Passes & Canyons Blog

The OFMC pulled out of Custer and headed north. But not too far north. This was another day when a short ride called for a diversion. In this case it was that mandatory OFMC-trip stop, gambling.

We headed north on US 385, through Hill City, past Pactola Reservoir, until we got to SD 44, then turned east. We wanted to connect with Norris Peak Road and run up to Nemo Road that way but they really don’t have these things marked very well. We went past it and stopped to reconnoiter, then headed back and figured this must be the road. It was.

Reaching Nemo Road we didn’t stop to discuss it but I was very much aware that this was where, a few years ago, Dennis nearly met his doom. We had stopped for a break and as we got ready to head out I pulled across the road and sat waiting. Dennis followed me without looking to see if the road was clear. It was not. There was a semi coming along at a good clip. Dennis later said he couldn’t hear anything except the roar of all those Harley engines.

He pulled out in front of that truck and that guy slammed on his brakes. I’m sure he must have been cursing this crazy biker but it was not Dennis’s day to die and the truck managed to stop. This was that place.

We cruised up Nemo Road to where County Road 3, Vanocker Canyon Road, goes off to the right. As the guys noted when we stopped, Vanocker Canyon Road is a beauty with the kind of sweepers you dream about. We rode it all the way up into Sturgis.

This was a couple weeks before the rally so things were gearing up but still quiet in Sturgis. Another reason there wasn’t much going on in Sturgis was that the temperature was well above 100. We got into town, parked, and walked to the Knuckle for lunch. We enjoyed the cool in there as long as we could and then just headed back to the bikes and out of town, on our way to Deadwood. But we barely got out of town when we were stopped on the road by construction. No shade, 106 degrees, just sit and wait. Yow!

Finally we were moving again and we made it on up to Deadwood and, after a hassle finding parking, headed into a casino. Nobody was having much luck that day, however, so we didn’t stay long. Back out at the bikes I pulled a bottle of Gatorade out of my bag and took a sip. I might as well have been drinking coffee, it was that warm. Let’s get moving!

On up to Lead and then down to Cheyenne Crossing where we turned north again down Spearfish Canyon. The canyon was beautiful, as always, and a nice ride but if we thought we were going to get some coolness in the canyon we were deluded. We got to Spearfish and quickly found our motel and settled into our rooms, savoring the cool.

Later that evening I went outside to give my wife a call and sat where I could see a time and temperature clock. Talking to her at 10 p.m. the clock was still telling me it was 94 degrees. I guess I’ll name this year’s trip “The Journey Through Heat.”

There would be no rush in the morning, it was to be another short day’s ride. With more heat.

Biker Quote for Today

We know you’re a poser if your $500 boots aren’t scuffed from riding.

The OFMC spent three nights in Custer, in the Black Hills, and with the Sturgis rally soon to inundate the area, the locals were getting ready.

I don’t know if these are normal room rates or whether they were already elevated for the rally but we paid an absurd amount for a very mediocre motel in Custer. And we were lucky to get it. They were turning people away the whole time we were there.

Our first full day in Custer was a golf day. This is an every year thing with the OFMC, although due to a shoulder injury I no longer play, I just tag along and play ball spotter. My eye-sight is better than theirs anyway.

The second day was a day to ride. We headed north out of Custer and picked up the Needles Highway just north of the Crazy Horse monument. We’ve done this ride numerous times but how can you not do one of the best roads around just because you’ve done it before? And this time I had something extra–my GoPro camera sitting on top of my helmet and a remote to shoot pictures with strapped to my left grip.

I’ve taken riding pictures before but it has always been in a very limited fashion. I put my camera strap around my neck, tuck the camera inside my jacket, and then when I want to shoot I pull it out, press the on button, and hold it high and shoot, trusting to auto-focus to give me something good. That has worked fairly well but I could only do this at times when it was OK to let go of the throttle–or put on the throttle lock–and when the road was not so gnarly that I needed to give riding my full attention. As you can guess, this has been fairly limiting.

