Father and Son US Road Trip- 9 States, 12 National Parks, 2 Months, 6500 Miles!

[pseudolus]

Cool thread - competing with bobcock for most inspirational thread to get people to visit the US award I think.

[terry57]

The route you are taking is what I done on a Contiki tour back in 84.

I'll never forget it especially Mount Rushmore which every person should see before they kick off.

Simply mind boggling in real life.

Crazy Horse is just as Impressive, I'm sure your heading there as well.

Fok it, I'm going back, only thing that worries me is driving on the wrong side of the road.

[terry57]

Cool thread - competing with bobcock for most inspirational thread to get people to visit the US award I think.

If more people would get of there arse and actually go to America and tour the country there would be a lot less Yankee bashing.

I found the Americans to be very friendly and welcoming towards us tourists .

A stunning country to tour hands down.

[Humbert]

I can almost smell the fresh, clean, pine-scented air. In contrast to the toxic fumes we breathe here in Thailand.

[cyrille]

Great thread Tony!

Really cheered me up this morning.

[cyrille]

I can almost smell the fresh, clean, pine-scented air. In contrast to the toxic fumes we breathe here in Bangkok.

ftfy

[aging one]

Tony really well done. Its nice to have that much love and pride for your son. I took my 9 year old twin daughters on a road trip 6 years ago. Thanks for bringing back the memories. Now I want to post more picture of my journey up. But this is your great thread keep them coming.

[TonyBKK]

I guess that's great fun for the kid on the back of a bike, but for only a little while,A car with a dvd player and playstation in it for him would have been safer, more comfortable and more fun for him IMO . I would never entertain the idea of putting one of my kids on the back of a motorbike
I could imagine my ex wife's response if I turned up on a big bike and told her I was taking the kid into bear territory on it
Each to their own I guess, great pics BTW

Sorry mate, I'll have to respectfully disagree- using DVD's and video games to pacify children is simply dreadful. The negative effects of video games on small children is pretty well documented. Why stare at a DVD when you have the incredible natural beauty of rural America to keep you entertained and inspired?

Anyway, stay tuned, our journey is just beginning and only gets better!

[terry57]

^

People do that to stop there kids from bitching when on long road trips, your on a bike so you don't hear your lad.

[TonyBKK]

Cool thread - competing with bobcock for most inspirational thread to get people to visit the US award I think.

If more people would get of there arse and actually go to America and tour the country there would be a lot less Yankee bashing.

I found the Americans to be very friendly and welcoming towards us tourists .

A stunning country to tour hands down.

^ Well said mate.

Please don't judge the US by what you see on the TV or in movies.

Television is of course all about ratings, and I guess freaks rate higher than normal people...

"Real" America can only be experienced by going there and is so much better than what the media would lead you to expect

[TonyBKK]

^

People do that to stop there kids from bitching when on long road trips, your on a bike so you don't here your lad.

Heh heh, actually we've got helmet intercoms so I hear him just fine. He's a good kid and I never get tired of chatting with him and listening to what he has to say.

[TonyBKK]

Short ride to Hill City- funky little mining and lumber town, now a tourist destination with galleries, restaurants and of course the 1880 Steam Train.


My son LOVES trains! Model trains, toy trains, real trains, movies about trains you name it, he digs it, so I thought he might enjoy a ride on the Black Hills Central Central Railroad 1880 Steam Train.


LOL!


C'mon PUSH!!!




The 1880 Steam Train is the real deal- a restored coal fired (converted to oil) locomotive with 37,500 lbs. of tractive power! It takes around 3 hours to make the round trip on the standard gauge Burlington track from Hill City to Keystone and back-


Got our tickets-


While we were waiting we could hear the train whistle off in the distance. Kristhawee was so excited!!


All aboard!!


Let's go!!


