Didja get $15.28 worth of entertainment today?

 

The price of gas.  That's what it cost to fill up the bikes today.  Last year, it was never over $10, and we ran premium fuel because that's what the Vespa took.  These days, we look for non-ethanol regular; not always easy to find.

Today's ride: parts of Custer State Park.  The chip-seal work has expanded onto Neck Yoke Road, the next road we normally take after Spring Creek Road - yeah, the one with really fun curves and hardly ever any traffic.  I figure it will be a week or so before we consider taking that one on.  Neck Yoke Road is in need of some improvement due to washboard road surface in some of the corners and "divots" in the road (not really potholes, but not fun to hit on the bikes).  I don't see how the chip-seal is going to fix those problems... but, we'll see how the road is when they're done with it.

So today, we took Hwy 79 south to the small town of Hermosa, then Hwy 36 west into Custer State Park.  Highway 36 has been resurfaced and it is smooooooooth!  Nice sweeping turns.  First we've ridden that one this season.  With the road construction on some of our other favorites, it is nice to have options like this.

We rode into the park and stopped at a small picnic area by a pond...

A warm one today, so that was a refreshing stop.  I took the opportunity to put a camera on my bike and shot a bunch of video.  Later, I put the camera on Joan's bike and shot even more video.  It is going to take me a while to sort through all of that, so here are some still images from the day...

Some of the best riding since we've been here (two weeks today), and Mother Nature was kind to us.

We stopped for a second picnic break at a different location, then headed east out of the park.  Another run on Highway 36, then 79 back to Hart Ranch.

Rufus got to go for morning, late afternoon, and evening walks.  While I started downloading 360 videos, the big furry boy sat outside with his Momma.

We picked up some ground prime rib meat a couple days ago, and put the griddle to work for some up-town burgers.  Between that and the $15.28 we spent on gas today, we are living large!