USA 2012 - Sturgis

On the first full day, I left for Sturgis on my own and was able to park on Main St, where the biggest concentration of bike parking takes place, lucky or what!  I wandered around for nearly 6 hours soaking up the spectacle of the gathering, which was extreme.  Biking bits, t-shirts and other apparel, bikes and accessories, and even knives, tasers and other fighting irons!  The place was thronging with people, some females of whom had little more than two Elastoplasts for their tops (seems State Law says you can't be topless, but this is ok)!  I checked out various trade stands, Knuckle Bar, One Eyed Jack's, the Harley Expo and Custom Bike Show, the Sturgis Museum among others.  Some of the Custom Bikes were pieces of art and engineering, but weird in the extreme, just for show as to what was possible and not for riding.

Look, no rear axle!

Sinister

Car/bike/trike?

Bike with side bike!

Returning later, I walked into Deadwood centre among the saloons and casinos, also abound with bikes, saw the place where Wild Bill Hickok was killed and, oh, found the H-D dealer for more T-shirts!

Looking at one bike in Deadwood, I wondered what some of the people do and where they come from to these events.  Who has the money and believes it is worthwhile to build a 503 cu in (5.7 litres) V8-powered custom bike with a nitrous oxide supplementary fuel supply.  Yep, that same laughing gas is used to increase power in rockets and other engines!

5.7l of power, PLUS nitromethane cylinder!

The rumble of the bikes going past the hotel from morning to night is constant but almost all riders don't even wear a helmet, let alone any other riding gear - I felt rather over dressed!  State laws vary on this, yet there is a law in South Dakota that says you can't wear sunglasses at night!  Oh right, that really makes a difference!

I met a guy who had left Albuquerque, New Mexico, at 1am and arrived in Deadwood at 5pm, a distance of around 950 miles, in 16 hours, which I later worked out to be averaging 50mph with fuel and food stops.  Completely mad!

I spent the last day at the rally people and bike watching again, plus taking pix and video of the stunt display, before heading to the Tatanka Centre, telling the story of the bison.  Kevin Costner was the founder of the idea to tell the story of how the white man tried to wipe out the bison to wipe out the Indian in turn.  They nearly succeeded.  It includes some excellent bronze sculptures of bison being hunted by Indians, and I heard a talk from one of the Lakota tribe, which dispelled many myths about the Indians and their culture.