Sturgis:
After the party
By Steve Graves
The 69th Sturgis Rally started without us, but
that was the plan. On Saturday Aug. 8, the final big
day of the biking world’s biggest party, we were
700 miles away in a parking lot in Kansas City. This
was the plan however, to check out Sturgis the
week after the rally. All the great riding, none of (or
at least hopefully less of) the big crowds.
Four bikes, four guys, bags stuffed and strapped
to sissy bars and no agenda. “We’re just headed
for Sturgis and there ain’t no plan.” Call it a Sturgis
trip, Wild Hogs style. Our cast of characters in-
cluded me on my Heritage Softail, Gale, our boss,
on his souped up Street Glide. Steve, who we af-
fectionately refer to as “Goat _ucker”, but not be-
cause he has actually slept with a goat on his
brand new Screaming Eagle Road Glide, and Dave
who we affectionately refer to as “Stinky”, because
group of guys from Long Island who had just come Thunder Basin National Grassland into South
he actually does stink on his Heritage.
from Sturgis and were winding their way back to Dakota and pulled into Deadwood where we
Shortly after 8am we rolled out of Kansas City
Salt Lake where they did a Fly and Ride. found a hotel. We had dinner at Kevin Costner’s
and headed north on 29 Highway, took a left on
Over breakfast in the hotel we talked about restaurant and helped the profit margin of a couple
Highway 2 and found a truck stop just past Lincoln
heading to the other corner of the state and casinos.
on Highway 80. Over lunch we pulled out a map
checking out Yellowstone, staying in Cheyenne for When we pulled in to Sturgis the next morning,
and decided that we could have problems finding
a day or heading up to Sturgis. the party was clearly over. Main Street looked like
a place to stay in Sturgis with no reservations.
At this point, Yellowstone was the leading can- it had a wonderful time but was still too hung over
Therefore Cheyenne, Wyoming seemed to be a
didate so after breakfast we stayed on 80 to to start cleaning up. After a brief stop at Sturgis
plausible destination to end our day of riding.
Laramie. We found a Walmart in Laramie. We had Harley Davidson we enjoyed the Black Hills riding
With a belly full of chicken fried steak we
some shopping to do. It was really cold, leather we came for. Mount Rushmore, Keystone, Nee-
opened up the throttles and pushed eighty on 80
jackets and chaps weren’t getting the job done. dles Highway, Hill City and Custer. Does it get any
heading west. The day was gorgeous as we
We needed more clothes. I understand that in Au- better?
blasted across the Cornhusker state, waving at
gust stocking caps are out of season but if you live On Needles Highway we enjoyed the benefit of
hundreds of bikes across the highway heading
in a state were summer can feel like November, showing up after the party, no waiting on the one
east. Perhaps getting a room wouldn’t be that dif-
keep some on hand for the tourists. I managed to way tunnels. Right before we pulled into Custer State
ficult after all. We made a brief stop in North Platte
find a Wyoming Cowboys sweatshirt with a hood. Park and paid the admission fee, we flipped a U-turn
to check out the Harley dealership where the Goat
In the Walmart parking lot we pulled out the and pulled in where it said “Helicopter Rides $40”.
purchased two bells, one for my bike and one for
map again. Continuing east on 80 meant higher
Gale’s. With the whole evil spirit thing properly
elevations and likely colder temperatures. Yel-
addressed we continued west enjoying more
lowstone was quickly taking a back seat. We de-
beautiful sunshine all the way to the Wyoming
cided not to decide on Yellowstone and instead go
state line.
north, have lunch in Casper and flip a coin there.
This is where we pulled in to an abandoned gas
From Laramie to Casper is absolutely beautiful
station and looked up at an ominous cloud. But it
big sky country. However, it was not a beautiful
appeared to be just one angry cloud in an other-
ride. We traveled through several miles of road
wise happy sky. So we pressed on for a few more
construction that was actually road removal. The
miles and found an open gas station. By now the
nice lady who ran the gravel parking lot gas station
sky had turned gray and it appeared we could be
and sold me low octane fuel mentioned that, “Yes,
hitting a storm. We quickly fueled up and donned
it is unseasonably cold today.” And I don’t re-
rain gear hoping to make Cheyenne before the
member the name, but she said we would be
skies opened up.
going through the windiest pass in the country.
We didn’t make it. The sky turned black, the
She wasn’t lying. We leaned left and went straight
gently breeze turned into knock you to the shoul-
all the way to Casper.
der gusts, and rain that felt like poking needles un-
While fueling up in Casper we looked across the
leashed on us. We pulled off on the next exit ramp,
street and saw Booty’s Barbeque. We had found
but we didn’t stop. Everyone still had clean un-
our lunch destination. As I was enjoying a deep This was cool. I had never been in a helicopter
derwear and we were so close to Cheyenne so
fried hot dog covered in Booty sauce (how could before. They had two of them there, a big one and
pressed on. The rain relented just as we pulled
you not order that?), we pulled out the map again. a small one. The Goat and I walked up together to
into Cheyenne where we found a Holiday Inn.
There were a few locals who came in and out get in the small one, a Huey C300, which is a fancy
I don’t know who stays in Cheyenne the rest of
while we ate and each of them had pros and cons term for Plexiglas bubble with a propeller on top.
the year, but on this Saturday night the Holiday
for nearly every highway in the state. Yellowstone The pilot began waving his hands at us, and the
Inn’s entire covered entrance was lined with mo-
lost and we decided to head from Casper to Stur- young lady walking us out informed us we would
torcycles. We checked in and because of the
gis via 25, 387, 450 and 85 Highways based on have to go one at a time. It made me nervous to
storms still in the area, had dinner at the hotel.
the local input. think that the two of us could send this thing over its
After dinner we spent the rest of the evening in
The sun was shining and the temperature finally weight limit, but when I climbed in I realized this
front of the hotel smoking and chatting with a
warmed up to pleasant as we rolled through the bubble wasn’t big enough for three people.
52 Wide Open
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116