Hi everyone! Welcome to day 38 - officially the half way point of the ride! And it was a very special day indeed. Firstly, we got to visit Mount Rushmore. Secondly, we got to leave South Dakota. Nothing against the old SD but we definitely stayed there for a long while and a change of scenery has been long awaited.
The morning started with Bryan and Zona getting their inner anger out by smashing their old unusable helmets. The helmets took surprisingly many hits and even a few people jumping on them before breaking .
The first 20 miles of the ride were beautiful but quite intense. We had several big climbs including one that went all the way up to 18% grade incline at one point O_O Despite being very sweaty and out of breath, it was a nice opportunity to appreciate beautiful views of the Black Hills for us.
A few miles before getting to our first rest of the day which just happened to be right by Mount Rushmore, a couple of the groups stopped for some side activities like gold panning and visiting the The National Presidential Wax Museum.
Expecting to become rich any second
Not quite sure what exactly is happening here
After our impromptu stops and a lot more climbing, we all finally made it to Mount Rushmore. It turned out to be much smaller than most of us expected and frankly had a disappointing gift store. Despite that, we still took tons of pictures and enjoyed our short time there.
No differences spotted
After Mount Rushmore, we still had 57 more miles of biking to do. Lucky for us, the Black Hills turned out to be amazing for biking. Despite having to do a fair bit of climbing, we also got to enjoy the most breathtakingly beautiful and fun downhills of the ride so far.
Matt H pondering his life choices
Mercedes rock hunting by the side of the road
King of the hill
Bat dad Peter
About 10 miles away from our stayover, we crossed the border into Wyoming. The Wyoming state sign did not disappoint and we all appreciated it quite a bit (especially knowing we would only be biking downhill after it).
Veronica also took a chance to take a picture with the South Dakota sign to say goodbye, and even took a sticker off it as a little souvenir.
-Valerie