(https://farm1.staticflickr.com/840/28735528457_328ae9148f_b.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/KMg6tP) (https://flic.kr/p/KMg6tP)
I was perusing Twitter, reading about Sturgis 2018, which begins in just 10 days. The tweet had a link to this vintage pic from Sturgis 1996, and I noted two things:
1. It instantly started me reflecting on my own trip to Sturgis back in 2014...A really great time, and the stuff of another ride report someday ;).
2. Look at all those baggers...Looks like riders have been touring on baggers since way before baggers became cool.. :D
So: Have YOU ever been to Sturgis? If so, when and what stands out most in your memories of being there? (https://www.flickr.com/photos/147814917@N06/)
I think it was '89 when I went. It was an anniversary year. I remember reports of 140k bikes in the area. I'll try to find a pic when I get home. I also remember a Goldwing club meeting in Keystone that weekend... More wings than I could accurately put a number to. In Sturgis, I remember mostly heavily modified Harleys, incredible tattoos, and butt cheeks... The likes of which I've never seen and cannot be unseen.
Also remember the local news reporting on the number of rider deaths that weekend.
:(
I'm eager to see any pics you have from your visit there all those years ago. I did see a bike down while we were up there, but I don't think anyone was seriously hurt...Thank God!
I do recall a story from an old friend who lives in Wichita: He owns a specialized motorcycle recovery truck, and travels to Sturgis every year. One time, he was called to recover a bike for a rider who had crashed, and was taken by ambulance for treatment. My friend took the bike to a storage facility where it sat until he heard from the rider, who had been briefly hospitalized, then flown home. The rider hired my friend to go back to Sturgis, load the bike, and transport it all the way to central TEXAS so the rider could have it rebuilt!
I bet there are more such stories than we can count!
Never been to Sturgis. I haven't even been to South Dakota. North and South Dakota are the only two states I have never been to so I'll have to make it up there someday. I have zero interest in going to Sturgis during the big rally but I would like to ride the Black Hills area.
I am not a fan of large crowds of anything. Much less a fan of large crowds of drunken revelers pretending to be outlaw bikers.
Almost always, the first two questions I get asked when I tell someone I ride motorcycles are,
"Do you have a Harley?"
and,
"Have you been to Sturgis?"
Why do most non riders think the motorcycle world revolves around these two things?
I have been. It was a long, long time ago when I went to that land far, far away. :D (Sorry, always wanted to say that)
I even went with some semi-outlaw and outlaw friends of mine. How did I get such friends? Well, they sort of hid me from the cops I was running from on my very first motorcycle. I was 13 at the time with no helmet on my head, Converse sneakers on my feet, and no license in my wallet. :D On my very first motorcycle that I "bought" from a friend who's mom and told him to "Get rid of that damn thing". :D :D
I was "keeping it" at his house because my Father told me, Son, you will never own a motorcycle while you are under my roof! (He also knew the 4 cops that where chasing me. A fact I wasn't aware of at the time)
Well anyways, I had semi lost the police and was coming back up the street where they where living. 1 was out in the street and when he saw me, he pointed to the house and wave his other arm directing me to the house. They had put a ramp on the steps going into the house. I could hear the police sirens still so I took his advice and direction, rode up the ramp and into the rental home they had.
We all had a pretty good laugh and when things calmed down, I rode to where I was "keeping" my motorcycle.
All that /\ happened in the 70's.
In the early 90's, when the "gotta have a Harley" craze was new, 4 of those guys and I rode up to Sturgis for the rally. Only 1 of that original 4 still belonged to a "club", the other 3 had moved on from that life.
It was crowded (Sturgis) but we had fun. No one gave me any real crap about my "Jap Sportbike". (that really wasn't a sportbike at all) Yep, there was drunkenness, nudity, hell raising, lewdness, and even a fist fight or 2...or 3. But, over all, I have been to worst ones than that. (Faunsdale, the first few, were wildness in a cage)
If you do want to ride the area, I would skip the rally (and the jacked up prices on everything) and go at another time.
BTW, those four friends I talked about/\? They have all passed on. Of course they where older than me by 14-32 years.
