Day 19 Newcastle to Rapid City

Trains tooting their horns when the conductor sees you “air-pull-the-horn” is cool. But when you are trying to sleep…it’s irritating. These guys in Wyoming work nonstop on transporting coal. Every hour a train blares their horn notifying the incoming delivery. I put in my earplugs but they kept on falling out of my ears. I went through three pairs because I couldn’t find them in the dark of night. I had a miserable and restless sleep and the ride didn’t get any better, although riding through custer national park was a pleasant surprise.

self-explanatory

Riding out of it was another story. The wind picked up later in the afternoon; “picked up” I mean 30-40 mph winds with 50mph gusts blowing from the north. And guess where we were headed…directly into the wind, 15 miles of wind wrestling and rolling hill climbing, my favorite. Normally, I climb up rollers at a decent pace (around 12mph), but with the wind I crawled at 6 and the downhill at 8mph. Sick and tired of climbing at such a slow rate Ed decided to fight the wind for the last 5 miles at 13mph. By the 3rd mile, I was cussing like a sailor at ed and the wind, but mostly at Ed. My monologue went a little something like this: Why the bleep are you bleepin’ goin’ so bleepin’ fast, you bleepin’ mother bleeper? You bleepin’ told me not to bleepin’ fight the bleepin’ wind. What the bleep? Bleep! All the yelling did no good because it was so windy Ed couldn’t hear me cussin’ his bleepin’ ear off. At the end of the ride, I thanked him, gave him a hug and told him I appreciate him being here. he kinda makes it easier for me since I get to suck his wind (bike lingo for “drafting”), but makes it harder at the same time, since he rides so freakin’ hard, ALL THE TIME.

This tops the most difficult ride of the trip, pushing aside the 4th of july ride to numero dos. We pushed through the last 15 miles fast enough to finish first along with the chuckster and dewayne. A little later Barb came and gave ed and I hug for giving her the inspiration to keep on pedaling (apparently, seeing us gave her hope that this ride is possible- glad to be of service, barb).

For dinner I skipped out on the cafeteria food because a special guest came to see me. A $500 plane ticket to see me definitely warrants for some fine dining and not overcooked spaghetti and meatballs. So Steph and I went to Delmonico Grill where we enjoyed or I enjoyed the buffalo steak, some shrimp dish, ahi tuna, a glass of Goose Island Pere Jacques (a malty sweet ale) and a glass of wine. Afterwards, we dragged ed and catie to see mount rushmore and the overhyped lightshow (they flip the light switch to ON) I expected a laser show, but you can find that at the Crazy Horse Monument.

That's the light show...no joke