Devils Tower (7/8/23 Sat)

My overnight in Billings was at the Yosemite Campground. It was just down the street from the Billings KOA. I talked with the owner who was the 4th generation to run it. His grandfather sold the land to the KOA to make campground #1 in the 1960's. KOA corperate headquarters is in Billings. They asked his grandfather if he wanted to be part of this KOA idea,. His responce was just becaue Lucy & Ricky went camping doesn't mean the rest of America will take to it. His grandfather was wrong. We had a lot of other interesting conversations, but that was kind of the big one. His son help print my receipt when I checked in. So he would be the 5th generation operating this campground.

In the morning I was coffeed, packed and on the road for Devils Tower before 8am. The parts of the road not under construction had 80mph limits.

Last time I road to Devil's Tower was from Rapid City, and we led a group of rally goers in from the East. From the East I recall never seeing the tower until we arrived. We slowly approached on an old raod in an even older magicaly looking primeval forest. It truly felt mystical.

When you approach from the West, you see the tower sticking out of the landscape from the highway miles away. As you approach you get more peeks at it, then it's just in your face for a few miles. You riide along a hayfield and farm with the tower as a backdrop. Eventually coming to a restaurant/gift shop that seems to have it in their backyard. Then you turn down the road to the monument and drive through the KOA to pass around the tower to get to the road I remember. By the time you reach the primeval forest you've been three quarters of the way around the tower. Nearly seeing if from all sides.

Today I passed the entrance booth with a sign saying you pay on your way out. Another sign saying high traffic and it could take an hour to park. A few corners later the traffic came to a standstill in the forest. The only movement for the next 10 minutes was to compress the space left by someone turning around. I decided I've already seen more than last time and I could get a new sticker and photos on my way out. The Restaurant had stickers and a brownie sunday without the 78F wait in traffic. Flashing my yearly National Parks pass I purchased to enter Teton covered my exit costs.

After the brownie sunday I adjusted my route to pass through Spearfish Canyon, as it was another place I felt worth re-visiting. This time a mobile light up highway sign at the entry said runners present in the road, seek alternate route. Since runs normally start early I assumed that by 1500 it should have long ago finished. That was a correct assumption. But the auto traffic drove extra slow, just in case. I led a group of Harleys through a bit over the speed limits, passing whenever a zone was provided to do so.

We made decent time through the Canyon and onto the next roads, but a storm cell nipped at our heels. My gps twice gave me seveere thunderstorm warnings, but we always headed away into brighter skies. And we kept up the pace just to stay dry.

In Custer I went to the Chalet owned by the woman who wrote The Butterfly Route. It's a very good book about her motorcycle journey through Canada, the US, Central and South America. Just like I noted online this morning no vacancy for Saturday night. I checked to see if anyone cancelled, but they hadn't. I also just missed the proprietor, but was given a suggested overflow of the Rocket Motel just down the street. I went there and got a room just before the rain cell hit. After the cell completed I went accross the street for dinner at The Pounding Fathers Brew Pub. I also sent email about stopping by the Chalet on Sunday to buy a book.

Back at the room I had a long talk with Anne before writing this.