Long day, 500+ miles, but mostly just boring. Left Murdo about nine, then drove for three hours before stopping just across the Minnesota state line at a rest stop for lunch (mostly leftovers). Gassed up just before Albert Lea, MN, then caught I-35 to highway 20 going East to Cedar Falls, just outside Waterloo. Pulled into a Holiday Inn Express just off the highway and had a decent meal and a couple of beers before coming up to my room to clear emails and blog.
Two things to say about the trip. South Dakota does a much better job of maintaining their section of I-90 than Minnesota does. There were a few places in Minnesota where the highway was great, but most of it was in really poor shape. Even the worst of SD’s I-90 was way better then most of MN’s I-90.
As soon as I got into Iowa, the sky turned black almost from horizon to horizon. I went through a few rain storms that made me want to pull off the road and just wait the storm out, and I really feel sorry for a motorcyclist that got caught in that deluge.
Tomorrow I will cruise to West Branch, only about an hour and a half from here, to visit with John Fuller for a while, then head down to Keokuk to find lodging and get things set up to hunt for information about Joseph Roop, who died in Keokuk in 1865. His son came to take his mother and his father’s body back to Ohio, where he is buried. That’s another stop on this trip.