Annieoakley53's Blog

Rob had dropped off the TriGlide the previous evening at the local Harley shop for our 5,000 mile service, so we planned our day around the time we’d need to pick up the bike. Chloe was depressed that we were heading out again, and leaving her alone!

First, we headed west to visit the Amana colonies – a German pietist settlement that lived successfully in a communal manner for 80 years. There are still pietists in these settlements, but others have come to live in the area and have outvoted them. We went through the museum – the curator was a member of the group, and was informative and charming. The gift shop had many handmade toys and crafts. The settlement members had all been taught to knit – simplicity and industry were tenets of their faith. All worked for the common good.

We had lunch in the Ronneburg restaurant in the community, which had been a community building originally. Good German food. The people in the shops, the museum and the restaurant were all friendly and informative.

After we finished looking through the shops and the museum, we started toward the Kalona settlement, an Amish community. We had heard the bakery had very good sourdough bread. On the way there, we saw several horse-drawn buggies and wagons. We stopped at the bakery and bought the bread and some other goodies we discovered – including some “Dutch letters” – a wonderful almond paste cookie shaped into letters of the alphabet. They are made in Pella, IA – famous for its May tulip festival and Dutch settlers. Very yummy.

Then we headed toward Riverside, the future birthplace of James Tiberius Kirk, Captain of the USS Enterprise. We found the location and made a donation to the federation class of 2.5.

Then we moved on to find the USS “Riverside” – live long and prosper, fellow Trekkies!

We also found the museum with a time capsule to be opened when Kirk is finally born. 🙂

Wednesday was our day to make plans for the week. We decided to take the Channel Cat across the Mississippi, and walk around the historic village of East Davenport, and have lunch at Lagomarcino’s – a family-owned soda fountain/candy shop that has been in business since 1908.

We crossed the river into Illinois and boarded the cat. This is a covered “water taxi” that stops several places along the Mississippi. There were excited groups of small boys waiting to get off to tour the John Deere factory. The cost is very reasonable – $6 per adult, $3 per child (under 2 years of age is free).

The Mississippi is wide and muddy. As we cruised along the banks, visions of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn came to mind. The low hanging branches just above the waterline seem iconic.

We disembarked at East Davenport and walked around the historic town. It’s full of quirky shops in old buildings. Rob got a real kick out of the Iowa (quilt scrap) version of the peace flags we see all over Portland.

There was also a pocket park which reminded us of home.

We then headed to the historic soda fountain for lunch – it was very charming, and the food was quite good. There were candies galore!

We then boarded the cat for a cruise back across to Illinois and the car.

After our tour, we took a drive up into the historic neighborhoods. I’d been impressed with the gorgeous old Victorian mansions on the heights overlooking the river when I’d come out for my niece’s wedding, and wanted Rob to see them. There is one particular spot that overlooks the river and showcases some of the most well-kept and beautiful old homes.

We headed back home to Sally’s for the afternoon, and then she took us to an Iowa institution for dinner – the Iowa Machine Shed – with probably the best pork I have ever eaten, all in a farmer-themed setting.

Then it was on to visit our niece and husband and their children, and to dessert at another Iowa institution – Whitey’s Ice Cream shop!

August 10th

This part of our ride was spent regretfully leaving the Black Hills and heading toward the freeway. The 10th was a clear day, and not too hot – fortunately, for we had many miles to cover once we hit I90. We hit the freeway in good order. The sunflower and soy fields flew by. This part of South Dakota is fairly flat, with much agriculture – at least along the I90 corridor.

On leaving South Dakota, we drove into the southwestern corner of Minnesota! Another state into which we have finally ventured – if only on an edge. We stopped about every 60-100 miles to stretch our legs and move around. We traveled east until we came to I35, where we headed south, into Iowa. By this time, it was getting to be evening, and we were concerned that we weren’t seeing many gas stations or places to stay off the highway. The first city we saw signs for that looked like it might have accommodations was Mason City. It turned out to be 10 miles off the highway, and was a very depressed town – with a Harley dealership (closed) but virtually no roadside accommodations. We got back on the bike and headed back to I90. The next reasonable spot to stop was a rather shabby Best Western in Williams. We pulled in there, grateful to find a place to stay. We dined on the Iowa version of Totino’s pizza. We were safe and dry. What more could one ask?

August 11th

We headed out for Davenport at the crack of 10am. We must have needed the sleep! There was a rather nice breakfast available in the motel. The weather was clear and warm. I saw one cloud on the horizon. The only shade one finds on the highway in the Midwest when it’s sunny and hot is that offered by an occasional cloud. After a couple of hours of riding, we noticed many more clouds gathering.