With the GoPro remote on my grip I could now pay attention to riding but still very easily reach my thumb over and snap a shot. As for what I was shooting, the breadth of the image is so wide that as long as my head was faced generally in the direction of what I want a picture of it was sure to capture it. Of course this means cropping out 90 percent of the total image but with the kind of resolution this camera has you still end up with excellent photos.

So we rode the Needles Highway and stopped at one point for a break. Our intention was to also do the Wildlife Loop through Custer State Park and none of us were certain where we were but I didn’t think we had yet gotten to US 16. Dennis was convinced we had. I said fine, if we’re past US 16 we just need to look for the turn-off where the Wildlife Loop forks to the left. If we had not already reached US 16 we would need to go right and then left. Dennis was in the lead.

We hadn’t reached US 16 yet but as we came to it, Dennis turned left. This is why John said numerous times in the past when he was still riding with the group that the only other one he trusted to know where they were going was me.

No matter, the Wildlife Loop is a loop and going to the left we would still get to it, just at the other end. But we stopped at a visitor center and when I pulled out the map to show where we were Dennis and Bill wanted to backtrack and get on the loop going the way we had intended. So we did that.

We finally got on the Wildlife Loop and for the first time ever for me we saw exactly zero bison. They apparently had better things to do than hang around for tourists to gawk at them. But we did see donkeys. The donkeys do not have better things to do than hang out where tourists can feed them carrots.

So now we figured to continue onto Iron Mountain Road with all its tunnels and pig-tail bridges. I knew when we got to US 16 we would need to go right and I told that to Bill, who was in the lead. Remember one of the rules I’ve stated previously: never let Bill lead. Bill got up to US 16 and went left and I flagged him over. “Follow me.”

We rode Iron Mountain Road but unfortunately the battery in my GoPro had run dead so I didn’t get any shots along there. We reached Keystone and went in for cool air and cold drinks and then the plan was to head to Hill City to have dinner at the Alpine Inn. If you get the chance you should definitely have dinner at the Alpine Inn. They have two things on their menu: steak or Kaes Spaetzle Primavera. You can choose between a six-ounce or nine-ounce filet mignon. The meal includes a potato and a quarter head of iceberg lettuce with ranch dressing, plus Texas toast. Price: $13.95 or $16.95. This place is hugely popular so be sure to get there early. And the food is good.

And that was our day. Ride back to Custer, settle in, and get ready to head out in the morning.

Biker Quote for Today

You know you’re a biker if Sturgis is your dream vacation.

This year’s OFMC ride was not covering so many miles so in order to fill things out I scheduled in several excursions. The first was the morning of our second day, when we loaded up and then rode up onto Scotts Bluff National Monument before heading out of town. I had been up there but neither Bill or Dennis ever had.

Dennis and I were prepared but Bill had forgotten to bring his national parks pass, but the ranger at the entrance told me there were no fees this summer so we rode right in. If you’ve never been to the monument you should go. The road up the bluff circles around the bluff and goes through a tunnel to bring you out on top. It’s probably the best view in Nebraska because it’s probably about the highest point in Nebraska that you can get to normally. And if you have the time, there is a shuttle that will carry you to the top and you can walk down on the trail they have built–a really nice, all-downhill stroll.

We didn’t do the trail so after about an hour on top we were rolling, with Custer, South Dakota, our destination for the day.

NE 71 carried us north and then east until we picked up NE 2, again going north, toward US 20 at Crawford. More prairie riding; at least the hills add some interest. The heat at this point was intense, as it was much of this trip. At Crawford I pulled into a gas station just as a place to take a break with some shade but then noticed the empty-looking ice cream parlor/cafe next door was in fact open. So we pulled in there instead.

The Dairy Sweet in Crawford was a great stop. The sandwiches were good and the milk shakes were great. And the air conditioning was a life saver. Outside it was over 100 degrees.

It had been my intention to follow US 20 north and east to US 385 at Chadron but as we headed out of town I noticed a sign for NE 2 heading toward Hot Springs, South Dakota. What the heck? I had no idea this road was here, and it must certainly save us miles and would help us avoid the busy 385. I made the turn.

