Episode 21: Rapid City: The Lazy U. (2012)

As I've mentioned before, left to my own druthers, I pick a direction and wander... maybe with some fixed point, but not always. I had a vague notion of going to the west coast because I'd never been further west than Minneapolis. My stops were dictated by where the bus stopped and how long it would be when the schedule heading the general direction I wanted to go was pulling out.

So I ended up in Rapid City without much of a plan.

The first thing I did was get a beer and some food that wasn't trail mix or bus station muffins. The beer was cold and cheap. The food was overpriced and not particularly good. But it did give me time to think and ponder my options. I did have a little money to find a bed; but I didn't have a lot of it and I had to make it stretch. The next bus heading towards Billings was in a couple of days. Foremost, though maybe not first, Rapid City is a tourist town. It's a more spit and polished version of Cripple Creek, Colorado: wild, wild west meets plucky people and pesky uncomfortable history that, when looked at too long and examined too deeply, uncovers some truly terrible things that never made it into a Macmillian public school history textbook. But there's a lot of spittoon quality brassy things, saloons, casinos, and statues of presidents and robber barons who visited once upon a time.

There are also tourist priced hotels and motels. All the usual chains. When it comes to chain motels, I look for Super 8 or Motel 6; this isn't an endorsement, by the way. It's just that they used to be pretty good for stretching the coin a little further than it would normally. And I wasn't disappointed in that regard because there WAS a Super 8. It was a two mile walk up Mt. Rushmore Road, through the heart of the downtown passed that polished spittoon brass and statues, leading to the store front casinos that advertised services like cashing social security checks.

Walking up Mt. Rushmore road was as close to a cathartic experience as I think I've ever had. My pack was a little too heavy for the travel I was doing and my feet weren't in great shape. I was enamored of the big sky and the the palette of colors, but the casinos, almost all of them cheap storefronts meant to draw locals off and away from the tourist traps – or to give the people working in a tourist economy some respite from gawkers and grab assers. Walking that incline was the inspiration for the first scrap of lines that became my first travel chapbook, The Crossing of St. Frank. It was the first place where I first peaked the savage beauty of … everything, really, and where I realized that you can't have beauty without the savage, and vice versa.

After about a mile and a half up the road, I spied a small motor inn, straight out of age of Route 66: The Lazy U. The sun was down. It was getting dark. Fast. I'd been on and off buses since Minneapolis and hadn't slept in a bed in three or four days. I could have kept walking to the Super 8, but decided that it wouldn't hurt to check at the Lazy U. I liked the look of the place; not pretentious. Family owned.

The older married couple that owned place were very kind. I told them my story – the short version, anyway – and that I needed a room for a two nights. They didn't have one room for two nights, but they let me stay in one room that night and agreed to let me switch the following day.

This is the beauty of family owned businesses; they can bend their policy if they see fit. The room was wonderfully uncomplicated. The bed was comfortable. The shower – felt like a revelation. That couple was among the most humane I met on that trip and I have never forgotten them.

Thanks so much for listening to Episode 21 of Record of a Well Worn Pair of Traveling Boots. Please be sure to show some love by subscribing to this podcast on ITunes, Spotify, or whatever pod catcher you use. Check out the past episodes and look for Episode 22 in a couple of weeks.

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The Lazy U Motel, Rapid City, SD.