Well, Folks, we arrived in Sturgis on Wednesday afternoon and met up with our friends, Karen and Dave from Arizona. We met them 8 years ago in the parking lot of a hotel we were staying in and have been good friends ever since. When we go south in the winter we always make an effort to park in their driveway for a few days for their free camping services (snicker).
Dave and Karen are some very interesting folks. They raised eleven children, two of whom were their biological children, and five of the remaining adopted nine children were from other ethnic backgrounds. Only one of the eleven children was male, so Dave has some interesting stories to tell about living in a household with eleven females who were all suffering from PMS at the same time!!
So we spent the afternoon catching up and then drove the eleven miles up the canyon to Deadwood and Lead to find some supper. Then it was on to a few casinos in Deadwood where Karen came out about $30 ahead, then on down the road back to the campground and an early tuck-in-to-bed.
This was all fine and dandy and quiet until about 2 a.m. when loud motorcycles pipes, sirens and flashing lights woke me up. So being the Nosey Norwegian that I am I of course had to get up and see what was going on. No surprise that Ole slept through the entire racket and I had to fill him in on the details the next morning. Senior Citizen Simon kept me company while I watched out the window. Seems some idiot stayed in one of the bars too long and then hopped on his bike and went speeding down the highway toward the campground. Now believe me, there is an abundance of cops in this area right now, and anybody who chooses to break any of the traffic laws deserves what they get. This idiot apparently thought he was going to outrace the cops here, who are also on motorcycles, headed into the campground thinking he was going to hide amongst the motor homes and tents but was unsuccessful – he crashed into a tree and stopped fast. Three motorcycle cops followed him with a police SUV right behind them, got him stopped just down the road from us, sirens going and flashing lights flashing. He must have gotten off his bike and tried to run as I could see all kinds of search lights flashing through the trees that surround the campground. Apparently he got hung up on a barbed wire fence and the police closed in on him. Then a wrecker appeared, loaded up his bike and I would imagine he’s probably still sitting in the clink and his bike is locked up somewhere. Being put in jail in Sturgis during Bike Week is almost as bad as being put in a Mexican jail – if you know what I mean!!
This morning we woke up to rain showers so nobody was in a hurry to get going. Ole and I finally decided we’d try to do a little shopping before the crowds get bad and everything gets picked over. Also, we needed to have some repairs made on our T-bag as the zipper broke which of course causes things to fall out. After visiting three different places we finally found someone who was able to fix it.
One of the very noticeable things about the bike rally this year is that the counts are already way down. Folks who normally move out of their homes and rent them to groups of bikers have not been able to rent. There are signs all over town that there are homes available for rent, campgrounds and motels are not full and there are lots of vendor spaces available. I believe two things have happened here: gas prices have put people off and Sturgis has priced itself out of the market. In the past, hotel rooms that normally rent for $50 a night would go for $250 a night during bike week. Food and beverages prices were always raised at least 20 percent, along with gas prices. The latest gas price that I saw in Sturgis this afternoon was regular for $3.69 per gallon. Diesel was $3.59, so I’m glad we filled in Buffalo at $2.95 and won’t need to buy anymore before we get home. Now is that gouging or what? I think people are getting tired of being taken advantage of, thus the picture I have attached of the no inflated prices sign. The saloon that had that sign posted was so full there wasn’t even standing room. Also, the crowd attending the bike rally is getting more and more gray, if you know what I mean. The teens, 20s and 30s can’t afford it anymore and it’s the 40s, 50s, 60s and older that you see on the streets, and being older and wiser they’re just not going to stand for all the gouging.
We’re seeing lots of familiar faces in the campground as many of us have been camping here since the place opened five years ago. There’s the electrician from Kansas City who travels with his dog Norton and a wife who drinks way too much wine every night, turns on her CD player and dances all in her own little world. The RV on one side of us has five guys from Pennsylvania, who plan to get on their bikes early tomorrow morning and ride to Cody, Wyoming, about 200 miles from here. There is so much beautiful riding here in the Black Hills I don’t know why they think they have to go all the way to Cody, which is all grassy plains other than the Big Horns. Across the road from us are Jeff and his Dad from Huron, SD. Jeff is a wonderful young man who works as a counselor for wayward boys, but is leaving that job to go back to farming with his father. Then two doors down from us is a couple from Payson, AZ, and the wife just happens to have graduated from the same high school that Ole and I did, only two years ahead of us. We didn’t know her, but we knew her sister quite well. It’s a small world, isn’t it? There are lots of other familiar faces here that we haven’t had a chance to catch up with yet, but we’ve been coming here so many years it almost gets to be like a family reunion.
Ole has been coming here every year since 1988. I haven’t missed a year since 1994. That’s a lot of years, People. And even though we ride the same routes every year and do basically the same things, we don’t get tired of it. It’s always beautiful and very enjoyable.
By the way, I want you all to be very proud of me. I was having trouble getting my cell phone to connect to the internet – but I managed to get that all figured out and as you can tell (duh) it’s working now!! So I just want to feel all those proud vibes way down here coming from all of you. Just remember, I’m not the brightest light bulb in the box when it comes to computer hardware so this is a major accomplishment for me.
Dave and Karen are some very interesting folks. They raised eleven children, two of whom were their biological children, and five of the remaining adopted nine children were from other ethnic backgrounds. Only one of the eleven children was male, so Dave has some interesting stories to tell about living in a household with eleven females who were all suffering from PMS at the same time!!
So we spent the afternoon catching up and then drove the eleven miles up the canyon to Deadwood and Lead to find some supper. Then it was on to a few casinos in Deadwood where Karen came out about $30 ahead, then on down the road back to the campground and an early tuck-in-to-bed.
