My Honey was up for a ride today - we got out relatively early because it is another hot one. Two more days of hot, then the weasels are forecasting a couple days of rain and cold... we need to get this riding in when we can; about two weeks before we head out.
I suggested we go check out the recently re-opened Playhouse Road. You may have seen me write about riding on Playhouse Road, but that is the portion outside of Custer State Park; the portion of that road in the park has been closed all summer due to road construction. I didn't know what to expect, but it has to be better than what the road was before - it was downright nasty, with huge potholes and busted up road surface.
We geared up, mounted up, and headed out. The other goal of this routing would be to keep us in mostly forested terrain, where it should be cooler. In the map above, our ride took us on the fuzzy purple route, with some duplication on the way back. All twisty, all the time! That map is an "official" Motorcycle Map of the Black Hills... there are some roads we were on that this map overlooks, in favor of the more well-known roads: if Neck Yoke Road, South Rockerville Road, and Playhouse Road weren't so close to Iron Mountain Road, motorcyclists would flock to them. I'm OK that they aren't so publicized, because it means I can find fun roads to ride, even on holiday weekends or during the Rally. Same with Highway 89 that is just west of the park: great riding, no traffic.
The "new" portion of Playhouse Road is no big deal: it is about 3 to 4 miles where they redid the roadbed and topped it off with chip-seal. Certainly a big improvement over what it was, but the rest of that road could have used a refresh, as well.
A decision to be made at the end of Playhouse Road - it puts you on Needles Highway... turn left and you have good riding back to the main road (Highway 36/16A) in Custer State Park... or turn right and you ride the narrow, but incredibly scenic, road to the Needles Eye Tunnel. Joan said, "You pick,"... right it is, and the traffic was reasonably light. One dumbass family that stopped on the road right before the tunnel (it looked like they were unloading trash???) - we got around them and had a clear shot to get through the tunnel. This is also Highway 87, which takes you back out of the park and another decision: left towards the town of Custer, right towards Hill City or Mt Rushmore. Joan picked left, which gave us more great riding (and faster speed limits than in the park), and eventually back into the park.
We rode through Custer State Park west to east, then decided to take Iron Mountain Road north. Once back to the intersection with Playhouse Road, it was duplicating our tracks on those fun twisty roads back to Hart Ranch. About 100 miles and all of it twisty! No photos, no video... just riding.
Easy to see why we keep coming back to this area.
No comments:
Post a Comment