Father and Son on the Black Hills Central Railroad 1880 Train :mrgreen:

[TonyBKK]

And we're off! Leaving Hill City bound for Keystone on the Black Hills Central Railroad 1880 Steam Train-

We were in the car directly behind the locomotive and it made an insane racket and the whistle was deafening

I liked the "No Smoking" announcement- something about, if you need a smoke, just stick your head out the window and inhale deeply

There was a big mining and timber boom here in the late 1800's and early 1900's and you can see a lot of old buildings, mines and abandoned rail spurs along the way-


Entrance to an old mine?


Lots of wildlife too!


The train has to climb a couple of steep 4-6% grades and it was awesome to listen to it puffing and chugging up the incline-


Turkeys!


Interesting old buildings along the way, some occupied, some abandoned-







We pas a lot of old abandoned spurs- would be really fun to hike these to the mines they used to serve-





The "Lazy 2 Crazy 2 ranch"


Chugging up another incline-


Guess the pancakes, hike, splash park and rocking of the train took their toll on my little guy


I kept snapping pictures so he could see what he missed while in dreamland




We crossed the "Old Hill City Highway" several times- a nice looking road that we'll ride later-


More deer-


Oh yes, we will definitely have to hit this road!


Approaching the Keystone depot-


Kristhawee is still passed out, so we just stay on the train waiting for the ride back to Hill City-


Getting ready for the return trip to Hill City-


At Keystone they uncouple the locomotive and move it to the other end of the train. Means we get a lot less noise, and a lot more smoke for the return trip


Gotta love the staff!


Headed back to Hill City-


Random pics from the train-




Another abandoned mine-


Another abandoned home-


Almost back to Hill City-


Arriving at the Hill City depot-


He hang around to watch them uncouple and move the locomotive-


Wow, that looks like hot and dirty work!


Bye bye 1880 Train!

[TonyBKK]

Day 5! Today we're going to ride the Iron Mountain Road, the Wildlife Loop and the Needles Highway!!


Another beautiful day- early start, nice and cool and not a cloud in the sky!


We take the 244 from Hill City, past Mount Rushmore to Keystone where the Iron Mountain Road (16A) begins. The 244 is a beautiful road in its own right, taking us through the spectacular rock formations that make up Mount Rushmore-


Riding past Mt Rushmore-


The Iron Mountain road (US 16A) is famous for its scenic, one-lane tunnels aligned to frame Mount Rushmore, its "pigtail bridges", and sections where the highway has been divided into single (and narrow) lanes on each roadway.

Pigtail bridge (not my pic):


Such care was taken not to disturb the landscape that some sections of the road actually divide into one-lane one-way ribbons that swoop and bound through mixed pine and deciduous forest. I've never seen a road like this in the US before- quite unique!


The Iron Mountain road, along several other scenic roads in the Black Hills, was originally laid out by Governor Peter Norbeck to create a very scenic, slow-speed road for tourists. The section of US 16A from SD244 to SD89 that we are riding today is known as the Peter Norbeck Memorial Byway in honor of the governor.


The numerous small tunnels insure that there are no large trucks or RV's on these roads. Lots of bikes though! I have tons of video I need to go through- hopefully I got a good video of this amazing road which I'll add here later.

We hadn't had breakfast yet to after we entered Custer State Park we stopped at the State Game Lodge, a beautiful old building built in 1920 that served as the "Summer White House" for President Calvin Coolidge and was visited by President Dwight D. Eisenhower.


They had a pretty good looking breakfast buffet and we were both pretty hungry-


Father and son at the State Game Lodge, Custer State Park, Black Hills, SD-


The stuffed animals in the dining room were a nice touch


My son at the Custer State Park Game Lodge, Black Hills, South Dakota

Next we ride the Wildlife Loop Road through Custer State Park and play chicken with some 2000 pound Bison!

[TonyBKK]

Wow, they don't call it the Wildlife Loop for nothing- my son and I were keen to see some animals and we were not disappointed!


Bison everywhere!


There are some 1300 Bison in Custer State Park and suddenly we found ourselves surrounded! They look pretty docile but I know they can be unpredictable and honestly, sitting on a bike, these were a bit too close for comfort.

I gave the camera to my son and he took the following pictures- not bad for a 5 year old, eh??