Rob commented that at least there were rolling hills and trees to see – and rivers. The weather grew hotter.

We finally arrived in Davenport – and found my sister’s place. We’d made it! 2,500 miles so far on this trip!

Sally took us for a drive over to Burlington (IA), where a new and beautiful restaurant has been opened in the old hospital – Martini’s, overlooking the Mississippi.

Rob and I are impressed with all the beautiful Victorian era homes built on the hills above the floodplain of the Mississippi.

We had a delicious dinner (fully making up for our cardboard pizza) and watched the river roll by. It was delightful! Our visit to Iowa is off to a great start – cicadas and all.

Saturday, August 8, dawned nice and clear but cool. Thunderstorms were forecast for the afternoon. This was our day to travel around the area and check out the 75th annual motorcycle rally which was Sturgis 2015. We had heard stories from travelers we met leaving the area – that the town had been closed and 3000 bikes had been turned away, that there were over a million bikers this year, and that the body count for biker lives lost was 9 (as of Thursday, 8/6). Our friends had been through the area, but never during bike week. I think they were shocked as we approached Custer that every surrounding town was part of the rally. There were bikes everywhere. We headed into Rapid City SD to look at the Harley dealership there. It was crowded, as usual, but we got there early and left as the crowds began to arrive and the weather grew hotter. Then we headed into Sturgis.

Mr Bill was shocked.

It was overwhelming, as usual – and this was Saturday, the last day of the rally. None of us could imagine how much worse it must have been earlier in the week. We lost each other multiple times in the crowd, and grew hot and tired. Pretty soon, we found the few things we wanted to get – Rob and I got our rally patches and had them sewn on – and we headed out of town to take a look at Deadwood, and then to Hill City to catch the 1880s train to Keystone (which is operated by a steam locomotive). On the way there, we lost our friends again and suddenly, Rob saw a biker hit the guard rail – he was thrown from his bike, which kept going. We went to assist as we could. There were many bikers there doing what they could to help. He was pretty badly injured; luckily, he was wearing his helmet. Fortunately for him, a nurse, a paramedic and a fireman stopped to render assistance, and I called 911. He was well taken care of, but it was a very sobering moment. I am keeping him in my prayers – and his son, who was riding with him and was very shaken.

In a more somber frame of mind, we met up with our friends in Hill City and went on to buy tickets for the two-hour train ride to Keystone and back. This was very relaxing and well-narrated. We learned quite a bit about the history and geology of the Black Hills, and a bit about the flora and fauna.

Lisa, Carol, Rob and Bill on the Black Hills train

The view from the train of Harney Peak

This was a lovely winding down of a stressful and strange day. We came home, barbecued steaks on the grill, had a tossed salad and visited with our friends, who were departing the next morning to meander toward home. On the way back to our cabin, we realized there was a huge lightning storm over area around Mt Rushmore – we sat by the pond and watched the best fireworks show ever for over an hour.

Sunday, August 9, we didn’t have to pack up the bikes and head out at 7am. That was a relief! We decided to ride the Iron Mountain Road again. It is an amazing ride – corkscrew turns and beautiful views with lots of sparkling granite. The weather was supposed to turn to rain with possible thunder showers in the early afternoon. We took our rain gear, just in case, but thought we could beat the weather fairly easily. We did have a very pleasant ride, until we came around the back side of Mt Rushmore. Suddenly, we were deluged. We had put on our rain coats – but my rain pants are very difficult to get on over boots, and so I thought I’d be fine just in my jeans and nylon rain jacket. We were so wet by the time we came down into Custer that my jeans were completely sopping – and so were my socks, the inside of my boots and my helmet! It was amazing. We stopped for lunch in town just to drink something hot and try to warm up a bit, and then rode the rest of the way to our cabin. There, we stripped off our gear and tried to find creative ways of drying everything.

We finally did dry off, and sat outside in the sun to plan the first leg of our ride into Iowa. It looks like we will be heading in on I90 (boring!) through Minnesota for a ways. We have two long (or three shorter) riding days ahead of us, and then we will be at my sister’s house in Davenport. We made dinner and took our leftover veggies to feed the pet goats that live on this place.

And so – on to an early night’s sleep, and maybe this netbook will finally complete its ADDITIONAL updates. Blessings to all.

As we headed out of Buffalo, we did most of our miles on major highways and freeways (I90). This makes for a much faster trip, but it’s also not a memorable ride. I don’t like to travel freeways when we can help it. We will have to do many miles on freeways this trip, since our goal is to get to Davenport, IA by the 11th, if at all possible. There are some weird and interesting sights along the road, however. I like to title this one: “What could possibly go wrong?”

