George Mickelson Trail, SD – July, 2019
Having spent all this money on gear and a tandem, we knew we wanted to do some more bike packing trips. I was browsing through the Hall of Fame Rail to Trails when I stumbled across the George Mickelson Trail. It is a 109 mile long trail through the Black Hills in South Dakota from Deadwood to Edgemont. It jumped out at me, not only because it looked like a really good ride, but also because of its proximity to a National Monument that I had yet to see (Mt Rushmore).
I was chitchatting with Andrew’s mom, Sally one day, and turns out the George Mickelson Trail was also on her bucket list! So we schemed a plan to make it happen this year over the 4th of July holiday weekend.
Day 0’s – July 3rd and 4th
It’s a 10 ½ hour drive to Deadwood, SD, where our trail began, so we decided to break up the drive into two legs for the way out there. We drove halfway to Sioux Falls after work on Wednesday, and other than the views of all the flooding still ongoing throughout Iowa, and a gas scare where we went down to 17 miles of range, the drive was uneventful. For the 2nd leg of our drive, we decided to stop at the Corn Palace tourist attraction – it is the world’s only “corn palace” after all. The palace was pretty cool, but they were halfway through changing the corn patterns, so it wasn’t as cool as it could have been. We also stumbled across the Dignity Statue in Chamberlain, SD – which was at a really cool rest area that had a little museum and an excellent view of the Missouri River beyond.
We met up with Sally in Deadwood around 1pm. After checking into our hotel (Cedar Wood Lodge) we made our way to the downtown area – to get coffee, explore, and watch the parade scheduled for 3pm. After the parade we went over to the grocery store in the neighboring town, Lead (pronounced like leader). We were going to get veggie burgers at one of the restaurants in Lead, but apparently they had a special limited menu for the holiday, so we had to go elsewhere for the vegetarians. But while we were at the restaurant, it did give us a chance to walk around the side of a pit mine across the street. That was really cool, and we probably wouldn’t have noticed it if we hadn’t stopped to try to eat. We missed out on any firework opportunities that night because a heavy storm came in while we were out to dinner, luckily that was the only portion of the trip where we found ourselves drenched by the elements as we made the half a mile walk back to our hotel.
Day 1 – July 5th
Deadwood to Hill City
Daily Miles: 48
There was another storm predicted for that afternoon so we were eager to get moving in hopes of getting to Hill City, our nights destination, prior to any rain. The trailhead to the George Mickelson was essentially across the street from the Lodge. So at 7am we grabbed our free muffins, cinnamon rolls, and the ever important coffee provided by the Cedar Wood Lodge, and made our way south. In researching for the trip, we were anticipating the first 15 miles to be rough, as it was all uphill. Because I had been dreading and imagining a super steep hill for the start I was pleasantly surprised by the minor elevation change we were actually confronted with. That is until we decided to take the 17% grade “short cut.” (We need to remember, shortcuts in the mountain are not always better!). Because of the recent rain, the ½ mile of steep incline was all mud, loose sand, and ruts… it didn’t take long for us to find ourselves pushing. Along with that steep portion of trail, there were also a few places of washout that again forced us off the bike, and several locations of technical riding over gulleys from the water crossing the trail. Andrew steered the tandem like a champion while I gripped the back handlebars silently in terror, confirming my desire to not take up a mountain biking hobby (I surely would have crashed had I been steering).
My favorite part of the trail was just before the Rochford Trailhead where we stopped for lunch. Here there were meadows in the foreground with taller hills in the background. There was a winding stream that also followed us along the trail. It was very apparent how much rain the area had seen with the stream occasionally covering the banks and spreading into the occasional field; luckily there were only a few areas where the trail was washed out. Lunch was rice and beans cooked by Andrew, which was the perfect fuel needed for us to finish the days ride. It also provided us with some opportunity to dry our socks and shoes that were wet from walking our bike through some of the washed out trail. It wasn’t until we were all packed up and ready to ride that we realized our back tire was completely flat. As far as locations go, it wasn’t bad. It took a minute, but Andrew got the tire patched without too much difficulty, and the patch held up for the rest of the ride.
After lunch we enjoyed some sweet downhills even if they only lasted a few miles. We had 8 more miles of uphill for the day, and I don’t know if it was because we were tired, but this hill seemed way harder than that first one out of Deadwood we had been dreading prior to the ride. This hill however came with three big timber tunnels!
As we made our final downhill into Hill City, we got our first glimpse of what I’m pretty sure was the back side of Mt Rushmore mountain in the distance. We rolled into our lodging at the Black Hills Trailside Park Resort, an adorable single room cabin right off the trail. We had lucked out with the weather, that storm we had been fearing came and went all while we were eating dinner. For dinner we went to a local’ recommendation- Desperados, where I tried some local fish (Walleye). Andrew had pasta and Sally ordered another veggie burger. Hill City is a cute little touristy town, and after dinner we were able to wonder the main street on foot and stop for some much deserved ice cream!