This was all fine and dandy and quiet until about 2 a.m. when loud motorcycles pipes, sirens and flashing lights woke me up. So being the Nosey Norwegian that I am I of course had to get up and see what was going on. No surprise that Ole slept through the entire racket and I had to fill him in on the details the next morning. Senior Citizen Simon kept me company while I watched out the window. Seems some idiot stayed in one of the bars too long and then hopped on his bike and went speeding down the highway toward the campground. Now believe me, there is an abundance of cops in this area right now, and anybody who chooses to break any of the traffic laws deserves what they get. This idiot apparently thought he was going to outrace the cops here, who are also on motorcycles, headed into the campground thinking he was going to hide amongst the motor homes and tents but was unsuccessful – he crashed into a tree and stopped fast. Three motorcycle cops followed him with a police SUV right behind them, got him stopped just down the road from us, sirens going and flashing lights flashing. He must have gotten off his bike and tried to run as I could see all kinds of search lights flashing through the trees that surround the campground. Apparently he got hung up on a barbed wire fence and the police closed in on him. Then a wrecker appeared, loaded up his bike and I would imagine he’s probably still sitting in the clink and his bike is locked up somewhere. Being put in jail in Sturgis during Bike Week is almost as bad as being put in a Mexican jail – if you know what I mean!!
This morning we woke up to rain showers so nobody was in a hurry to get going. Ole and I finally decided we’d try to do a little shopping before the crowds get bad and everything gets picked over. Also, we needed to have some repairs made on our T-bag as the zipper broke which of course causes things to fall out. After visiting three different places we finally found someone who was able to fix it.
One of the very noticeable things about the bike rally this year is that the counts are already way down. Folks who normally move out of their homes and rent them to groups of bikers have not been able to rent. There are signs all over town that there are homes available for rent, campgrounds and motels are not full and there are lots of vendor spaces available. I believe two things have happened here: gas prices have put people off and Sturgis has priced itself out of the market. In the past, hotel rooms that normally rent for $50 a night would go for $250 a night during bike week. Food and beverages prices were always raised at least 20 percent, along with gas prices. The latest gas price that I saw in Sturgis this afternoon was regular for $3.69 per gallon. Diesel was $3.59, so I’m glad we filled in Buffalo at $2.95 and won’t need to buy anymore before we get home. Now is that gouging or what? I think people are getting tired of being taken advantage of, thus the picture I have attached of the no inflated prices sign. The saloon that had that sign posted was so full there wasn’t even standing room. Also, the crowd attending the bike rally is getting more and more gray, if you know what I mean. The teens, 20s and 30s can’t afford it anymore and it’s the 40s, 50s, 60s and older that you see on the streets, and being older and wiser they’re just not going to stand for all the gouging.
We’re seeing lots of familiar faces in the campground as many of us have been camping here since the place opened five years ago. There’s the electrician from Kansas City who travels with his dog Norton and a wife who drinks way too much wine every night, turns on her CD player and dances all in her own little world. The RV on one side of us has five guys from Pennsylvania, who plan to get on their bikes early tomorrow morning and ride to Cody, Wyoming, about 200 miles from here. There is so much beautiful riding here in the Black Hills I don’t know why they think they have to go all the way to Cody, which is all grassy plains other than the Big Horns. Across the road from us are Jeff and his Dad from Huron, SD. Jeff is a wonderful young man who works as a counselor for wayward boys, but is leaving that job to go back to farming with his father. Then two doors down from us is a couple from Payson, AZ, and the wife just happens to have graduated from the same high school that Ole and I did, only two years ahead of us. We didn’t know her, but we knew her sister quite well. It’s a small world, isn’t it? There are lots of other familiar faces here that we haven’t had a chance to catch up with yet, but we’ve been coming here so many years it almost gets to be like a family reunion.
Ole has been coming here every year since 1988. I haven’t missed a year since 1994. That’s a lot of years, People. And even though we ride the same routes every year and do basically the same things, we don’t get tired of it. It’s always beautiful and very enjoyable.
By the way, I want you all to be very proud of me. I was having trouble getting my cell phone to connect to the internet – but I managed to get that all figured out and as you can tell (duh) it’s working now!! So I just want to feel all those proud vibes way down here coming from all of you. Just remember, I’m not the brightest light bulb in the box when it comes to computer hardware so this is a major accomplishment for me.
4 comments:
what an adventure youre having!! im so proud of you to be able to figure out how to get innernet going!!! one time the tv show cops showed cops in sturgis, and it was filled with mostly guys like what you described here!! that was funny!! looking forward to continued adventures here!!!
I'm just getting back to my blogs after getting (or trying) my new computer set up. I had to read you first and check out your adventures and pictures. It all sounds wonderful!! And I know just the kind of fun you're having. I used to love visiting or meeting up with other couples that we had befriended during our travels and getting to know new ones. They are mostly good ol' friendly folks that travel that way! Keep having fun and I'm so glad you got 'connected' so you can stay in touch! BTW, cell phone service for the internet must have improved since I was doing it 5 years ago. It was SO slow I would never have been able to post pictures! Such progress in the world of communications! {{Hug}}
Wow! How fun! And so many characters you find along the way!
Hey Lena,
Welcome to SD, the land of Price gouging... It's like that all the time here, not just for Sturgis. I noticed our town prices went up for bike week too. The whole state economy depends alot on this particular week, can you believe it?
I just love the black hills! they are just fantastic.
I hope you are having fun!
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