Monday, July 6, 2020
The Black Hills are a favorite place of ours so no trip west is complete without a stop there on the way home. We spent the morning driving east on I-90. I completed another hat. This one does not require much long-distance running one color behind the other to form the pattern, and I like the result much better. I will do a variation of this pattern again. (Our local community collects winter hats, gloves and scarves for the disadvantaged in the fall, and I find it’s a good way to keep my hands occupied on a road trip or in front of the TV. I get to try all sorts of variations on color and pattern without worrying about getting it perfect the first time. Someone will like it!)
We had promised ourselves KFC sometime on this trip, and we were actually near a town at lunch time today. Well, a late lunch, but I could see on my phone that there was a KFC in Spearfish, SD.
We found a picnic spot.
OK, so the view left something to be desired, but the grassy median was nice.
We started down Spearfish Canyon Rd., the scenic route on the map. And it is definitely scenic with rocky black cliffs all around. I had wanted Steve to fill up with gas before we headed into the wilderness, but he was sure we had plenty to make Custer and the map shows “towns” on the way. We got maybe a mile down the road and the gage on the car that says how far you can go without gas seemed to think we had gone 3 miles. Uh… We turned around and went back to town, the gage dropping way faster than we thought it should be. When we reached town, I got out and looked under the car and sure enough, there was a steady drip. Uh oh.
A helpful gas station directed us to a mechanic, but he wasn’t worried. He smelled what was dripping and pronounced it water, probably condensation from the air con system. He thought the wind and the ethanol in the gas was just giving us really bad mileage and told us not to worry about it. We filled up with more expensive low ethanol gas to dilute what was there, and headed back down the canyon. In fact, it was 70 miles to where we were going and the gage dropped 70 miles. Thank you, Jesus. I was not looking forward to spending a beautiful afternoon sitting in a garage waiting for the car to be fixed.
We got to enjoy the first part of the road three times. It is narrow and windy and traffic was not light in this first week in July, so we didn't stop very much for pictures, and I have nothing of the most spectacular cliffs.
We were surprised at the number of beautiful new homes in the national forest near Cheyenne Crossing. Not sure what the deal is there. Although it would be a fabulous place to live, I don’t want to lose our wilderness to pricey housing development.
We avoided Deadwood and took a gravel road over a high meadow area to Rt. 385 and then down the asphalt through touristy Hill City, past the Crazy Horse carving to Custer. Crazy Horse was open, but last we knew they charged a high price per person (not vehicle) so we have always given it a skip. I really think they would be much smarter to charge a nominal fee per vehicle (like Mt. Rushmore) and then put donation boxes every ten steps. Way more people would stop, hopefully be impressed with what they see, and some become donors, perhaps even long term. But no one has asked my marketing advice…
I’ve been doing a lot of reading about Native Americans and our history together this past year. As we drove over the rolling countryside this morning with mountains on the horizon, I kept thinking of the people who used to call this land their own and the deceptions that led to its loss. One of these days I would like to travel with the specific goal of visiting Native sites and filling in the pictures that go with the words in the books.
The scenic route continues south of Custer, but we were tired of the car and stopped. Tomorrow will be exploring the Needles et al.
No comments:
Post a Comment