We were kind of stuck in a traffic jam of sorts- cars stopped to take pictures of the bison and I kept my eyes open and hand on the throttle thinking that IF a bison charged at us I'd try to keep the car in front of us between us and the bison...


Fortunately some obnoxiously loud Harleys came by and I figured if the bison were going to attack anything it would probably be one of them before us


Well, we made it out un-gored and with some great pictures. Kristhawee sure was excited to have seen his first Bison- some of them were so close we almost could have touched them!


Kristhawee took these pictures too- I think these are Pronghorns?


Yeah, pretty sure that's a Pronghorn (interesting animals- we learned a lot more about them when we were in Wyoming).


More Bison!


Now what is this incredibly cute critter?!

[TonyBKK]

Custer State Park's "Begging Burros"! (Aka Feral Donkeys)


These affable creatures are superficially similar to donkeys, but are more closely related to the African wild ass, which survives in semi-arid scrub and grasslands of Ethiopia, Eritrea and Somalia. This makes them well-suited to survival in the water-stressed Black Hills.


Despite all the warnings about not approaching "wild" animals, it was pretty apparent that these burros aren't terribly "wild".


Kristhawee and one of the Black Hills Begging Burros


Very cute animals-


Even though Kristhawee didn't have any food for them, they didn't seem to mind his company-


Two kids checking each other out-


Wanna be my friend??


This one, with nostrils flared and eyes wide, looks like he's thinking about taking my hand off


We survived the burros, continued on and enjoyed the rest of the Wildlife Loop-


Next up- the Needles Highway!!

[TonyBKK]

Hard to believe, but the Needles Highway was even more impressive than the Iron Mountain road!

Time to fire up the GoPro (though it's going to take me a while to edit videos)


Like the Iron Mountain road the Needles Highway is very narrow, has lots of sharp hairpin turns, low tunnels and the road has very little traffic. The first of many tunnels that were blasted through solid granite back in the 1920's-


Over the shoulder shot of the tunnel we just rode through-


14 miles long, the Needles Highway winds through pine and spruce covered mountains and the amazing granite "needles" for which the area is famous. In this pic you can see the Cathedral Spires off in the distance, a massive collection of rock towers pointed to the heavens.


We stopped here for some water and snacks and to take in the amazing views-


My son took some pictures of me- once again I'm quite impressed by his steady hand-




I regret not bringing more batteries and/or a charging cable for the GoPro. It's getting pretty old and the battery doesn't seem to last much more than an hour. It ran out of juice about this time so from here on I was snapping pics with the Canon while riding. Perhaps not the safest way to ride, but that Beemer pretty much drives itself


Interesting history about the Needles Highway- I'd assumed it was built by the Civilian Conservation Core in the 19030's as part of Franklin D Roosevelt's "New Deal", but I was wrong.

South Dakota Governor Peter Norbeck wanted to simultaneously preserve and provide access to some of the most beautiful regions of the Black Hills. In 1919, he designed the route for the Needles Highway, a road that many engineers deemed impossible to build. Two years and 150,000 pounds of dynamite later, the road was opened to automobiles.


Simply amazing!




I wonder what the purpose of this little "cave" is?


Some steep grades, lots of hairpin turns and blind corners- brilliant!


Approaching another tunnel with blind entrance. One has to remember that this is a two-way road!


You have to be pretty careful and sound your horn before entering a tunnel lest you meet someone else coming the other way-


More twists and turns-


Eventually we arrive at Sylvan Lake- it's mid-afternoon, pretty hot, Kristhawee decides that it's time for a swim!!

[TonyBKK]

It's a hot day, but the water is COLD!


We swam out to the rock island you see in the picture above. (Remember our mission to re-teach Kristhawee how to swim?)


C'mon in! The water's FINE!


Oh my, underage babe alert


If admiring beautiful girls is a crime, let me be guilty!!


Kristhawee is.... um... doing laundry??


Oh, no, silly me, he's making a weapon!


Ok little dude- let's rumble!