Springer, that's an awesome story! Thanks for sharing it. I have to say that, all-in-all, Sturgis was pretty tame when I was there in 2014. Of course, I and my wife were there together, and were staying about 50 miles south, so we left each afternoon about 4. So I'm sure we missed a lot of the action I'm too old to deal with anyway! :D
BREAK
Klaviator: FYI: I'm going to Sturgis in September (15-17 to be exact) to watch the Motorcycle Cannonball roll thru town. Maybe you want to go along?
Quote from: renchinrider on July 25, 2018, 09:39:11 PM
Springer, that's an awesome story! Thanks for sharing it. I have to say that, all-in-all, Sturgis was pretty tame when I was there in 2014. Of course, I and my wife were there together, and were staying about 50 miles south, so we left each afternoon about 4. So I'm sure we missed a lot of the action I'm too old to deal with anyway! :D
BREAK
Klaviator: FYI: I'm going to Sturgis in September (15-17 to be exact) to watch the Motorcycle Cannonball roll thru town. Maybe you want to go along?
Marc, I'd love to come along......but there's this nasty think called WORK that will get in the way. I can't wait to retire so I can do stuff like this. By this time next year I expect to be retired or at least semi retired.
I hear you! :D Can't wait for you to retire as well--then you can lead us on even more of your awesome rides! ;)
Quote from: norton73 on July 25, 2018, 10:21:57 AM
Almost always, the first two questions I get asked when I tell someone I ride motorcycles are,
"Do you have a Harley?"
and,
"Have you been to Sturgis?"
Why do most non riders think the motorcycle world revolves around these two things?
the two statements most likely to identify a non rider.
riding for days on end to -insert any city name here- to creep through the slowest, loosest, SAMESAMESAMEst traffic on Earth....
has about as much appeal as a self-root canal using technology from the 1700's.
I'll get my kicks from South Dakota one registration at a time ;-)
riding for days on end to -insert any city name here- to creep through the slowest, loosest, SAMESAMESAMEst traffic on Earth....
has about as much appeal as a self-root canal using technology from the 1700's.
I'll get my kicks from South Dakota one registration at a time ;-)
[/quote]
Agreed: I'll never understand why anyone would want to (try to) ride in endless circles through a traffic jam to go nowhere--that has always mystified me.
And I rank most expos in the "root canal" activity category. Rarely does anything there inspire me, though perhaps it should! ::)
But I can't help my addiction to gawking at motorcycles, no matter their make, size or vintage, or the venue at which they're on display (though I haven't yet been anywhere more exciting than Barber Vintage Fest! :) :)) Well, to clarify: I don't get much of a thrill out of looking at new, showroom motorcycles--they're all the same, and after the first one, there's nothing new or interesting to see. I like to see bikes that are owned and loved by their owners, and to which their owners have dedicated creative originality. I'm not a crotch rocket guy per se, but I still can't help dawdling as I stroll from bike to bike at a Cycle Gear bike night just listening to crotch rocket owners talking (with glowing pride) about their latest innovation to either make their bike faster, or make it handle better. I once spent almost an hour with a guy as he told me about bringing his 1960 Vespa back to life. And that was in the midst of meeting a bunch of awesome guys who adapted four mid-60s Honda Dreams (the "Critter Bikes, from Corinth, MS) and rode them across the TAT from Memphis to San Fransisco!!! I could have spent the rest of the day with all of them--probably a week if I'd had nowhere else to be!
I guess our trip to Sturgis was a bit of a hybrid because were were at the actual rally for just a few hours at a time, and we didn't do any of the crazy stuff at the Buffalo Chip, Full Throttle, etc. We just enjoyed the bikes, met some really nice people from all over the world, and toured around that portion of South Dakota. It made for some great memories for us! I would gladly go again, but my next goal is to finally make it to Laconia, NH--been trying to get there for 4 years now! Laconia is even older than Sturgis.
And believe me: When my wife says she enjoyed a motorcycle event ??? ??? ??? That's a VERY significant achievement! :D
Going to Sturgis is on my motorcycle bucket list. You can't get 100K+ bikes in a town and not have a good time
Rallies have never appealed to me. Most, not all, buys a bike hauls it to ____________, gets drunk and then tries to ride. 100,000+ bikes in a small town just don't seem like fun to me. Oh all the 1/2 naked girls, well, if you are into that go to a strip club. I"d rather be ridin, but that's just me.
