'long valley road'
That's just one of the songs I heard this weekend, at the Black Hills Bluegrass Festival. Dad and I jumped on the motorsickles Saturday afternoon and pointed them towards Rapid City, then sat out in the grass until 10 and listened to half a dozen groups pickin on banjos and mandolins and fiddles.
Then we went looking for a hotel room in town, thinking we'd go back up to the festival Sunday morning to catch the gospel show. No dice: every room was booked; apparently that's 'just the way it is in the summers here,' according to the night staff at one hotel. So we had a drink at Murphy's, then drove over the hill to Sturgis and found a place to lay our heads.
Murphy's was sort of an odd choice for a drink--it's definitely the college hangout, so Dad was the oldest guy, by about 30 years. (That's also how much older than me he is, which maybe made me the second oldest guy there, maybe... hell.). But it was still a fun time.
Sunday we rode the back roads, to Nemo and Brownsville, into Deadwood, and then had lunch at Cheyenne Crossing before heading back to Newcastle. Before lunch we also made the detour up to Terry Cemetery and visited great grandma and grandpa and Edwin Johnson, who're buried up on the hill, surrounded by crushed-rock backfill from Golden Rewards mining operation. It's a sight. We had to climb under Golden Reward's fence to get onto the road up to the cemetery. If Dad had had side-cutters along, I think he'd have made a new entrance. I guess the company wanted to move all of the bodies so they could mine the chunk of rock beneath the cemetery, but they were blocked from doing it. Tradition standing in the way of progress, I guess.
On the bike I made a set of mistakes this weekend, small reminders of my mortality. In Custer I shifted down instead of up as we were headed out of town--I had the throttle all wrapped up, ready to shift into 3rd, but then I stepped down into 1st instead of kicking it back into 3rd. No big deal this time, but a dumb mistake that can throw things into a skid. At the Brownsville store I stalled out pulling back onto the highway, because I didn't gas it enough up the incline. Not dangerous, but embarrassing, killing it right there in front of a dozen other bikers sitting and standing around outside of the store. And, on the road up to the cemetery, I locked up the back tire after dad made the quick decision to pull into a driveway and ask for some directions. It also turned out okay: I just got things rolling again, went down the road a ways, and turned around. Relatively small mistakes, but a good lesson: pay attention to the present, and don't get get too caught up dreaming about the past or hoping for the future. Live this day, and the others will take care of themselves. Or something like that.
Then we went looking for a hotel room in town, thinking we'd go back up to the festival Sunday morning to catch the gospel show. No dice: every room was booked; apparently that's 'just the way it is in the summers here,' according to the night staff at one hotel. So we had a drink at Murphy's, then drove over the hill to Sturgis and found a place to lay our heads.
Murphy's was sort of an odd choice for a drink--it's definitely the college hangout, so Dad was the oldest guy, by about 30 years. (That's also how much older than me he is, which maybe made me the second oldest guy there, maybe... hell.). But it was still a fun time.
Sunday we rode the back roads, to Nemo and Brownsville, into Deadwood, and then had lunch at Cheyenne Crossing before heading back to Newcastle. Before lunch we also made the detour up to Terry Cemetery and visited great grandma and grandpa and Edwin Johnson, who're buried up on the hill, surrounded by crushed-rock backfill from Golden Rewards mining operation. It's a sight. We had to climb under Golden Reward's fence to get onto the road up to the cemetery. If Dad had had side-cutters along, I think he'd have made a new entrance. I guess the company wanted to move all of the bodies so they could mine the chunk of rock beneath the cemetery, but they were blocked from doing it. Tradition standing in the way of progress, I guess.
On the bike I made a set of mistakes this weekend, small reminders of my mortality. In Custer I shifted down instead of up as we were headed out of town--I had the throttle all wrapped up, ready to shift into 3rd, but then I stepped down into 1st instead of kicking it back into 3rd. No big deal this time, but a dumb mistake that can throw things into a skid. At the Brownsville store I stalled out pulling back onto the highway, because I didn't gas it enough up the incline. Not dangerous, but embarrassing, killing it right there in front of a dozen other bikers sitting and standing around outside of the store. And, on the road up to the cemetery, I locked up the back tire after dad made the quick decision to pull into a driveway and ask for some directions. It also turned out okay: I just got things rolling again, went down the road a ways, and turned around. Relatively small mistakes, but a good lesson: pay attention to the present, and don't get get too caught up dreaming about the past or hoping for the future. Live this day, and the others will take care of themselves. Or something like that.
Comments