Today we left Pierre, South Dakota and the Missouri River. Pierre is a nice town, small for a state capital, but nice. Right across the street from our motel was a park that ran along side the Missouri River and on display was the first schoolhouse in Pierre (photo 1). I also took some pictures of the bridge coming into town and a fellow who had gotten an early morning start on his fishing (photo 2, 3 & 4). The Missouri looks wide and rather tame at this point (photo 5) and Pierre should be proud of the job they did in making it so accessible to its citizens.

We jumped onto SR 14 again and would stay there for most of the rest of the day, at least till we left South Dakota. As were leaving, we thought it only fair to go by and see the state capital (photo 6) and a memorial to soldiers and sailors (photo 7). You seem to find more monuments of appreciation to our servicemen in these small towns than you do in the bigger cities. Why is that?

Soon we were back into the same type of farmland that we had seen yesterday (photos 8 & 9), but this morning the temperature was much cooler and the clouds threatened rain (photo 10). We moved quickly east at 70 mph.

Motorcyclists don't usually like rain, but I dislike heavy wind even more. Out here on the prairie the wind seems to be constant, varying only in degree, and today the wind alternated between being a real pain in the butt to just being aware of its presence. At one gas stop, I even raised the windshield to a higher level in an attempt to reduce the affect of buffeting on our abused bodies, with mixed results. I guess you have to take the bad with the good, as they say, and we'll just consider it a part of the adventure.

As we were pointing the Goldwing east, we were interrupted in our travels in the small town of Wolsey, South Dakota, by a train blocking the main street (SR14) while it had to switch a couple of hopper cars. As we were waiting, I took a couple of photos of the whole town and it reminded me of the small town of Bell, MO, where my grandfather lived. One main street, a large water tower with the town name on it, a couple of grain silos, and small businesses serving the local towns folks (photos 11,12,134,14,15). My grandfather loved his small town of Bell. I'm sure the people of Wolsey feel the same way about their little community.

As the train finally left and we continued on, we came across yet one more herd of Angus beef (photo 16) and Linda felt that we had taken pictures of everything else, we should at least record this part of our trip.

It was getting close to noon, so we stopped in the little town of DeSmet for something to eat and discovered that this was the little town where Laura Ingalls lived as a child. Laura Ingalls is the author of all of those "Little House on the Prairie" books that were eventually turned into a TV series with Michael Landon. We decided to go visit this site, since we were here already, and asked a local girl at the Dairy Queen if she knew how we could get there. She told us to, " Go down this street, turn left at Rich's Gas Station, go down to the Court House and turn right, and it's about three blocks on the right.

Fine, we headed out looking for Rich's Gas Station and ended up going out of this little town. After turning the big Goldwing and trailer around and heading back into town, we realized there was only one gas station in this town, and it's a Shell Station. Then it dawned on us that this young lady knew that someone named Rich owned the Shell station. In the comfort of her local knowledge, she apparently forgot that we didn't know Rich and would only see a Shell station, and missed the turn. Anyway, we figured it out and made it to the local attraction.

Behind Laura Ingalls' little home was her schoolhouse with three seats for students (photos 17,18,19,20). This was even smaller than the schoolhouse we saw this morning at Pierre. It was a nice break from the road, but we quickly returned and headed for Minnesota.

It was time to try and make some time since the clouds were getting darker and lower in the sky. It looked like rain, the radio on the Goldwing said it was going to rain, and I preferred not to ride in the rain if I didn't have to. Mile after mile, darker and darker clouds, closer and closer to a motel. Would we make it before the sky opened up?

Finally, we crossed the border and had another 38 miles left to Marshall, Minnesota. Just as we pulled into town, big drops started to fall, not hard, more like a soft shower really. We stopped and asked directions to a local motel and as we pulled into the local Best Western, the rain actually stopped. Go figure.

Tomorrow we head for Duluth, right on Lake Superior. It will be our first time seeing one of the Great Lakes. I can hardly wait.

Go back to the Laura Ingalls day for Old lady with red corvette

Today's Route: South Dakota SR 14 to just past Lake Benton, MN. Minnesota SR 23 to Marshall, MN.