Days 2 and 3 out of 5

Holy shit, I don't even know where to begin. First, I woke up at 0530 to try to hit the road as early as possible. I've probably said it to a few of you before hand but I really was not looking forward to yesterday's drive. 13 hours in one day really isn't all that fun...at least I thought then. I left Peter's around 0550-0600 and managed to land myself right in the middle of Chicago rush-hour traffic. Once I got out of the city and the suburbs, that's when I first started drive through rural America. Now, the last time I was in Illonois before monday was in the early 90s (1990 I belive) for my cousin's wedding. So to me, Illinois was a foreign land. For some reason, I get excited when I know I'm going to be driving through a state I've never been to or remember. Illinois went by pretty quick as my journey brought me into Wisconsin probably a little over an hour after I left Chicago. Now I was excited because I had truly never been to Wisconsin. Well, that excitement died off as the scenery really didn't change much until I crossed the Mississippi which was a really big deal to me because 1) I like really big bodies of water and 2) I've never driven that far away from home, let alone that far in the U.S. Minnesota was actually pretty cool for the first 50 to 75 miles but as I started to drift into the Great Plains, that excitment once again, died pretty quickly. Now for those of you that have an ifinity for the midwest, don't get me wrong, it's beautiful out there. That's the heart of America we're talking about people! When you drive for 700 miles through it by yourself, however, it can really wear down on you. I can't even begin to tell you how miserable it was. Well, I take that back. It wasn't too bad. When it really started getting bad in Minnesota, I started counting down the hours and miles to Souix City, SD which I knew was 347 miles to Rapid City where I was stopping for the night. South Dakota wasn't all that great either until I crossed the Missouri River. One things for sure is that the Mississippi ain't got shit on the Missouri River. If you think the Mississippi River valley's breathtaking, drive over the Missouri on I-90. That was one of the highlights of my trip. Once I crossed the Missouri, South Dakota was starting to lose its gold blankets of fields and was starting to get a little rugged.

That was the first thing I noticed about the hills of South Dakota as you got close to the Black Hills: they look like God put a green blanket over a bunch of dirt mounds and put a few trees and bushes here and there. It's not like you can distinguish clumps of grass or grass blades. It literally looks like a green blanket smoothly rolled over the hills. I don't know. It's hard to describe. If you've seen them you know what I'm talking about. If you haven't, check my pictures out. I had never seen them before so I thought it was pretty interesting. I didn't get to Rapid City until about 2000-2100 (Note: about 100 miles east of Rapid City lies the border between Central and Mountain time so I gained an hour once I hit that line). I'm glad I kept wasting time stopping to eat and stretch and I'm also glad that the trip took as long as it did because man, I have never seen a more beautiful sunset than that in the Black Hills of South Dakota. I truly can't describe it. The pictures may help but its something that you have to see for yourself. There were one or two people I was wishing I could have experienced that sunset with :-)

Rapid City....what can you say about it? I think an episode of Cops was filmed there. I'm not one to judge a city or its people but there were a few places where I was definitely on my guard. When I got my lavish room at the Time Out Inn, I decided I had some time to kill so I walked out of my motel room about 30 feet into a bar and had a beer. The bar was pretty empty except for two locals and the bartender. This pretty laid-back native-american dude sat next to me and we started talking. He bought a round of shots, we talked for another hour and I was off to a pool hall he recommended. Another beer and a round of pool later, I was walking out of the pool hall only to come across this one guy taking care of 3 incredibly intoxicated older guys who kept asking me for a ride to "the" bar. Considering I walked and I had been drinking myself, I just told them that I didn't have a car (Despite clothing with logos that obviously scream I'm not a local. One of the drunk-ass guys falls flat on his ass and starts holding his ankle saying that he broke his "leg" and that it was swollen. EMT mode kicks in and decided to check his "leg" out. Well, he pulls his boot off and asides from a $50 dollar bill stuck to the bottom of his foot, his "leg" was fine despite his assurances that his ankle was so swollen he couldn't get his boot off. I tell him to put his boot back on and walk to the hospital (which was like 10 blocks away but at this point he's so drunk he'll probably forget that he was even lying about his "leg" hurting. He says he can't put it back on because it was "too swollen". I reiterate: go to the hospital. He says, "Ok, I'll go if you give us a ride to [the] bar." I walk back to my room and go to sleep.

