Last day at the rally

Missed writing at all about yesterday. The hotel we were in for the night was nice so we got some good sleep in. Ran into a man from Medina who had stopped at the rally and was on his way elsewhere (I think he said Colorado). Had some advice for our trip as he had done it before. Suggested some roads to try out and things like that. But anyway, the day's goal was to get to the rally so we could have a break. Went through some beautiful country, ran into another bout of rain (but we got our rain gear on in time to keep nice and dry) and made our way through South Dakota into Wyoming.

One thing to note on these long seemingly dull roads is not only the beautiful scenery, but the billboards. A TON of old style hand painted billboards advertising restaurants and rest stop but also the amazing sites to see. Truly the biggest advertiser was Wall Drug. Absolutely crazy with the signs. We were convinced after a few hundred miles of signs (no joke) and stopped, but it was so crowded we decided our time was best spent at Mt. Rushmore and Devils Tower. Mt. Rushmore was beautiful and we're glad we stopped. Great piece of artwork. Devils Tower was even more impressive with the promise of hiking trails. We rode around, took some great pictures, and made the decision that we had to come back Saturday.

We arrived at the rally and found a nice camping spot. Had a good steak dinner, talked to some fun people and hit the hay!

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Today we spent some more time at the rally. Most of the time way just unwinding from the long days of riding earlier. We did do some riding to go back to Devils Tower to spend some real time there. We finally got to walk around it and really enjoy ourselves there.

Between Devils Tower and Mt. Rushmore there's no comparison. One is a piece of art; the other is an amazing work by nature. It's a lot easier to appreciate the work of nature in its raw state. It's even more interesting to watch people conquer it by climbing it. Free climbing it. And people say we're crazy. :-)

Afterward we came back to the Rally and mingled a bit. One of our neighbors is from the PNW -- Joe. He's a cool guy and we spent a bunch of time talking with him. He's spent a lot of time overseas on his jobs and he's seen a lot of the world -- a lot that most people wouldn't want to, like Angola and Columbia. People are pretty much the same the world around though, typically good folks once you get the governments out of the picture.

There's also a couple folks here who got here via a round-the-world trips... makes us look like sissies by comparison.