Making friends on the beach- this family, if I recall correctly, was also from Minnesota-


Kristhawee is building a volcano! (Serious work- just look at his face)


We climbed up the rocks next to the beach and you get some nice views of Lake Sylvan- These would make a nice panorama if I could be arsed to stitch them together








Hike a little further on the rocks and you discover this amazing view that wasn't even visible from the beach-


Even more beautiful with my son in the picture


Father and Son at Sylvan Lake, Custer State Park, Black Hills, South Dakota, USA


Kristhawee's feet are getting tougher!


Having fun scrambling around on the rocks-


We swam some more then quite suddenly black clouds rolled in and we enjoyed a nice afternoon thunderstorm. There was lightening so we took cover. While we were taking shelter in a little gazebo-like structure in the parking lot a bunch of emergency vehicles showed up along with search and rescue types- apparently an older gentleman had been hiking to the top of Harney Peak (the tallest mountain east of the Rockies) and had collapsed...

It's not a very tough hike, but the pine beetle has killed off most of the trees which means the trail is now very exposed and it was a hot sunny day. Hopefully the gent was just suffering from heat exhaustion and nothing more serious.

We met a single father with two daughters and the younger one was around my son's age. They were getting along great and were kind of playing tag, ducking under the railings of the gazebo when the older daughter misjudged the clearance and ran head first into the concrete rail She kind of knocked herself out and then came to and had a seizure- I caught her before she hit the ground and the seizure passed very quickly but it was pretty scary and her little sister totally lost it.

Fortunately there were already plenty of medical and emergency personnel on the scene. They checked the girl out and said she was probably ok but that dad ought to take her for an X-ray just to be sure. Yikes! It's scary how quickly good times can go bad. I always had that thought in the back of my head on this trip- the "what if" nightmare scenarios of crashing the bike with my son strapped to it. I consider myself a pretty experienced rider, chose one of the safest touring bikes on the planet and didn't take ANY chances but still, no matter how skilled you might be or how much you might prepare, you can never control EVERYTHING. You never know when a drunk driver might take you out (been there done that) a bison decides to use you as target practice, you blow a tire in a hairpin with no guardrail, etc etc. Yet on the flip side, LIFE is dangerous. There is RISK in everything we do. I feel like more and more people choose "safety" over common sense, to the point where many people live their lives in fear, obsessed with making everything "safe" and eliminating as much risk as they can and as a result don't really LIVE.

One of the things I really like about Thailand is that people are free to be just as stupid as they want to be. The government here doesn't try to legislate common sense. The result is a freakishly high road fatality rate, but also a really really FUN place to ride. Don't want to go too far off on a tangent, but I've been reading this other thread on Advrider called "When do you call it quits" (When do you call it quits? - ADVrider) and many people there have voiced my feelings of concern and malaise better than I can. Suffice to say, the ride with my son was epic, perfect, couldn't have gone better, and for that I thank my lucky stars.

I hope we can do similar rides in the future and that some day, when he's old enough to ride his own bike that we'll ride and tour together. I'm certainly not ready to call it quits and I'm pretty sure my son feels the same way. But if his feelings change maybe we'll do it in a car next time, or rent an RV and bring the whole family along. Born and raised for his first four years in Thailand he grew up on 2 wheels and learned right away that he NEVER gets on a bike without a helmet, so he found it quite surprising and couldn't understand why SO FEW of the bikers we encountered this summer wore helmets.

I moved to Asia in the late 90's and this is the first big road trip I've done in the US in ~15 years. It seems to me that while I was gone a lot more motorcycles have taken to the roads and that a lot LESS people are wearing helmets... No doubt for the folks living in the US it's been a gradual change, but for me being away for 15 year the sudden and noticeable increase in bare headed bikers was quite striking. What happened?

We encountered these bikes at a gas station somewhere west of Sioux Falls, SD and neither wore helmets or had windscreens. The result was that one took a big bug/beetle in the face, high on the cheek, just below his fashionably small sunglasses at 75mph and now his eye was so swollen he couldn't see out of it anymore...