Day 2 – July 6th
Hill City to Keystone to Custer
Daily Miles: 37
Saturday we detoured off of the George Mickelson trail. I had never been to Mt Rushmore before, and since we were so close I couldn’t let us pass up this opportunity to ride to it! (And because at Mt Rushmore you only pay for parking, bikes get in free!). Unlike converted rail trails, roads are less gradual with their elevation changes, presenting us with much steeper inclines (as well as declines). Knowing we had a very hilly day ahead of us, our original plan had been to leave our gear at the lodge and Hill City, and then come back for it after our detour. That plan was abandoned however when we realized the office didn’t open until 9am, and not wanting to waste the morning, we decided to tough it out and ride fully loaded leaving out cabin around 7:45am.
Keystone was an 11 mile ride away along Highway 323 there was a brief steep 300ft elevation gain followed by a glorious scenic 1000ft downhill into town. My only complaint about this route was that it crossed the railroad tracks at least 20 times, and because the road curved so much we often had to leave our lane to cross the tracks at a perpendicular angle. Luckily our morning ride was void of any trains and also low on cars – we probably saw 3! I’m guessing it was so quiet because of the early hour, our afternoon ride back to the trail was packed with cars, and the morning was definitely the more scenic route.
Once in Keystone we rewarded ourselves with some coffee and scones from Grapes and Grinds while we waited for Rushmore Tramway Adventures to open so that we could ride the alpine slide. The slide was a lot of fun, I almost wish we had ridden it twice, because I was too cautious on my slide and I would have liked to go again with more speed, but we had a hill to conquer, so after our single ride we put on our game faces and began our way up to Mt Rushmore. From Keystone to Mt Rushmore was about 2 ½ miles at a steady 6% incline the entire way. The road was four lanes, and the shoulder was a decent size, so we felt relatively safe riding up (although it would have been nice if more cars used the left lane to give us a little more space). After an hour of riding, with several breaks along the way, we made it to the top and were rewarded with the very crowded majesty where everyone was gathered to see the 60ft tall monument that is Mt Rushmore.
Day 3 – July 7th
Custer to Edgemont
Daily Miles: 45
Today’s ride was by far the easiest one, so we let ourselves sleep in before heading out for the day. The George Mickelson Trail has a $4 day pass (or $15 annual pass) you are supposed to buy when you start using the trail. At the North end of the trail, they had pay boxes what felt like every few 100ft, so we made the executive decision that rather than back track to the Custer Trailhead, we would just ride south and pay at the first pay box we come across. Low and behold, the next pay box wasn’t until the next trailhead about 10 miles away. And today was the one day we actually ran into a trail ranger! Lucky for us the ranger was very nice and friendly. He even road along side with us for a while and we swapped biking stories along the way.
Today’s ride had vastly different scenery from the first two days. We had reached the prairie. Today was also the hottest day of the ride, and it was only made hotter by the lack of shade. I was very thankful we were riding downhill and not uphill today.
We stopped for a lunch of pasta and f’sausages at the Minnekahta Trailhead around 11:30 am. After fueling up we were ready to finish the last 16 miles of our ride into Edgemont. Around 6 miles out we came up to this amazing large ravine. We could even see Edgemont in the distance at the bottom. Around 3 miles out, the ground started to level off and we found ourselves in what the ranger had described as ‘road ditch riding’ (he had forewarned us not to judge the trail by the last three miles). We basically rode between a parked train and the highway until we made it to town. One cool aspect of this portion was that there were swarms of butterflies hanging out on the trail that would all take flight as we came upon them. (There were also portions with swarms of grasshoppers, but riding through the butterflies was much more pleasant).
We finished our ride in the small town of Edgemont around 2pm, giving us plenty of time to take pictures and change before our 3pm scheduled shuttle pickup (with Black Hills Discovery Tours). The two hour drive back to Deadwood was pleasant, and once back in town we celebrated the completion of our trip with pizza.
All in all the trail was amazing. It had enough variety and challenge to keep us engaged. I could definitely see us making the trip again in the future (but without the Rushmore detour).
Total Mileage: 145
More Photos
Whats up with the Bandages?
I’ve been suffering from knee pain (and if you read the Katy Trail ride post, this was a huge concern for me coming into this ride). What I’ve learned from the doctors and physical therapists, is that my knee caps don’t properly track – instead they tend to fall inward (interestingly enough most people with this symptom have the opposite problem, and their kneecaps tend to fall outward). The tape on my knees helps hold my kneecaps in place so that the repetitive motion of cycling doesn’t cause me any unnecessary pain due to the improper tracking.
After the Katy Trail Ride I had given myself patellar tendonitis – and the symptoms had lasted over a month after the ride, so for this ride I took extra care to stretch my legs constantly, and wear the knee tape (and I wore my knee brace on the hilly 2nd day) and I am happy to report that I had zero pain after this ride!
The bandage on my shin was to protect a cut from a bike crash the week prior – as might be expected I came out of this trip with some interesting tan lines!
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