As we came into South Dakota’s Black Hills, we were greeted by Bighorn Sheep. I think this photo would make a great Bev Doolittle painting, by the way….

However – our destination for this leg of the trip was the Black Hills Bungalows, which is one of the most peaceful and beautiful places we have ever stayed. We arrived in good order, and had a late lunch in Custer at the Flintstone theme park. It was quite a contrast from our elegant breakfast.

At last we arrived at our destination. A few pictures to make my point about this little slice of Peace on Earth:

This was a wonderful day – we saw lots of wildlife as we exited the park’s east gate. Our ride was unbelievably and bone-chillingly cold, in the misty morning. We saw elk, deer, antelope, swans (!) and geese on the way out. We stopped at the Canyon grill to have some coffee. And then we ran into my favorite creatures, making their way across the highway – our beloved North American Bison – or as we all call them, the buffalo.

This, by the way, is a view of us on the road on our new TriGlide – next to a buffalo.

We stopped after we passed the crossing and watched these magnificent animals snort and grunt and shove each other. The males especially seemed rather frisky. I have a wonderful video, which my netbook refuses to open, so I will try to add it later.

Behold the modern-day buffalo hunters, who do their worst via camera, leaving the magnificent herds intact.

We left the park and headed into Wyoming.

We stopped at Our Place in Cody for breakfast – cash only, and $.25 coffee with refills. You’ll find it connected to a gun store.

From Cody, we headed on to our destination for the night – the very charming town of Buffalo, Wyoming. It boasts a haunted hotel, the Occidental, in which we stayed in 2013.

It has quite a sad history.

Our rooms this time were booked in a quite charming B&B – the Mansion House Inn, which although reputedly haunted, did not feel in the least bit sad. Rob and I had a gorgeous room on the main floor. We made reservations at the restaurant affiliated with the Occidental – the Virginian, which has very good steak. We walked over after dinner to take a look at the lobby and main floor of the Occidental. On our way there, we walked through the saloon – where locals were having a ball doing a kind of cowboy karaoke.

Mr Bill was along for the trip, and his response to his exposure to the Occidental was – as you may imagine – “Oh no!”

We stopped and watched the high-school band play a summer concert in the park across the street. A horse-drawn wagon was available to rent – we simply mounted our bikes and toured the town. It is a beautiful little place.

Our Mansion House Inn breakfast the next morning was delicious and creatively staged. I highly recommend this place – the town and the B&B to all who are interested in Wyoming travel.

The next day we decided to do laundry and go for a ride in the park. Our way into Mammoth was through very long road construction waits and extremely rough roads – which was not fun for the two who were on two-wheeled bikes, and not much fun for us, either. I think we all felt like we’d been beaten up when we first arrived. We decided we did not want to go that route on our Yellowstone exploratory rides.

The laundry facilities were outside the north gate in the town of Gardiner, so we were back in MT to wash clothes. We ate lunch in a very nice little cafe – Teddy’s – and had homemade sourdough bread sandwiches and potato soup. Yum. After our clothes were clean, we packed up and re-entered the park – this gate was not anywhere near as busy as the west entrance had been.

We spent the day riding around the Roosevelt area and visiting Undine and Tower waterfalls, and then rode to check out the hot springs area.

On our return to the cabin, we discovered a visitor, who had stopped by to digest his meal (we suspected it was a ground squirrel, from the size of the bulge). I had never seen a bull snake (see the video on FB).

We also discovered the restroom changing of the guard was occurring.

At about the time we were heading to the cafeteria to eat dinner, we were deluged with another thunderstorm. The thunder crashed throughout the canyon and echoed off the hills. It was a pretty frightening experience to just walk the several blocks to eat!

The water swirled around the cabins, but as always, the end has been promised.

Sorry for the lag in posting, friends! My netbook has been behaving quite strangely, needing lots of updates.

When we left Virginia City, we stopped at Boot Hill cemetery. Evidently there was a vigilante style trial where “road agents” (now there’s a euphemism for highwaymen!) were found guilty, hung and buried at the cemetery on a hill at the top of the town.

Our days have been very full. Our ride from Virginia City to Yellowstone Park feels like ancient history now, on August 9.

Virginia City is a step back in time – carefully preserved. It’s worth a visit.