The folks in the parking lot were trying to help decide what to do. Most were telling him to go to the hospital, but the biker chose to continue on with one good eye, no helmet, no windscreen and the same little sunglasses... All in the name of what? "Freedom"? Looking "cool"? Being "tough"? I just don't get it... I mean, I AM guilty of occasionally going for a spin without a helmet on, so I'm certainly not in a position to preach. It DOES feel good to cruise around a lake or down a main street with the wind in your hair and nothing over your ears, but cruising on an interstate at 75mph with no windscreen and no helmet is NOT my idea of a good time... And isn't it just WEIRD that 49 of our 50 States have deemed that splitting traffic on a motorcycle is so dangerous it's illegal, yet riding without a helmet is permitted in some ~19 States? What's up with that?! I just can't understand the logic or rational, if any behind that contradiction. Ok ok, sorry, really didn't mean to go on like that, but recounting the story of the little girl knocking herself out just brought it all to a head and it feels good to put pen to paper, so to speak, and try to make sense of it all.

On with the ride!!!


Roads were a bit wet so we took it nice and easy-

More tunnels and hairpins-



We were soon back in the sun and on our way to Deadwood!

[TonyBKK]

It's getting late and it's been a long day. I originally was aiming for Spearfish but really don't like riding at dusk when it seems the deer are most active. Also, setting up camp in the dark is no fun- so we decide to hit Deadwood instead and ride the Spearfish Canyon in the morning when we're fresh and rested.


The ride to Lead and Deadwood was quite nice- fast road in good repair with little traffic, long sweeping turns and beautiful scenery along the way-













I've started to experiment with the camera and I'd like to think that some of the shots aren't half bad-








Both Deadwood and Lead are pretty cool old mining towns. Seems they are still mining in Lead, while Deadwood has been pretty much converted over to a full on tourist town.


Spotted a KOA on the road between Deadwood and Lead and stopped there for the night-


Remember how I said earlier that I thought KOA's were more aimed at the RV crowd? Well, this was one of those types. Not a very pleasant location or site, but the staff were friendly, it was late, we were tired, and at least they had nice clean bathrooms with hot showers, WiFi and much to my son's delight, a pool and hot tub-


I had spotted a funky looking Pizza joint just up the road in the direction of Lead so we decided to hit that for dinner-

That's MY beer, in case anyone is wondering


Awesome pizza but a large was way more than we could finish- yippee! Pizza for breakfast!

This place was called "Pizza Lab" and was half restaurant, half "disco"- they had a big dance floor and an actual DJ spinning the records- weird funny place. There was a big group of students from France there that evening and my son had a really good time dancing with them. I may have busted a move or two as well, but thank goodness there are no pictures of that nonsense!

Cheers!


I'm full of pizza and beer- Little guy gets ice cream for desert!


Made it back to our campsite quite late and we both passed out in a flash- yet another full day of fun, adventure and discovery!

What will tomorrow bring???

[TonyBKK]

Good morning from Deadwood, SD!


We rolled over to Sturgis for breakfast and to check out the toys at Sturgis Motorsports-


Sturgis was really really quiet. Guess other than during the big rally not much goes on there?

Kristhawee has never been in a cave, and the Black Hills is full of them. Talked to a number of other travelers about which is best, and was advised that Wind Cave National Park and Jewel Cave National Monument are over run with tourists this time of year and sometimes there are so many people you can't even get in to the caves... Well, that doesn't sound like my idea of a good time But a few people mentioned Wonderland Cave as a cool alternative that is a lot less crowded. Wonderland it is!

It's a short pleasant ride to Nemo and the final mile or so of road is dirt with steep grades and in really rough shape- not my idea of a good time on the big LT, but we made it!


You can only enter the cave with a guide, smart I guess since to this day they still don't know where the cave ends- it's that big! Our guide was a really cutie too, college student working at the cave over her summer holiday.

We grabbed a quick bite to eat before our tour started-


The entrance (not my pic)


Down we go- it was a pretty hot day, but nice and cool in the cave.


No crowds here- It was just us and one other couple! Krsthawee is diggin it!


