Happy Birthday Marianne!

Tuesday, July 10th: Up against the wall, MF. Actually, today we headed to Wall, South Dakota, famous for its iconic Wall Drug, which we had never heard of until this trip. The ride itself was an uneventful 57 miles, 20 miles of which were on the interstate (read: boring). After cleaning up at our hotel in Wall, we headed over to Wall Drug for some lunch. The place was founded in the 1930's, and has metamorphised into a stadium-sized chachtzkie store, selling everything from ice cream to t-shirts to Wall Drug shot glasses to toy cars to meds. Apparently, people come from miles away to shop for this crap. They also have a prehistoric dinosaur bone selling for $2,200. The food was so-so, but the onion rings were to die for. There were thousands of roadside signs advertising Wall Drug, starting hundreds of miles away from the place. One advertised 5 cent cups of coffee, and free donuts for veterans and hunters. So, when we got the front of the line, Joel identified Allison as a veteran, and she received her free cake donut (icing was extra). Wall was celebrating its centennial with bull riding and fireworks that night, but we had better things to do, like sleep.

Wednesday, July 11th: HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM/MARIANNE!!!!
Today we headed to Pierre (pronounced "peer" by the locals). It was 117 miles of mind-numbingly, insufferably, hellaciously boring road. But it was sunny. We saw a lot of hay. There's not much else to say. A hundred and seventeen miles is a hell of a long way.

Thursday, July 12th. Fueled by the previous night's culinary adventure (also known as the China Super Buffet...a $7 per person special), we stormed out of Pierre and began the 84 miles to Chamberlain, South Dakota, a town nobody had ever heard of. The ride was actually quite pretty, as we rolled along the Missouri River. There were lots of rolling hills and a couple of big climbs at the end, which were fun! Our least favorite parts about the ride were the tough head wind we encountered for the first 48 miles, until we turned to head south, and the atrocious state of the road, whose bumps and holes were a challenge for our rear ends. Once we arrived in Chamberlain, we headed to a coffee shop for lunch, which was actually quite delicious, although our hopes for a good dinner were deflated when we set eyes on the buffet: fried chicken, mystery meat, instant mashed potatoes, and....NO DESSERT. Sigh.