MaxMetal Custom Motorcycles

Our family is very extended - in all directions.  On this trip, in Cairo, NE, we visited with my mother, two sisters, and an aunt and uncle.  We went on the Rapid City, SD to spend the night with another sister, then on to Idaho to visit our daughter.  We could have made a few more kinfolk stops along the way but had to ride on past since there was so little time - but maybe next year.  In every direction we can possibly travel we have relatives and I like visiting family and friends.  The food is good, the late-night “catch-up on the family” conversation is fun and the cost is within the budget.  (This goes both ways - I like having family and friends visit us, too.)

Other accomodations on this trip included a nice Best Western in Billings, Montana.  It had a mountain retreat feel with carved bears clinging to the deck railings.  Cute. 

Motel 6 did not rate very high in my opinion.    For an extra $10 somewhere else, we could have had a comfortable bed and a free continental breakfast. 

My favorite stay was at the “Historic Elk Mountain Hotel” in Elk Mountain, Wyoming.  For us, it was a shelter from the storm, literally. The hotel was built in 1905 and has 12 guest rooms.  It has a rich and interesting history.  I’ll fill in some details in a later post.  http://www.elkmountainhotel.com/

I liked Sturgis!! It really is the granddaddy of all motorcycle rallies but it had a small town friendly feel to it.  For $4.00 - we  were able to park our bike in a shaded driveway; the homeowners were there to watch the bikes and they even offered free water and lemonade.  (This is in contrast to Myrtle Beach, where we got the feeling that local residents would enjoy running over a motorcycle.)  The town has only 6,700 people in it.  During the rally, the downtown area is taken over by rally vendors.  The traffic is very controlled but not congested, each corner is a 4 way stop.  And as soon as you leave the down town area you are on the open road again, Interstate 90, going 70 mph, heading toward one of the many area attactions, i.e. Mt. Rushmore, Devil’s Tower, the South Dakota Badlands, the Needles.  There are so many things to see in the area.  We only had a few hours to take in the main rally and no time to do sight seeing.  We will be back another time. 

Across the nation, the highways and the railroads run parallel courses.  I have always enjoyed watching trains.  As a child I counted rail cars as they passed the crossing and waved at engineers and the guy in the caboose.  (What is the guy in the caboose called?)  I miss the cabooses.  Trains and train tracks were a constant feature of the roadside throughout the trip.    

Burlington Northern train along Nebraska Highway 2.

Narrow gage railroad bridge in Montana.

Here is a website that has a lot more train pictures for people who are really into trains.   
  http://www.trainweb.org/oldtimetrains/index.html 

The railroad has a large part in the history of our country and in the history of my family.  My mother owns 160 acres that my great-great grandfather bought from the Union Pacific.  The US government deeded a large swath of land to the UP on either side of the tracks they were building.  This land was sold to settlers coming to the plains. 

We raced a storm across the prairie all afternoon.  Hour after hour, we watched the  clouds. The rain caught us just outside of Rapid City, SD. 

We pulled off the road when GT could no longer see the truck in front of us.  The downpour was brief and soon we were riding again, with a rainbow at our side.

These are a few of the motorcycles and jobs which have come through the repair shop here at MaxMetal Custom Motorcycles.

Click the thumbnails for a larger picture.

Shop Views

 1966 Harley FLH clutch repair 

2006 Honda VTX 1300 insurance repair

 Custom motorcycle replace primary belt

2005 Harley Police Raod King polished aluminum bag inserts

In Alliance we turned north on highway 87 and followed the sign to Carhenge.  This site is billed as a “Car Art Reserve” and is actually listed in the Rand-McNally Road Atlas.  It is a replica of Stonehenge made with automobiles. http://www.carhenge.com/

Our son’s comment was “It’s just wrong to do that to a Willys.”  This was an amusing and interesting stop.  You have to wonder if someone just had too much time on their hands.   http://www.roadsideamerica.com/set/OVERhenges.html   is a link to “Roadside America - Your Online Guide to Offbeat Tourist Attractions.  — In case you want somewhere different to go.

Probably my favorite spot on Earth, ever since childhood, is the Sandhills of Nebraska.  I love the openness - so free and forever feeling.  We rode the length of the Sandhills Journey Scenic Byway from Grand Island to Alliance.  http://www.sandhillsjourney.com/  It was definitely not congested!  At one point, GT set the bike on the centerline and we rode for mile after mile. Only the sun, the clouds, the grass, and the wildflowers beside the road watched us go by.  Plus a few cows and an occasional train.  The cars were few and far between.

 We rode through remote little towns like Hazard (pop. 66), Merna (pop. 391), Anselmo (pop. 189), and Halsey (pop. 110) which is base for the Nebraska National Forest.  (Side note here - the Nebraska National Forest was hand-planted in the prairie.  Forests don’t happen there naturally.) 
The hills are grass covered sand dunes that once were the home of the American Bison. Now it is cattle country. While the roadway is bordered by barbed wire fences it is considered open range.  Cows have the right-of-way.

Nebraska!  I always feel like I can breathe deeply again when I get to the wide open prairie.  I grew up near a little town along Highway 2 in the middle of Nebraska and that stretch of road feels like home to me still.    We came into the state at Nebraska City and followed Highway 2 through Lincoln, where it joins I-80, on to Grand Island, where it takes on its own identy again. The stretch between Grand Island and Alliance is called the Sandhills Journey Scenic Byway.  http://www.sandhillsjourney.com/  A great ride that I will write more about tomorrow.  Below is a picture of my hometown as we rode in at sunset after our second day on the road.

We started day 2 about 100 miles south of St. Louis.  By this time we were seeing motorcycles everywhere.  There were bikes being ridden, towed in trailers, strapped in the back of pick-ups, all variations - streaming toward Sturgis like pilgrims flocking to their Mecca.  

At a gas station outside Nebraska City we met a motorcyclist from St. Louis.  St. Louis is approximately 400 miles from Nebraska City and he talked like he and his group had had a good ride so far.  They were hoping to get on to Ogalala, NE before stopping for the night but said the girls with them were complaining about sore butts.   GT asked what he was riding and he replied “Over there” with a wave of his arm toward the diesel pumps.  “Over there” was a huge motor home.  Their bikes were secure inside a large trailer behind it.  We wished them a good trip,  got on our bike, and rode another 150 miles to our destination west of Grand Island.