Sturgis - Needles Highway

Tight quarters on Needles

Well, any motorcycle enthusiast that has studied the roads around the Black Hills knows Needles and Iron Mountain roads.  Coming out here was a once in a lifetime chance to ride those roads and there was no way I was going to miss those.  Well, I missed one of them, but not both!  Guess you can't do it all in a single trip to Sturgis.

We chose Needles to ride.  We were alone away from the pack and had an hour or so to kill (poor choice of words when riding this road) so we decided to give it a shot.  It is a fairly technical road, especially when it is crowded.  I would not say it is as technical as The Dragon in Deals Gap or the Diamondback in Little Switzerland, but it still offers an adrenaline pumping ride even at the low speed limit (35mph).

One Lane Tunnels

The highlight of both of the roads are the one lane tunnels carved into the mountain.  They are rough, and they are not policed.  So you just stop, wait for an opening and go.  It was an awesome sound to sit and listen to so many bikes come through the tunnels, each rev'ing their engines!  The best part of needles is at the top.  Well, I am not sure Rhonda would agree it was the best.  This is where there are tight rock walled turns that will make you pull your arms and legs in (like that would help).  There are times when you can see 3 levels of road below you that you will eventually be on after a few tight hairpin turns that leave barely enough room to navigate with the large number of bikes parked in each turn.

Needles is not for the faint of heart.  It is not hard, and to be honest the slow speeds made it more difficult in my opinion as the bike was not as stable and I constantly had to monitor the speed of the bike in front of me.  But none the less, the views are spectacular and the ride had more personality than any other mountain road i have done.  I wish I could have done Iron Mountain Road, but there simply was not enough hours in the last day.  Maybe next time.  But I am glad I got to experience one of the roads!