She's Home...

On Thursday morning, at 4:25, that was 2 hours 35 minutes before sunrise, I left for South Dakota. I had rented a nice, but heavy, 5x9, single axle, U-haul trailer from the local dealer and picked it up at closing time on Wednesday evening.

I drove straight through to Wyatt's Hideaway Campground in Belle Fourche. 731 miles in 14 hours with 3 stops for gas and 1 for food.

I spent about an hour at the campground loading and securing the bike and talking to the owner, Kent.

I was back on the road at 7:20 (WI time). I started east and drove until I got tired. I was going to stop in Chamberlain but when I stopped for a pop at the only 24 hour gas station, the cashier suggested driving a little further to Kimball. He said the rooms were half as expensive as the ones in Chamberlain. We talked about trucks and motorcycles for about half an hour before I got back under way. I pulled into the parking lot of the Westwood Inn at 1:00 a.m., 1007 miles for the day!

I wasted no time the next morning and was back on the road at 7:50. I kept the speed down on I-90. It's posted 80 MPH but I was holding it at about 60 or so... had breakfast in Sioux Falls and made 2 more gas stops on the way home.

I got home about 6:30 Friday night, unloaded the bike, rinsed the leaked antifreeze off the trailer bed, returned the trailer, gassed up and was home and all unloaded by 7:30...

Secured with 8 straps... 3 in front, 5 in back... It didn't move at all! The trailer has a built in wheel chock for the front tire and 8 big D-ring tie down points. The only improvement to their trailer design I could think of was, if the tailgate could be folded all the way flat into the box for better aerodynamics when the trailer was empty.

38 hours
1534 miles
$260 for 100 gallons of gas.. but the truck wasn't full when I left on Thursday morning.
$55 for a motel
$52 for the trailer
$300 for the rental car 2 weeks ago.
No problems

That was still a savings of more than $153 when compared to the $821 + taxes, that U-haul in Belle Fourche quoted me to rent their smallest truck one way to WI...