Since the Dragon is out of commission, we have decided to ride the Black Hills the end of May. We know we want to go to the usual places, Devil's Tower, Badlands, Black Hills, etc. We also are planning on taking a Southern route over to Grand Teton and go over Beartooth pass into Montana and making a Northern loop back into Sturgis.

Would Sturgis be a good place to ride out for a few days before we go over to Beartooth? We would plan on spending about 3 days in the Sturgis area and then spend 3 days looping over to Beartooth and back to Sturgis before heading back to TX.

We are planning on doing an Iron Butt from Dallas to Sturgis before easing up and enjoying the scenery. Spend 6 days riding the area and then doing 2 days home.

 

Hey ... I am planning a trip very similar to that with my lady rider friends. We are going in June. Make sure to post details of your trip when you get back. I'd love to hear all about it.

 

I'd stay in Hill City in the middle of the Black Hills or even Custer or Hot Springs. Sturgis is kind of empty when it's not rally time.

 

The wife and I were there the last week of May last year. Had a great time. We stayed in Custer and it was close enough to all that we wanted to see. Definitely ride Needles Highway and Iron Mountain road. Both are great rides. We visited Mt. Rushmore, Crazy Horse Monument, and rode the steam train from Hill City to Keystone (round trip). The wildlife loop in Custer State Park is nice with lots of wildlife including lots of buffalo. One afternoon we rode Spearfish Canyon road to Spearfish then rode on out to Devil's Tower. On the way back to Custer we rode through Deadwood, but didn't have time to stop and look around. We had intended to ride on out to Yellowstone, but the weather turned really bad with hail storms and tornadoes in that area, so we headed home early. We rode a total of 3400 miles in 10 days, with the most ridden in one day being 615 miles. We are looking forward to making another trip up there to see all that we missed last year. The weather was a little cool to us, but we live on the Texas Gulf Coast so anything below 60 is cool. The lows were close to 40 and the highs were in the upper 50's while we were there, so it wasn't too bad, but it did rain pretty hard one day while we were there.

Bill

 

i second iron mountain road and crazy horse. also just exploring west of sturgis is beautiful!

 

the needles highway, wildlife loop, and devils tower are things you don't want to miss if in the area. Sturgis will be slow with no rally going on but Deadwood would probably be worth a visit.

If your looking for a place to stay, Custer state park has several campground and cabins that are decent and reasonably priced. Last time out, we stayed at the cabins at Legion Lake and the lodge serves a pretty decent breakfast. The Sylvan Lake Lodge has a patio out back with an awesome view that is a great place for a mid afternoon pit stop.

Have a good trip

 

Thanks, for the tips so far. We don't really care about a night life, we are focused on riding. I'll check out the Custer area. Really all we care about where we stay is a comfortable bed, hot shower, good place to eat and get a couple of drinks at the end of a long day of riding.
Our wives require more, but somehow we always manage to find a good spot away from shopping.

 

I dont know if I would base out of Sturgis. (as far as going to/from yellowStone, tetons and beartooth long way between these) First as stated staying in deadwood, Hill City is fine to see the "local sites". If you are waning to go to Yellowstone,beartooth etc then I would stay in Cody wyo as this has alot to see and do there.
Also END of MAy will be cold! Snow above 3k feet most likely. I went last year the first week in JUne and had cold rain in deadwood, Frozen on the bikes in the mornings, Hail, sleet and snow showers into Ranchette WYO! From there over the big horns at 3k feet we had snow (4 inches total) we were lucky as it did not begin sticking to the road util we started our trp back down the other side (some places there were 8 feet deep placess on side of the road). take warm cloths.

 

+ 1 staying in the Hill City area, Keystone is a pretty good and it's at the start of Iron Mountain Road. It will be a good days ride to the beartooth from there, I would stay in Cody that way you can do the Chief Joseph on the way to the Beartooth. You may want to check in advane of going to see if it is open and also for rock slides on it.

 

Definitely call ahead to find out about road closures. The Bearthooth pass is an awesome ride but it snowed on me there in July once. There is nothing going on in Sturgis at that time so rooms should be cheap. I like the town of Hot Springs. I try to stay there when I do the rally. I would really like to hear the weather report from the higher elevations when you get back.