Day 36 – Bozeman to Iowa

Saturday, August 3, 2019

When I woke up at 5:30 am, the temperature had cooled down to 11 C ( 52 F ) and it was a little damp outside.   I cleaned up a bit and left the rest stop shortly before 6 am, heading towards the sunrise.

I had driven an hour before I got tired again, so I pulled over at a rest stop, reclined my seat and rested for a while.   When I woke up, one and a half hours had passed, but I felt refreshed, so I continued my journey.

The landscape slowly changed from rolling foothills to prairie grasslands and as I got closer to South Dakota there was an infestation of motorcyclists converging on the Sturgis area.   They were coming from all directions in various size groups, mostly riding, with a few people trailering their motorcycles. I noticed that a large number of the riders had very little safety equipment, especially helmets but they may not have anything to protect.

I sped  past the Wall Drug area, driving at the posted speed limit of 80 mph ( 128 kph ), however, it is also construction season and it seemed that every time that I had just gotten up to the posted speed, there was another long construction site with a single lane and a reduced speed limit.

I continued driving east, only stopping long enough for gas and some rest.   At one of my stops, I noticed that I had entered the Central Time Zone and ‘ lost ‘ another hour.    As I entered Minnesota, it was after midnight and I looked for a rest stop on the 218 south but I didn’t find anything, so I kept driving.   It appeared that there weren’t any rest stops or even hotels in the area, so I opted for another option.   At 1:30 am, I pulled into a ‘ Loves ‘ gas station/truck stop, parked my car, pulled out my sleeping bag and pillow, crawled into the back seat and fell asleep.

My GPS indicated that I had driven almost 15 hours and it would take another 13 hours of driving left to get home.