First Jedediah Smith Trail 1822 — 1824

Day 35: September 19th, 2009 Bozeman — Rapid City

Map Bozeman to Rapid City

Even so it was extremely late yesterday, I already wake up at a quarter past seven in the morning. I hurry up to get ready. All in all, there are more than 500 miles to drive today and I also want to do some shopping at the Montana Silversmith!

Breakfast will be at IHOP, which should be somewhere in direction of the Outback Steakhouse. So I drive one exit to the west on the Interstate and turn in direction of the Outback Steakhouse. There, I enter a shopping area. But I am not able to see something at the Outback. So I continue driving the main road. I almost fear that I have been lost again. But just past Home Depot I see the IHOP sign on the house wall. It seems like they are not allowed to put signs high up here like everywhere else in the country.

In spite of being a Saturday today, I immediately receive a table. Currently, all servers are dressed with Football shirts of the different Football teams. Funnily enough, my server wears the Pittsburgh Steelers shirt. What a coincidence!

The breakfast here is okay. Only the bacon is not really great and they are only two thin stripes. There, I had better ones in the past. I pay and drive over to the next gas station.

Just before eleven, I am eventually back on the Interstate.

I–90, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, Yellowstone River, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, Yellowstone River, MT

I–90, Yellowstone River, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, Yellowstone River, MT

I make good miles now. Only the inclines give my old truck a real hard time. The coolant temperature always climbs up to 240 degrees. This is something I have to really work on, there is something going wrong. I even have the impression that things get worse when I turn on the cooler fans. Maybe I will work again a bit on it back in Pittsburgh, if time permits.

I–90, MT

Montana Silversmith, Columbus, MT

Finally, I arrive at half past twelve in Columbus. First, I drive in the direction, which my navigation software tells me. But this runs towards the mountains. That is definitely wrong. Therefore I turn around and drive back in direction of the city. And suddenly I see the store. It is the building, which looks from the outside like a western style building with a lot of timber. This is something I remembered correctly. But I thought it would be directly at the main road. Indeed, it is at a small shopping area beside the main road.

I park directly in front of the store and enter the building. There, I am greeted really nicely. When I tell the shop assistant that I have been here around 5 to 6 years ago she tells me that there has changed a lot. She explains to me what are the regular price items and which ones are on sale. There are even items that have costed $160 before and are now available for $80. There you can really fall into a spending spree if there wouldn’t be customs. My limit is at $200 and I am able to find some nice items for my parents and friends back home. Hopefully, they are happy with my selection.

Around half past one I eventually pay and drive on. In the meantime, my navigation software shows an arrival time of a quarter to nine in the evening. Hopefully, I will be able to gain some time back. But I doubt that it will be really much. Especially, if you are kept up by endless construction zones, where you are only allowed to drive 35mph! This is almost a cheek!

I–90, Yellowstone River, MT

I–90, Yellowstone River, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, MT

Train, I–90, MT

88 S10 Blazer 149000 Miles, I–90, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, MT

I–90, MT

Slowly I work my way towards Wyoming. Again, I miss the state line sign because I was forced to concentrate too much on the surrounding traffic.

I–90, WY

Then I continue up to Sheridan. I have again almost my doubts, that I will make it with my residual gas in the tank. Due to driving a lot in third gear in the mountains my truck really eats up the gas. At least I have the impression. When I do the math at my stop to gas up in Sheridan, I realize, that it was not this bad.

I quickly make a stop at the restroom, have a cereal bar and then continue my ride. There is not really much time for a lunch break. I have to get going.

I–90, WY

I–90, WY

I–90, WY

I–90, WY

I–90, WY

I–90, WY

I–90, WY

I–90, WY

I–90, WY

I–90, Gillette, WY

I–90, WY

I–90, WY

I–90, WY

Also in Wyoming are a bunch of construction zones on I–90. But at least you are allowed to drive 65mph. However, I am not going faster than 68, so this really works out for me.

I–90, WY

Sunset I–90, WY

Sunset I–90, WY

Sunset I–90, WY

Sunset I–90, WY

Sunset I–90, WY

When I leave Wyoming behind and arrive in South Dakota, it is starting to get dark. I am not sure if the picture of the state line sign will be really okay.

When I arrive at half past eight in Rapid City, it is already completely dark. When I am driving the roads to my motel, I slowly remember how everything was laid out here. Also the Outback Steakhouse can be easily seen on the other side of the road. There are no single bed rooms available, but I receive the double bed room for the same room rate, because they charge here only by the amount of people. This is the advantage in the Motel 6 chain.

I quickly put my stuff into the room. Then I take a brief look at my Laptop to check if there is a Texas Roadhouse or something similar nearby. But the Outback Steakhouse is probably the only one I know around here. So I drive over there. Actually, it would not be far away. But because you must really circle around here, the air–line distance of 0.3 miles turns out to be a driving distance of a bit more than 1.5 miles.

Around a quarter to ten I pay and drive back to my motel. There, I try first if there is a chance to reach WiFi from another hotel. That works out with the Microtel Inn from across the street. Maybe that’s why she gave me this room, which is directly opposite to the other motel. There you have the best reception. All in all, she asked during check–in if I would need WiFi. But because it is not free, I declined it because I would only check for emails.

Indeed, I could make reservations for the next Motel 6 rooms, because I will not take a different route as planned. And maybe they even have special Internet room rates. Then I could save another 10%. We will see. For now, I start working on my bookkeeping and write my diary. While doing this, I listen to Rascal Flatts and Kenny Chesney. I also check my emails. Then I download the pictures from my camera.

Finally, I take a look at the Motel 6 web pages. But they do not offer any online reservation discount. Therefore I skip this plan. Then I take another look of my trip for tomorrow, before I go to bed. Because there have now people arrived, who are not really quiet, I decide to use my ear plugs again. All in all, it is already midnight. But tomorrow I must only drive a bit more than 430 miles, whereas I will loose another hour due to entering another time zone…

The next day is in preparation…