So I really don’t get it about this road. How did I not know it was there? It certainly was paved all the way so it’s not like I would have seen it and thought it was not paved. Whatever the deal was, it was a road we had never been on before and it was a nice one. Crossing into South Dakota NE 2 becomes SD 71 and runs up to where it hits US 18 at Edgemont, coming in from Wyoming. We followed 18 east to Hot Springs.

Gassing up in Hot Springs I mentioned that we had just come by The Mammoth Site and Bill asked what that was. I explained that it had been a sink hole where many creatures many thousands of years ago had been caught and drowned and whose bones now lay one on top of the other and that they were being unearthed and could be viewed by tourists, still tangled in the muck. Bill was very interested so we took another excursion.

From there we backtracked a bit on 18 to where we caught SD 89 north to where it merges with US 385 and on a few miles to Custer. This would be our base for the next several days.

Biker Quote for Today

I may not be that good looking, or athletic, or funny, or talented, or smart . . . I forgot where I was going with this but I do know that I love motorcycles.

I was half an hour late arriving at our meeting place, although I thought I had left home 10 minutes earlier than I needed to. Bill and Dennis didn’t seem to care but I was perplexed at how I could have so badly judged things.

Regardless, the OFMC headed out on I-76 with out first day’s destination Scottsbluff, Nebraska. Bill took the lead at the start and promptly led us miles in the wrong direction. When he finally pulled over and asked how to get on the highway I just said “Follow me” and led the way.

Dennis took the lead as we approached the exit for a rest area at Wiggins and I noted that the signs said this exit would put you on CO 52. We wanted 52 north so when we were ready to ride again I told them this was our exit and took the lead going north. However, crossing over I-76 I saw signs that I now realized meant 52 went south here but not north. 52 had jogged west at Fort Morgan. But I figured we could get where we were going via this route so I kept going.

What we ended up doing was zigging and zagging on the section roads in a way that followed the Platte River and eventually came into Fort Morgan–by a considerably longer route than if we had just gotten back on the interstate. Hey, at least it was pretty riding along the river. And we avoided 15 miles of interstate.

We rode 52 up to CO 14 near Raymer and New Raymer, turned east to CO 71 near Stoneham, and then north again. This was all pretty much straight with just some hills to add a little interest. Crossing into Nebraska, we stopped for gas at Kimball and there was more straight road going north. Finally we came through the very scenic cleft of Wildcat Hills State Recreation Area and descended into Scottsbluff.

Dennis had the motel on his GPS so he led us in. I was in the rear but I saw the motel and headed straight for it. Bill and Dennis did not; they rode past and were surprised to see me pulling in next to what they took to be an abandoned warehouse. Then they realized this was the motel.

Whatever this place used to look like, at this time their confusion is easy to understand. And this was not the only “abandoned warehouse” motel we stayed at on this trip. But the interiors were surprisingly nice.

So we were launched. The OFMC was on the road. And with my Kawi giving me problems with its carburetors I was looking forward to a week of getting familiar with how the throttle was responding now vs. how it used to respond. At least it was running well enough to make the trip.

Biker Quote for Today

Why motorcycles are better than women: Your Motorcycle doesn’t care what you’re wearing when you take it out.

Coronavirus or not, the OFMC took its annual trip in 2020, and we’re all still alive and healthy. So you can bet we’re planning a trip for 2021.

As the designated trip planner I have asked the guys what they want to do and then worked out a route and itinerary. They guys are good with what I came up with and here it is.

Our destination for the first day is Scottsbluff, NE. The guys mainly wanted to go to the Black Hills this year and this is a good midway point. You can ride all the way in one day–I have–but it’s more leisurely to take it in two. Plus, if you’ve never been to Scottsbluff and gone to the top of the bluffs you should. The actual park is Scotts Bluff National Monument. So this short ride will give us plenty of time to do that.

The next day we’ll ride on up to Custer, SD, which will be our home base for three nights. The OFMC always likes to spend two days in one place in order to have a day for golf. It turns out there are very few places in the Black Hills where there are public courses, and Custer is one. On the other day we’ll just ride around in the Black Hills.

Then leaving Custer we’ll have a short day’s ride up to Spearfish, SD. That’s a really short ride but the OFMC also always wants to do some gambling, so we’ll take a very short ride to Deadwood, give the casinos some of our money, and then complete the leisurely run to Spearfish.

