74 miles ridden – 5515 feet climbed

Today was a hard day’s cycling but a fabulous day’s ride. It was much cooler than the last couple of days – 85F/30C – and we were quite pleased that it was ‘only’ 74 miles. However, despite the first 38 miles being a more or less continual climb and having a pretty strong headwind, the constantly changing landscape and the iconic monuments we saw more than made up for it. In fact I wasn’t even excited about today’s right turn.

The first section was through Wind Cave National Park. Famous for its Bison and Prairee Dogs (more like rats than dogs!), its rolling landscape made it a pleasure to cycle through.

Our SAG stop was in the town of Custer. It was sort of charming although I noticed there were significantly more places to buy guns than there were to buy milk. However, as with most places we stop in the locals were keen to come and chat about our trip which is very nice although the prevailing opinion is that we are mad.

Climbing out of Custer was one of the tougher climbs of the day partly because of the gradient but mainly because the shoulder we had to ride on was only about one foot wide, the wind was very strong, and there was a lot of traffic but we were rewarded at the top with a good view of the Crazy Horse Memorial.

The plan is for this whole mountain to be sculpted into a statue of the Oglala Sioux Chief Crazy Horse on a horse 563 feet high and 641 feet long. It is impressive but there is a long way to go.

The excitement of seeing the Crazy Horse memorial and the anticipation of seeing Mount Rushmore took a bit of the shine off the right turn at 43 miles but it was nevertheless a very nice right turn onto a much smaller and quieter road. As we approached Mount Rushmore the scale of our surroundings became clearer. There is a green spec in the picture below – about one third across from the left just above the trees – it is a couple of climbers.

Our first view of Mount Rushmore was from a lay-by about half a mile from the main entrance – quite a striking view:

However, what you see from the main viewing area is really quite striking:

From left to right, Presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln. Seeing Mount Rushmore is definitely a highlight of the trip so far. The majesty of this monument was countered by the absolute tackiness of the town of Keystone at the bottom of the mountain so we visited the SAG stop and quickly made our way up the last climb of the day before a very fast descent into Rapid City.

A great day but with today’s climbing and the previous 2 days distance we are all exhausted. Tomorrow is a short day – 58 miles – with an 8:30 start so no alarm.