Day 72 (7/27): Pollock to Mobridge, SD

Mileage: 39.2; 2,078 total

When I got up the motel office was still closed, but I was told that the owner was in the cafe down the street. I found him there. He was a very amiable fellow, and invited me to join him and his friends for breakfast, coffee, and talk. The cafes in these little towns are the local gathering places, much like the local pubs in England, and I had a good breakfast and enjoyed meeting a few of the local people, including the woman who ran the local museum and was an expert in Lewis & Clark. We were seated at a large table, and during the course of the time I was there, new people would come sit down and join us. There was one topic of conversation that struck me as different than any I had heard before: there had been a thunderstorm the night before, and everyone that came in knew exactly how much rain they had received, ranging from 0.15 inches to 0.9 inches. I guess this type of knowledge is typical of any farming community.

As my route has taken me from eastern Montana thru ND and into SD, the vegetation has gotten greener, indicating more rainfall as I have traveled southeast. The fields of crops here, mainly corn and soybeans, are extensive and lush. I have never seen anything quite like them before.

When I departed it was hot and I faced bad headwinds again. At first, my progress was even slower than that of the day before, probably because I was still worn out from the day before. At about the half-way point I stopped at a farmhouse to get more water and had a nice conversation for about a half hour with an elderly woman who lived there. I drank a couple of quarts of cold water while talking with her, and that revived me a lot; then, when I left her place the headwinds ceased and so I had a fairly easy ride the rest of the way to Mobridge.

In Mobridge I (a) found a Dairy Queen and had a large Blizzard (milk shake); (b) checked into a motel; (c) had a good dinner.