The next day’s run is also very short, so I had to figure a good way to extend it. We’ll run up from Spearfish to Belle Fourche, then west through Hulett and on to Devil’s Tower National Monument. We’ve been to Devil’s Tower before but never gone in and up to the monument, this time we will. And then we’ll ride on to Newcastle, WY, for the night.

Following that we’ll cruise on down the eastern side of Wyoming to Torrington. That’s another short day but when you look at the map there’s not a lot of places to go without going a long way. And in recent years we have made a deliberate effort to stay in towns we’ve never stayed in before. We’ve never stayed in Torrington. Who knows, maybe we never will again.

The day after that will be the most scenic of the whole trip, as well as one of the longest. We’ll head south to Cheyenne and then take the state roads between Cheyenne and Laramie. Most people take the interstate but the state road is much nicer. Then we’ll head southwest out of Laramie down through the Snowy Range and back into Colorado for a night at Walden. That’s our last night out and the next day we’ll head home. So that’s the trip this year. Only about 1,000 miles.

Biker Quote for Today

It’s your road and yours alone. Others may ride it with you but no one can ride it for you.

The OFMC has been doing its thing for more than 30 years now in that time we have ridden most every road in the state, not counting the eastern plains–we don’t go out there all that much. So it was very interesting this year that we ended up on four different stretches of road we had never been on in a group before.

I mean, I personally had been on them all before, although not all on a motorcycle. But the OFMC had never ridden these roads. They’re indicated in the map above in colors. Unfortunately, to get them all on the map I had to zoom out so far that you can’t actually see the roads but if you look at your own map it should be pretty easy to figure out.

That yellow line across the upper right is U.S. 24 over Wilkerson Pass and across the south end of South Park. We actually ended up doing part of it twice on this trip. I guess the time for this one had really come.

In doing part of that a second time we had to get there and that is where that intersecting blue line comes in. That is Teller County Road 1 coming up from Cripple Creek. I had only just been on that road a week earlier with Judy in the car and before that I wasn’t really even aware of it.

Later that same day we went over Cottonwood Pass from Buena Vista to Gunnison, in green. This road was just paved so this was a real treat. It was also very interesting to see how the “improvements” resulted in many of the curves being straightened out. I knew this was going to be the case because Judy and I saw the same thing on the Sea to Sky Highway up in British Columbia, where they worked on the road in order to hold the Winter Olympics at Whistler.

Finally, there was that line in red, CO 69 coming up out of Walsenburg to just east of Cotopaxi in the Arkansas River Valley. This isn’t scenic like a mountain pass but it was pretty and it was a new road for the OFMC. Heck, I’ll gladly go down boring roads if I’ve never been on them before.

That’s the worst thing about living in Colorado for so long. There is hardly a road within 500 miles I haven’t ridden more than once. OK, I guess I’ll just suck it up and continue living the torture of riding all these familiar gorgeous roads we have in this state.

Biker Quote for Today

Why motorcycles are better than women: You don’t have to be jealous of the guy that works on your motorcycle.

We got another early start leaving Hotchkiss the next morning and it was another of those glorious, pristine early mornings out riding through nature. McClure Pass is always nice but at this time of day it is especially nice.

Of course, at Carbondale we picked up CO 82 to Aspen and that is always busy, just as passing through Aspen is always a snarl. Just get those behind you. Then, amazingly, we had Independence Pass almost to ourselves. I have never seen such light traffic on this pass. How nice.

After a stop in Twin Lakes for lunch we cruised on the short distance to Leadville and to our motel on the south side of town. I had deliberately chosen a place in this area because on other trips we have stayed on the north side of town, in a newer motel, but it was a long walk from there to downtown. So we were close to downtown but I can only say the place we stayed was a bit dumpy.

Our stay in Leadville was uneventful, other than the fact that we had an excellent dinner at the Tennessee Pass Cafe. I have no connection to this place; we just thought it was excellent and I’m passing along a tip.