There is so much beautiful scenery on the back roads of this country. However, the traffic into Yellowstone from west entrance was horrible. It was backed up for miles. We sat at the gate in the hot sun for about an hour, when finally, a ranger just began waving people through – there was at least one lane completely blocked by a broken down vehicle. The park is someplace it would take a lifetime to explore – this is my third visit, and we still haven’t seen everything. There are tourists and crowds everywhere. We checked into our rustic cabins from the Mammoth lodge just about 2pm. When checking into our cabin, we were warned to use the other restrooms in the camp area if there were elk guarding the one behind our group of cabins. Elk guarding our restroom? This was an intriguing thought.

Actually, there were elk – everywhere! We even heard a cow bugle for her calf – something new to us. There were elk peering into the windows of buildings and grazing outside the souvenir stores and restaurants. It was hard to mind the 75 ft rule when they followed you!

We settled in, relaxed after our long ride, and met for dinner in the dining room.

We left Missoula about 8am, after a wonderful breakfast in a downtown cafe. The best homemade corned beef hash I have had in years – and good coffee! We hit the road in good order.

We headed south toward Wisdom. This commodity is something no one should lack, and all should certainly seek. We wanted to check out the Big Hole again. On the way there, we met up with other riders and checked our maps.

One of the most wonderful things about riding is all of the wonderful characters you meet on the road!

We found Wisdom, and recorded our finding hereby:

Rob also found Wisdom again.

On the way to Virginia City, we went through Nevada City. There is a fascinating house at the edge of town.

One wonders what kind of history created this structure.

We stopped in Nevada City to get milkshakes – the perfect drink on a hot day, although this day was the best so far on our ride. The temperature was 87 at most – so much better than our first day on the road! I had a Moose Moss. There was Montana Huckleberry, too, Yum.

We arrived in Virginia City in good time, The clouds were beginning to gather overhead.

As I type this, on the balcony of our 1800s hotel, there is a thundershower. Rain is pattering down and clearing the dust. The air has visibly cooled – the bikes are covered, and I am grateful for the change in weather.

We are staying at the Fairweather Inn.

This whole region of Montana is dedicated to preserving its frontier history. The wind is banging the old screen doors and the signs, and I can hear footsteps on the boardwalk below.

The air has that clean dirt smell. The streets are emptying – it’s time for bed. Rest well, friends!

Sunday, we headed out from Clarkston about 7am. First thing, we saw an Osprey catch a fish as we crossed the Snake River. I love the opportunity to see so much wildlife I wouldn’t notice if we were in a car.

This was the day we were riding along the Clearwater River Highway. We decided to ride until we came to Orofino, ID, where we would stop for breakfast and coffee. We stopped at the Ponderosa Restaurant. It was a busy day, and service was pretty slow. This put us back on the road later than we’d hoped, and the heat was already rapidly rising. We got back on the road by about 9:30am. It is always wonderful to ride along a river – a forested one, especially in the heat, is especially lovely. The river is accurately named.

We continued on toward Lolo Pass. We had reservations at the Lolo Pass Hot Springs Lodge – and as the day had heated up rapidly, we were really looking forward to a soak in the springs and a cool dip in the pool.

As we approached the lodge, we heard what sounded like booming – there were crowds of young people crossing the highway. We had to wait for about half an hour before we could check in – there was one person cleaning the rooms, a very nice man. When we finally talked to him, he said the rooms wouldn’t be ready for an hour. He encouraged us to go next door and have some lunch, which we decided would be a good plan. He told us there was a “Pirate Festival” across the street, which was actually more of a rave than a festival. As he described it, an opportunity for kids to wander around the grounds with nearly no clothing and take Ecstasy. An accurate observation, and I still have no idea what it had to do with pirates. (A pirate festival – at Lolo Pass? The sea is nowhere in sight. Hmm….)

So, we walked over to the restaurant/bar, where we were informed by the waitress that the only food we could procure was the buffet they’d set up for the ravers – which consisted of burgers, pulled pork sandwiches, macaroni salad, chips, etc. – for $7. We were also informed that the restaurant would not be serving its regular menu until the next afternoon (Monday). The ravers were all over the hot tubs and the pool and were wandering all over the property, and back and forth across the highway. The booming continued. We decided this was not our idea of a relaxing stay. The lodge was very apologetic and refunded our money.

We headed for Missoula forthwith, and stayed at the Holiday Inn – where we finally found a pool and a decent restaurant. That town has some absolutely gorgeous Victorian buildings – downtown is quite charming. I highly recommend it! It’s also bicycle friendly, but we were shocked to observe that the bicyclists all obeyed the traffic laws. No running red lights or going the wrong way down one-way streets – unlike another city we know quite well.