Day 32 – Wednesday 6/29/22

Elk Point, South Dakota to Yankton, South Dakota – 52.6 Miles

The destination for today was undetermined, until I checked the weather this morning. Typically, I pick a town that is about 40 miles away and look at the hourly forecast for the time I’ll be passing through. If it’s favorable, I’ll look a little further down the road to see what a final destination might be. Yankton was the first city in the direction I wanted to go with accommodation choices, so I looked at the prediction. It wasn’t good. By the time I’d arrive the wind would be blowing at 26 mph from the SW. Since I was generally traveling west, this meant that I’d be fighting the wind after 1:00 PM. There wasn’t another town with the facilities of Yankton within range, and the thought of creeping along for another couple of hours to gain 12 – 15 extra miles wasn’t appealing. I reserved a room in Yankton before I left Elk Point.

The wind was at my back when I left, and the roads clear of traffic. South Dakota has 882,000 people and is the 17th largest state by land area, so there’s plenty of room for cars, farm equipment and solitary cyclists.

Because farming dominates the economy, it’s almost impossible to pass by any town or group of buildings and not see something connected to it.

After 15 miles I rode into Vermillion. I’d never heard of it until I looked at the route map, but it’s home to the University of South Dakota. With a little over 7,000 undergraduates, it’s not huge, but has the feel of university town on a smaller scale. References to the school’s teams (Coyotes) are seen on businesses and bars along Main Street. Overall, the downtown and neighborhoods surrounding it were beautiful. Probably not a bad place to spend four years.

Vermillion is built on a bluff, above the flood plain of the Missouri River. Years ago, there was Vermillion 1.0 that was built on the flood plain. Bad move. The residents decided higher was drier, which is why I didn’t have to paddle down Main Street today.

There was a bar on the edge of town that had a couple of antique gasoline pumps outside to remind everyone that fuel used to be cheaper 100 years ago.

If you ever wanted to go into the grain business, here’s an opportunity. I don’t think that someone would drive by the sign and suddenly think that buying this would be a great investment, but it’s possible. It’s different out here.

Once out of Vermillion, the route left the main highway and went to back roads. It was longer, but scenic and peaceful.

Road conditions declined briefly.

A few miles later, I stopped for supplies. The Sinclair brontosaurus was waiting.

Another small town and another classic building.

The wind was picking up and slowing me down. When I finally arrived in Yankton, I headed towards the river to check out the scenery. The view was in motion.

I rode around downtown for about 45 minutes, getting a feel for the stores and businesses. The town near the river is older, with the newer commercial district about 2 miles north. One thing that got my attention were the signs outside some of the stores. Signs are pretty generic today, and there’s not much creativity put into making a statement.

I’m glad to see that the people living in these smaller towns kept their movie theaters intact. These need to be preserved, if only to show others what creative design looks like.

Tonight, the wind is still blowing hard outside the hotel, and I’ve got a 70+ mile day tomorrow. I’ll primarily be riding west but heading north into a 14-mph wind for a portion of the day. Once I get that out of the way, the wind is supposed to shift to the SE for the next couple of days, which will aid my move toward Pierre, SD. Hope to be there within the next 3 or 4 days.