Regardless of what I option I selected for this day, I didn't have to leave early. Because of this, I didn't set the alarm clock and slept in until 8:30. Then I got up and showered, and went down for breakfast. Checkout was at 11 AM, so I had time to decide.
The baseball game in Mankato wasn't until 3:30 in the afternoon. Mankato was about an hour and half from Willmar, so checking out at 11 would get me there at 12:30. I would then have two hours to kill before the game started. I could easily burn an hour having a leisurely meal, but the second hour was a question mark. I know I didn't want to get to the ballpark an hour early and wind up sitting in the bleachers for 4 hours.
Plus, with the game getting over around 6:30, it would probably be 9 or 9:30 PM before I got home that night. Due to my limited vacation time I didn't take the next day off of work like I normally do after a motorcycle trip.
After mulling it over I decided that I would just head straight home from Willmar. If the game in Mankato was at noon or 1 PM, I probably would have gone, but 3:30 was just too late.
I hung around the hotel room relaxing until my checkout time at 11. I figured there was no sense rushing home from vacation. I packed up the bike and got ready to leave.
After riding around to the front and checking out of the hotel, I snapped a picture of the hotel sign. I hadn't gotten one the previous evening because of the rain.
As I was riding through Willmar, I decided to do a little exploring before I left town. I had been to Willmar once before in the summer of 1985 for the Sonshine Christian Music festival. I rode there in a van full of other kids from my church youth group. The year I went was the 4th year they held the festival, and the event was located on the campus of the Willmar Community College. The most notable thing that I remember from this festival was shortly before we were getting in the van to leave, I fell down a hill and shattered my kneecap.
Not knowing how messed up my knee really was, a couple friends carried me to the van and helped me get in a seat. I remember riding home in a great deal of pain, and at one point having excruciating leg spasms. We got back to Sioux Falls in the middle of the night and I called my dad to come get me. We only lived four blocks away from the church and my dad seemed aggravated that I called and woke him up rather than just walking home. I tried to explain that I'd hurt my knee. He finally begrudgingly agreed to come drive me home.
The next day my knee felt a little better and I could kind of walk as long as I didn't really put any weight on the leg. More or less I could kind of hop around on my right leg and as long as I didn't bump or bend my left leg it was bearable.
By Monday, though, things hadn't improved and me still hopping around on one leg convinced my mom that I wasn't faking so she took me to the doctor. Long story short, the X-Rays revealed a very messed up knee and I spent the remainder of the summer in a cast from my hip to my ankle. The good news is the cast worked well enough that I was able to avoid surgery. In fact, once I got through rehab my left knee is now better than my non-injured one.
Anyway, I decided it would be "fun" to see if I could find the spot where the festival was held and where my incident occurred. Surprisingly, I found it with little difficulty. The area looks a lot smaller now than I remembered. Also the hill seemed a lot less steep.
There at the community college was a baseball diamond, so I snapped another picture.
I rode around through town and saw the sights. There is a lake there called Foot Lake.
Upon reaching the edge of town, I headed south on highway 23. The scenery from Willmar to Sioux Falls is mostly rather dull, although there is one scenic spot in Granite Falls, MN Headed south on highway 23.
Roughly halfway home I came to the town of Marshall, MN. There is a college called Southwest Minnesota State University. I was in need of getting off the motorcycle for a couple of minutes, and there was a baseball diamond there so I figured it was a good excuse to stop.
When I went to leave, I followed a gravel path out of the area. As I rode it got narrower and narrower, and finally turned into a sidewalk. About the time I realized this I saw a sign that said "no motorized vehicles on the sidewalk." I made the decision to continue on for another hundred feet as it would get me off the sidewalk faster than trying to turn around. Oops. Oh well, being summer there wasn't anyone around to see my blunder anyway.
About 10 miles south of Marshall, around the town of Russell, a truck coming the opposite direction was flashing its lights at me. I wasn't sure what to make of it until about a half mile further down I came around a corner and saw a whole bunch of emergency vehicles. I slowed way down and as I passed, I could see there was a wrecked motorcycle in the ditch. EMTs were down in the ditch working on the victim. It didn't look good at all. The next few days I was scouring the news trying to find out the state of the rider, but was unable to. In any event, it was a good reminder for me to ride carefully.
In Pipestone, MN I stopped for another stretch break and to take one more photo of a ball diamond. Only one more hour until I'm home.
Probably the fastest way back to Sioux Falls from Pipestone is to take highway 23 all the way south to Interstate 90 and then head west about 15 miles. I decided that having not ridden on any interstates yet this trip, I would continue this trend and instead head west at Jasper, MN and take back roads all the way into Sioux Falls.
When I reached the edge of Sioux Falls I stopped to top off my gas tank. I then rode about a mile further to my favorite taco shop and got an order of their super nachos. If you ever stop at Gilberto's, I heartily recommend the super nachos. But get the 1/2 order. The 1/2 order is still enough to make you full enough to feel sick. I've made the mistake before of getting the regular order. The end result isn't pretty.
Another couple of miles and I was home around 1:30 in the afternoon. Just in time to watch the Twins play the Indians and enjoy my super nachos.
This was the shortest motorcycle trip I had taken, covering less than 700 miles in two and a half days. This is the point in my blogs where I usually link to a summary page that shows all of my stops, and the mileage and gas stats. I keep all these stats on a piece of paper I carry in my vest pocket throughout the trip. At every stop I jot down the times and information.
Nine days after this trip ended, before I had a chance to write up the story of the trip, my mother-in-law was killed in a car accident when her vehicle collided with a train. My wife and I had to quickly pack and leave town to travel to Ohio where we could help make funeral arrangements and deal with the aftermath. In my haste while packing, I found the piece of paper with all my stats. Unfortunately the way it was folded I didn't recognize what it was and threw it in the trash. By the time I realized what I had done, I was 900 miles away and unable to rescue it before the trash was hauled away. So my stats for this trip are unavailable.
I apologize for this oversight. It hasn't been a good year.
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This page last updated on 10/15/2019