They leave the lights on which has allowed ferns and moss to grow-


Formations found in Wonderland Cave include Stalactites, Stalagmites, Dogtooth Spar Crystals, Column Formations, Helictites, Lobulites, better known as Popcorn Crystal and frost Crystals. Calcite Lily Pads, Ribbon Stalactites, Boxwork Crystals, Flowstone and many more.


This is a "living" cave, which means that most of the formations are still growing. They call this the "Carrot Patch" :mrgreen:




Pretty hard to capture the colors with my simple point and shoot camera, but suffice to say, it was quite impressive!




Hands-on geology- touching flowstone


Some quite strange and rare formations-


Kristhawee in Wonderland Cave, Black Hills, South Dakota!


200+ steps to get out


Bye bye Wonderland Cave!

[TonyBKK]

I thought maybe the little guy would be tired from hiking around the cave and climbing all those stairs... Nope! He says "Dad, let's go for a hike!"

Good on ya Kristhawee! I see what looks like an old fire road. Let's see where it goes!




Can't tell you how proud I am of my son- tough yet sweet little 5 year old and so interested in the world around him




Gorgeous afternoon for a hike, loving the solitude and views-




It's getting late and I have no idea where this trail goes- let's turn around-


My son the aspiring naturalist


We got back to camp quite late and I cooked dinner in the dark and we fell into our sleeping bags and were asleep in seconds.

Does life get any better than this?

[TonyBKK]

The Black Hills were fantastic but it was time to press on if we were going to meet our friends at Yellowstone National Park in a few days.

My son wanted to go for a swim before we left, so we got on the road rather late.

From our campground in Deadwood to the campground I was aiming for on Highway 16 in the Bighorn Mountains was only about 240 miles.


I figured even with our late departure that it would be a piece of cake.

Riding west from Deadwood and Lead we passed the "Presidents Park".


Then we hit the fantastic Spearfish Canyon Scenic Highway (US 14)


Lots of other bikes out and about-


This is the kind of road that really makes you want to crack the throttle. Have to be careful though- don't really want to get pulled over for speeding with my 5 year old son on the back...


Zoom zoom!


I'm trying to keep it close to the posted speed limit of 45 and there are a lot of sport bikes blasting past me in both directions, so I HOPED that any popo will go after the speeding crotch rockets and ignore the BMW Land Yacht


There's not much of a shoulder and in many places it's thick forest right up to the edge of the road, so I do worry a bit about deer and keep the brakes covered.


Amazing scenery-


The big K1200LT Land Yacht handles these fast sweepers with aplomb and I'm thinking to myself that this wouldn't have been nearly as much fun on a Goldwing...







Would have been nice to stop and take a dip in the Spearfish River, but we'd left camp a bit late and needed to keep going if we were going to reach the Bighorn Mountains by a decent hour.


Wow, what a road!


Little interesting factoid- Spearfish Canyon is where they filmed the final scenes in the epic movie "Dances with Wolves".


Zoomin'





Got stuck briefly behind a tractor...


Dunno if the big land yacht made them nervous or something, but they kept hitting the brakes in the strangest places and almost wiped out on the gentlest of curves...


We reach the end of Spearfish Canyon all too soon, roll through the cute little town of Spearfish, and jump on the I90 Interstate headed West.

It's starting to get a bit warm- It's actually 11:49 am (I haven't adjusted the bike's clock for Mountain Time yet)


Welcome to Wyoming!!!

[TonyBKK]

It's getting hotter and the wind is picking up... I didn't think a big heavy bike like a K1200LT would be affected so much by the wind, but we were getting blown all over the place and I had some white knuckle moments when passing or being passed by large trucks.

Finally, after about 40 or 50 miles of this crazy wind I decided to get off the interstate, so we took the 14/16 which will reconnect with the interstate in Buffalo, WY


It's still very hot-


There is nothing out here except coal mines (couldn't see the actual mines, but could see the huge clouds of black dust that the diggers and dump trucks kick up), gas and oil mines, and cattle-


Miles and miles of nothing-


I was thinking to myself that this would be a terrible place to break down or run into bad weather- we went for many miles without seeing another vehicle or inhabited building.