In the morning it looked like rain to the south so we geared up but before we got to Buena Vista it was clear and getting hot so we stopped to shed the gear. Then east on U.S. 285 toward home. A stop in Fairplay and then another stop on top of Kenosha Pass so Bill could get a picture.

We were still a good way out but said our farewells here because at about this point we turn into horses headed for the stable and don’t even concern ourselves with staying as a group. Sure enough, Dennis took off at a serious clip and Bill and I soon lost him up ahead. We weren’t really trying but Bill and I did stay together until we reached our point of divergence and then we were each on our own. Another OFMC trip was in the books.

Biker Quote for Today

Why motorcycles are better than women: Motorcycles don’t insult you if you are a bad rider.

From Durango we had a short day in store so we were in no hurry to take off. Dennis and Bill paid a visit to the local Harley dealer while I made a stop at the local Honda shop. I wasn’t riding my Honda–I was on the Kawi–but I had noticed a small pool of oil beneath my bike and spotted a drop of oil hanging off the fairing, ready to fall.

This caused some concern. I had just had the oil changed and a complete tune-up done on the Kawi just before we left. Had Joel not tightened the drain plug sufficiently? Had he overfilled the oil reservoir so it was throwing out the excess? I put the bike up on the center stand and checked the sight glass but couldn’t see anything. This suggested overfill because I’ve see it when the oil is low and you can see the inside of that chamber.

I called Joel, my mechanic, and asked him diplomatically how many drain plugs he had pulled. The Kawi has two and I made the mistake once myself of only pulling one and then when I went to put the new oil in it got overfull on less than the prescribed amount. Joel assured me had pulled two drain plugs. As for filling it, he said he doesn’t measure, he looks at the sight glass and stops when it reaches the right level.

Joel asked how big the drip pool was and told me it was nothing to worry about if it was only a little puddle about three inches across. So just to play it safe I went to the Honda dealer and bought a quart of oil, which I carried with me the rest of the trip and brought home unopened.

So about 11 a.m. or so we headed west on U.S. 160, through Mancos, to Cortez, and then northwest on U.S. 491 into Utah, to Monticello. This was about 105 miles and this was our stop for the day. I had planned it this way because other than perhaps going to Moab there was really nowhere else to go around here. But I figured there must be something to do in or around Monticello because in consulting maps of our previous trips I saw that we had stayed there two nights once, many years ago.

It turned out I had misread my own writing. We didn’t stop there for two nights, it was where we stayed the night of day two of that year’s trip. And I tell you what, Monticello is a really small town. We walked up to one end of town and got ice cream, later we walked to the other end of town for dinner, and that was Monticello. We did a lot of hanging out that day.

The next day we walked next door for breakfast and while we were there the skies opened up and a deluge poured down. It was over by the time we were finished with breakfast but the sky still looked very threatening so we suited up and headed out. Now we were riding north on U.S. 191 through the desert and anyone who lives out in these parts will tell you the desert is at its most beautiful right after a rainfall. That was the case this day and this ride was one of the best of the trip. The smells and the colors are something you have to experience to understand.

After 30 miles on 191 we turned east on Utah 46, which crosses back into Colorado and becomes Colorado 90, to Naturita. If you have never taken this bit of road you need to work it into your route some day. It runs across the south face of the Monte La Sal mountains and then drops precipitously into a lush canyon and finally out into ranching country. This is a hidden gem that I suspect most people have never seen.

We then turned north on CO 141, the Unaweep Highway, which is also very, very scenic. We followed it to Gateway and turned east to meet up with U.S. 50 at Whitewater, a little south of Grand Junction. Then a jog south to Delta and a turn east to Hotchkiss–home for the night.

I’m going to do a little naked promotion here. At Hotchkiss we stayed at the Hotchkiss Inn. Kris and Andy Bartol, the owners, advertise on this website. But that’s not the point. The point is, they have an extremely nice place here. I routed us through Hotchkiss a few years ago and ever since then the guys have raved about how much they liked it. So they were very pleased when I told them we were stopping there again this year. OK, promo over. And so is this post.

Biker Quote for Today

Why motorcycles are better than women: Your motorcycle won’t wake you up at 3 a.m. and ask you if you love it.