I use to go to all the rallies in the southeastern U.S. and got paid to do it. I use to work for a couple of state/regional "biker magazines" and got paid to do it.
If you have seen 1, you have basically seen them all.
(http://i1228.photobucket.com/albums/ee446/owenwoolley/Thunder%20Roads%20pictures/dscn0090_zps5acffc2f.jpg)
(http://i1228.photobucket.com/albums/ee446/owenwoolley/Thunder%20Roads%20pictures/dscn0039_zps00102b15.jpg)
(http://i1228.photobucket.com/albums/ee446/owenwoolley/Thunder%20Roads%20pictures/dscn0046_zps25b285f2.jpg)
(http://i1228.photobucket.com/albums/ee446/owenwoolley/Thunder%20Roads%20pictures/thunder%20roads%202/mbsbb04f5_zpsvrthwa6q.jpg)
(http://i1228.photobucket.com/albums/ee446/owenwoolley/Thunder%20Roads%20pictures/thunder%20roads%202/mbsbb04f16_zpszwjhwsht.jpg)
(http://i1228.photobucket.com/albums/ee446/owenwoolley/Thunder%20Roads%20pictures/thunder%20roads%202/mbbs04f9_zpsabtb9d7z.jpg)
Never been to Sturgis but if I do go, it will not be during the rally. I have heard that most of the year, there is some really good riding there.
I'm not into big crowds, inflated prices, heavy traffic and having to wait in lines for stuff. It would be interesting to take in the sights and sounds of a big rally. If I could be "beamed" into Sturgis for a couple of hours just to take in the scene, I'd do it. Unless that Star trek technology is perfected in my lifetime I don't see ever going there except at some time other than during the rally. The same thing goes for Daytona or any of the big rallies. Even Americade which is a much different type of rally has very little appeal to me.
My idea of a fun rally is more olong the lines of what we did last weekend at the Cove rally.
Well, the rally is one thing. The area is something else entirely.
You don't need to go to Sturgis for the rally. You need to go to the AREA for the landscape and the geology / topography. It is unique to the continent. It will either remind you of sets you saw on sci-fi shows on TV in the 70's or expose you to things you've never seen the likes of. Sturgis is a plain and ugly town but comes alive with bikes and people from all over during the rally. Go see the rally, if that's your thing....bonus. But, the real value of the trip is seeing the Black Hills. From The Badlands to the Wyoming Border (and beyond), you will see lands the likes of which you have never seen anywhere else before. Desolate and remote feeling....within an hour's ride you can find places where you will feel almost like no one has been before...especially if you are able to get off the pavement.
Whether it's rally time or not....most everyone will be in town and the Black Hills will be yours for vanishing into. I would dismiss any snarky comments against the rally and simply consider going to explore the hills.
It's been 30+ years for me. But, the climate is not friendly to developmental advances and the land is comparatively remote. I cannot imagine it has changed that much.
I was in Custer, SD this summer and the riding and scenery are amazing. Can't imagine it has changed much as it takes days to get out there to the middle of nowhere. Absolutely worth trailering out and back...one time.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Quote from: Sweeper on September 18, 2018, 11:25:24 PM
I was in Custer, SD this summer and the riding and scenery are amazing. Can't imagine it has changed much as it takes days to get out there to the middle of nowhere. Absolutely worth trailering out and back...one time.
The most small and insignificant I ever felt was in that park, on a 500 lb bike, waiting just a few feet away from those giant-headed buffalo to get out of the road. I don't think they fear anything.
I've been 6 times my last was in 2006 went to the unveiling of the postage stamp (https://i.postimg.cc/k210Xbbr/3_AA0_BA33-8311-4_A70-8_EDE-46_E09_EA5808_B.jpg) (https://postimg.cc/k210Xbbr)
and back stage Nickelback no photos, no cameras allowed, was having a good time then
had a little hicup and had to stay a little extra time until it was cleared up haven't been back
https://youtu.be/u2_vLByFKiw
A little clip of the morning rush outside of Custer.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
No. Not yet. Maybe when I Retire. :-[
It would take too much time off work for now.
Yea, Maybe when I retire, I Do Want To Go......