Day 10 - Minnesota to South Dakota

September 20, 2010

I left Minneapolis a little later than anticipated this morning. After a final round of goodbyes I made it out the door at 11:15am. I programmed the GPS to take me to the Black Hills in South Dakota. Since this was about 650 miles away, I decided to break it up into two days. My goal was to make it an hour or two west of Sioux Falls, somewhere around Mitchell, SD. This would leave me with a manageable drive tomorrow.

I headed south on US-169 leaving Chaska, MN and within the first 30 minutes the scenery quickly changed from residential neighborhoods to farm fields again. Yup, more farm fields. Driving through the rest of MN reminded me of the drive through WI, only there seemed to be more trees and rolling hills in WI. MN was, for the most part, flat. Of course there were trees in MN, they just mainly surrounded the farm houses that were scattered every few miles, rather than the random pockets of forests that seemed to frequent Wisconsin.

One thing that I wasn’t expecting was all of the wind farms that sprouted up in Minnesota over the past few years. There were hundreds of wind turbines off in the fields. I guess it’s a good place for them because the flat terrain and wide open fields allows the wind to blow without any hindrance. It was very windy today with gusts up to 40mph. With my two bikes and car top carrier on the roof I was just trying to keep it between the lines.

I took SR-60 heading southwest and made my first stop to get out and stretch my legs in the little town of Worthington, MN, just prior to getting onto I-90W which will take me the rest of the way to the Black Hills. The stop at Worthington consisted of a gas station, café and a general store. It was at this stop that I made several astute observations. I spotted my first set cowboy boots. Not only that, I noticed that people wearing cowboy boots actually outnumbered people not wearing them. I also saw my first gun rack, complete with rifle, in the back window of a pickup truck. Ya know yer a redneck if…..? Lastly, as I perused the three isles that comprised the general store, I noticed that almost an entire isle was dedicated to CB radio antennas and antenna accessories. My Birkenstocks and I began to feel strangely out of place. I quickly walked outside and back to my car. Yup, I’m in the country now!

I stopped in Sioux Falls to fill up with gas. Surprisingly, it was only $2.55 for 89 octane, certainly better than the $2.79 I’ve been becoming used to. I walked around a sporting goods store for a half hour to give myself another break from the car seat and then got on the way to Mitchell, home to the World’s only Corn Palace! It was closed by the time I got there at 6:15pm, but I wasn’t that disappointed. I’ve seen it before and it’s just as I remembered it to be.

I figured Mitchell would be a good halfway point to camp for the night so I stopped at the Cabellas in town and asked for some campground recommendations. The only one they knew of was an RV park right alongside the interstate. My other option was to keep driving another 65 miles to Chamberlain to a place called Cedar Shore, which happen to be right on the Missouri River. I wasn’t that tired yet, and what’s another 65 miles after driving 300? This last leg of the drive happened as the sun was setting. The sun set quickly over the prairie’s horizon but the orange glow seemed to last for almost an hour afterwards. I had some great views of the lightning storms out of my driver’s window just to the south.

I checked in at the campground just as they were closing and found out that the cool lightning storms that I saw are headed this way. I set up my tent in about 20 mph winds (not easy) right on the bank of the Missouri River. Tonight should be a good test of my tent. I’ll consider myself lucky if this is the worst weather I experience on this trip. The lightning show is nice and there are coyotes howling in the background to keep me company tonight. Can’t beat this!

Goodnight.

Total miles: 1,724.5