I wake up the next morning at 0700. Take a shower, pack up, and hit the road. Today's trip was suppose to be easy: drive the 78 miles from Rapid City, SD to Devils Tower, WY. Since I figured I had all day to screw around, I figured I'd stop at Mt Rushmore. I mean, I'm less than 20 miles away from it. It'd be an act of treason not to. Mt Rushmore is located about 2 miless outside of a town called Keystone and damn if that wasn't one cool town. I highly doubt that anyone truly lived in the town as it was more of a tourist attraction once you were done with Rushmore, but it was still a pretty cool town to drive through none the less. I get to Mt Rushmore. Having never been there, it was pretty awe-inspiring when you're drive up to it and you pass the left (the Presidents' lefts mind you) side of the monument and you start to see faces. Someone once said when you see it in person, it's not as big as you'd think it would be. I really don't care what anyone says. I stood at the observation deck underneath it and it was definitely pretty fucking big. These two MX racers where there as well taking pictures of each other. I offered them a trade: a picture of me taken by them for a picture for the two of them taken by me. They agree: an easy and fair trade. As I left Mt Rushmore, I couldn't help but notice that the park had recently had a fire along the entrance road. Haha, firefighter mode kicked in and this got me really excited. Seeing fallen and felled snags, firelines, and a sea of charred trees really got me excited for the reason I had been driving all these hours which I had probably forgotten about somewhere in Ohio. I drove back through Keystone, spent $8.95 for the best breakfast buffet I've ever had, and I hit the road for Devils Tower only to stop twice to get some pictures of two fire stations near Rapid City.

Slowly as you make your way into Wyoming, the hills turn into ranchlands and you find yourself staring at more cattle than you can shake a stick at. The one thing that sucked about the drive to Devils Tower (as well as the majority of the day) was that it had been raining on and off and the clouds were really ruining the view. At least I thought so. I never realized the scale of the size of Devils Tower. Through crappy low-hanging cumulus clouds, I was able to see Devils Tower from about 6 to 7 miles away! When I actually reached the park, I was amazed as how it towers above the entire country around it! I mean, imagine a green blanket with a bunch of rocks underneath it scattered here and there. Then put a 10 inch brown cup on that blanket, gouge tracks all over the cup, and thats what Devils Tower looks like. Now, my original plan was to go there, do some hiking, and camp there for the night. Well, a few things sorta brought that plan to a halt: 1) I didn't plan on hiking too well when I buried my backpack and other hiking stuff in the back of my car 2) The trail was asphalt which sorta ruined the idea of hiking around the tower 3) It was raining, it was cold, and I was wearing jeans. The last time I checked, hypothermia and I weren't that great of friends. So the decision to stay or go was made between me and a quarter. Well, the tails side of the quarter told me I had to leave so I decided the only place to go was Billings, MT just because it was the only place I could get to that late in the day (1230 I left Devils Tower). I think that figuring out how I was going to Billings was the best part of the day if not the trip just because it was the first time I was straying away from what Google Maps suggested. So I took a route where I wouldn't see an interstate for a couple hundred miles. I took a Wyoming County rode for about 30 miles until I crossed over Montanna and picked up US Route 212 on which I spent about 130 miles. Some would call me wierd but I have no shame in saying that Wyoming and Montana ranch country was some of the most beautiful I have ever seen. Another thing I thought was sorta cool was being able to see 10 miles down the same road you're traveling on. I stopped twice along the way: Alzada and Broadus, MT. Again, call me weird but I like small towns such as these two I stopped in. Anyways, the day ends here in Billings, MT. I have 600-700 some miles to go. Since I have a full day left to waste, I'm going to try to drive through both Yellowstone and Grand Tetons National Parks tomorrow before I stop in Twin Falls for the night. Anyways, I'll keep you all posted as usual. I have photos as well: http://picasaweb.google.com/todd.bevans. Take care of yourselves and be safe.