Last night we had a little trouble falling asleep because there were planes flying low overhead frequently (we later found out that there was a military airport only about 5 miles away). It was chilly again last night, but we woke up pretty early, made some oatmeal again and then were on the road by 8:15. The wind was with us this morning which was great! We didn't have far to ride before reaching Rapid City. The city is very spread out because of the hills so it was a little overwhelming at first, but there was a McDonald's right when we got into the area, so we stopped to look up where everything we were planning to go was. Not too long after we left McDonald's a man in a truck beeped and waved at us, and we realized it was the guy who owned the campground we stayed at near the Badlands! Our fist stop, which we have been looking forward to for a couple days, was the Golden Corral (we knew there was one in town because Grandma filled us in). We were so hungry and so excited to be able to have such a wonderful selection of food to eat. I ate 2 full plates along with a ton of dessert (there was a chocolate fountain and even cotton candy!). I was in heaven! After we filled ourselves to the brim, we headed to the post office because Grandma had sent us a package. We left our Bear Mace and extra bottle of Halt with Gram before we left so she could mail it to us once we got closer to the mountains. After we got our package, we rode down main street in Rapid City, which was neat because there were statue of each of the presidents on each of the street corners as you proceed down Main street. Soon enough, we made it to the bike shop that we had pre-ordered a couple folding tires and water bottles to. There was a really pretty huskie dog with bright blue eyes at the door to greet us at the bike shop, she was so cute. After we got everything we needed at the bike shop, we sat outside and opened our package from Gram. There were a whole bunch of jam cookies and easter candy and even a couple packs of slimjims amongst the other things. What a great treat!!!! Soon enough, we continued out of the city towards our Warm Showers host just outside of Hermosa. We were pretty excited because this host was a member of a bicycle club that was given a campground and we were informed that we would get to sleep inside a little camper! As we came into Hermosa, a lady, who we later found out was Laura from the bicycle club, pulled over and took our picture and also made sure we knew how to get to our destination. With only about 7 miles left before we got to the campground we figured we would be there very soon, however, that didn't happen. Joe got another flat, this time on his back tire so we had to stop to fix that. While we were fixing it, a guy on a motorcycle pulled over and we chitchatted with him for a few. After we were back on the road, we couldn't have even gone 2 miles before we had to stop again, this time I had a flat. We knew my back tire was pretty warn, but we thought it would make it another couple hundred miles, guess we were wrong. The tire had 2 huge slices in it, so we had to use one of the folding tires we had just bought in Rapid City. When we finally made it to our host we enjoyed a quick tour of the place and then an amazing hot shower. There was a tasty meal of pasta with buffalo and tomatoes waiting for us and we also enjoyed some of the amazing bread that Jon had made (he is a chef). We planned out our route for tomorrow and then went to our little camper to go to bed. It was so great to not have to set up our tent and be able to sleep indoors! We rode 54.83 miles today.
|
|