Looks like we might get wet...


We ride on and on and it's still hot and windy and I know that my little guy must need a break, though he's not complaining.

Finally I spot a little roadside watering hole, like an oasis in a desert-


The Spotted Horse! (As you can see, it's still very very windy!)

We duck inside and it's like a place lost in time- a couple of old timers at one table and what I guess to be a father and son at the bar.


Gotta love the signs above the bar- "Drink till she's cute" and "Life's too short to drink cheap beer" were a couple of my favorites

I ask the barkeep for a glass of water and she tells me, "We don't drink the water around here"...

What a strange and interesting place. Kristhawee took my camera and snapped these pictures-






Kristhawee even got a picture of me with The Duke himself! John Wayne!


Kristhawee and The Duke!


It was a good thing I'd topped off the gas back on the interstate because it was about 70 miles to the first little town (Clearmont) that had a gas station.

After we'd cooled off and chilled out for a while at the Spotted Horse we went back out into the wind and heat to press on to the mountains-

[TonyBKK]

We continue West on US14/16 and it feels like this road will never end... I start to think maybe we just should have stayed on the interstate...




Then finally, way off in the distance, we spot the Bighorn Mountains!


There's snow up there! Kristhawee is excited!


The road starts to climb and the temperature starts to drop-


Entering Bighorn National Forest!


The road and the views get more interesting-


Dunno about the rest of you, but I'll take forest over plains any day!


US 16 winding through the Bighorn National Forest-




Fantastic road!


Can you see the highway through the trees?






Nice and cool up here near the tree line-


See the snow?


This is the first snow we've seen on our trip and it's a welcome change after all the heat we had earlier in the day.








Windscreen is getting pretty buggy!


Finally we arrive at Meadowlark Lake and the Lake View campground-

[TonyBKK]

The Lake View campground on Meadowlark Lake in the Bighorn Mountain National Forest is exceptionally pristine and beautiful!


We found a great spot in a tent-only area right next to the lake. Kristhawee helped me set up the tent-


This was a really cool spot- we were actually on a little island- we had to cross a couple small streams to get to this spot, and if you look closely at the picture above you can see a steam just behind the tent.

We got the tent set up just in time too because a small thunderstorm rolled in quite suddenly. No worries- we'll just chill in the tent until the rain passes.


Father and son


My son came up with this funny game that he calls the "Bison game" where we push against each other and see who has the strongest head. Believe it or not he wins a lot!


The rain has stopped, it's getting late, and the temperature is dropping fast-


I have to say a BIG BIG THANK YOU to the campground hosts, Don and Barb-


We arrived quite a bit later than I'd planned and I didn't have much in the way of food.

When I went to register and pay for the camp spot I asked Don where would be the nearest place to buy some food and he gave me a funny look and said probably the closest place would be all the way down in Ten Sleep, 20 miles away... Don's wife gave me a disapproving look and stated the obvious, "You don't have any food?!"

I was pretty beat and the idea of jumping back on the bike for a 40 mile grocery run did not sound like my idea of a good time, but gotta do what ya gotta do.

I went back to tell Kristhawee that we'd need to get back on the bike and we were just getting ready to go when Don came down in his truck with a big bag of food! Wow! He told us that another family had had to leave unexpectedly when one of their kids crashed on a bicycle and that they'd given all their extra food to Don and Barb as they left.

Don and Barb were kind enough to pass it along to us. Can't thank you enough for your kindness Don and Barb!!

I tell you, you meet the nicest people when you travel!

There was (and still is) a total fire ban in the Black Hills so we hadn't had a camp fire since our first night at Lake Vermillion. Don said it was no problem to have a fire here, so off we went to scavenge some wood. Seems my boy loves fire just as much as I do. I was a total pyro as a kid and I think my kid is a chip off the old block




We enjoyed hotdogs for dinner, courtesy of Don and Barb, and I had everything we needed to make smores for desert-


Full and looking a bit sleepy


One more smore before bed-


Our warm dry tent awaits-


Good night!!