'm badly overstocked on Elk Antlers right now and can cut you a sweet deal)...to drop you a line about today's episode.

Well... we lost all communication (cell phone and email) in Hot Springs and the previous town of Lusk. Very frustrating!!

But Hot Springs is actually a cool little town. With all the mineral waters there are lots of spas.

Today was only a 72 mile day, but was still very difficult with lots of uphill climbing and the heat...My God, the heat!!!

The air temperature climbed into the high nineties. Bear in mind that Patricia and I are acclimated to Santa Barbara's climate where 78 degrees is considered hot.

As Patricia started up toward Mount Rushmore the hill was very steep. Much of it at a 10% grade*  for around 9 miles. I let Patricia get way in front, as there are not many turn outs for me to pull over along the way to wait. I found her a little more than half way. She was dancing in the street. I thought. WOW, does she ever have energy to burn!!

Well once I got to her, she pulled over for a break. The only problem was with the flies. These flies out here are big and they bite you. She was being bitten by a bunch of flies and they drew blood like vampires, two little holes every time they bite. And then, as if to add insult to injury, as she was jumping around to avoid the flies she jumped into some tar on the road. It was like thick black gum and then the road rocks stuck to her shoes and bike tires. The temperature was so hot it had melted this part of the road.

On a happier note, after a few more miles we stopped at the Wild Horse Monument. It was spectacular!!  A little further up the road was Mount Rushmore. What a sight!

(Ah, the vicissitudes of life, not unlike the Hi-Way, full of ups and downs)

But with only four Presidents Rushmore was missing Patricia so as you can see from the photo at the top of this page, our [able, ingenious, creative and loveable] webmaster fixed that.

At the end of the day it was a great down hill run and then lots of climbing into Rapid City.

Patricia pulled off another day.  I do not know if anyone can imagine what she is going through and doing, unless you were here to see it.

She is truly a "Super Woman".

Peace to you all,

Gabriel

* [editors note: for those of you that have no frame of reference for "percent grade", a 10% grade is hard to even walk up for many people, much less pull a bike up with you. Commercial airport runways are never above a 2% grade due to the problems of stopping on landing and thrust reduction & fuel cost of taking off.]