Harvey Amer slowly trotted up on his
horse and bellowed out a loud "What's a
Mad-Rid?" He hopped down from his horse
and picked up my skate as we checked out
his ride. I explained to him what a
"Mad-Rid" was and offered him a Thrasher
magazine and some decals for his horse.
"Thraysher, what's a Thraysher? Is that one
of them fishin' magazines?" His cowboy
drawl was almost undeciferable, but we
were rolling on the ground. He took a liking
to us "city boys" and we decided to have
lunch with him. "Hey, you should get some
hightops like me," Harvey was elbowing
Gary as he flashed his weathered cowboy
boots. "There's rattlers all over these hills."
With this news from Harv, we skated
exactly in the middle of the road for the rest
of the day ending in Unity, Oregon, a town
consisting of a gas station and a saloon
named "The Watering Hole."
KILLER 'SQUEETS, NYSSA, ORE., JULY
4,95 MILES
"Hey dudes, it's the Fourth of July." Paul
Dunn realized this about two o'clock in the
afternoon, after we had put in about six
hours of sweaty skating. This happened a
lot, the not knowing what day it was, what
time it was, or where the hell we were,
mainly because of the mental states we
reached from skating for 12 hours a day.
We decide to call it quits at the Idaho
border, which is created by the famed
Snake River, you know, from idiot Knievel
days. We set camp at "Vern's Country
Campground," a quaint little place on the
edge of a mosquito-spawning finger of the
Snake River. We were deciding to take a
swim, but P. Dunn, resident biologist, takes
a water sample and determines if a no-go.
A local clues us in on the "killer 'squeets
the size of a quarter," which go for blood
when the sun drops, and we prepare for
the battle. I dig in to my bowl of Spaghettios
and realize my diet has taken a turn for the
worse.
PAVEMENT CHANGE, IDAHO, JULY 5,
104 MILES
The "Welcome to Idaho" sign was placed
right beside the beginning of the worst
pavement I'd ever seen in my life. Worse
yet, we had to be in Boise by noon for news
coverage and M.S. promotions, so we
powered over the stuff. A police escort.
picked us up on the edge of town and
ushered us to the capital steps, powering
through lights, major intersections, and
down one-way streets against traffic so we
could get there on time. Julie Nash, the
local M.S. coordinator, had all three local
news stations waiting for us. We inter-
viewed, then continued with the "Kawi
1000" escorts out of town, and we skated
till our wheels were sticking in the now
melting asphalt. We watched the news
clips from Sue and Allen Wood's home,
who were nice enough to put us up for the
night. Interesting quote by Jack on one of
the news spots: "We're not hippies, we're
not punks, we're like the guys next door."
Hmmmmm.
"THELMA, YOU'RE A BEAUTIFUL
WOMAN," ARCO, IDAHO, JULY 6, 138
MILES
By this time we had devised a rating
system for pavement conditions with
Harvey Amer skating for the first time and
astride his "mount" with a "Thrayshur
Police escort to the state capitol in Boise, Idaho.
Bob tested and twisted in a roadside ditch, Wy
five-star being glassy smooth and downhill
and one-star being the obvious. Well, we
were at two-star for most of the day with
the exception of a five-star strip through an
area called "Craters of the Moon," a really
creepy piece of highway cutting through
some volcanic terrain that looked like a
lunar landscape. Jack Smith, in despera-
tion for a shower, talked Paul into hitting a
KOA for a chance at them putting us up for
the night. Entering the office, Paul's silver
tongue went to work. "Well, hello, my
cohorts and I are skateboarding... etc."
He was speaking with the couple who
owned the camp. "This is my wife, Thelma."
Well, hello, Thelma, my you're a beautiful
woman." A few minutes later, Paul came
out with a big smile and we showered for
hours. Pays to be nice.
INTEREST RATES AND
SKATEBOARDING, YELLOWSTONE,
JULY 7, 130 MILES
The Jack Smith diet plan begins to take
its toll on the troops. I'm a four food group
type of eater. Gary is into the natural side
of things, and Paul eats a lot of fish. We all
lost except for Jack, who says, "Hey, I'm
feeling great!"
We climb most of the day, ending our
skate at a KOA on the outskirts of
Yellowstone National Park, where Paul
goes for another sponsored night. I rap with
a local sitting on a log and he's filling me
in on local events, girls, fishing, and bears
when he suddenly blurts out with "You
young fellas is sure lucky interest rates.
have gone up." I sit back and wonder what
the hell he is talking about. "Yeah, interest
rates is up so less trees are getting cut
down, right?" I agree but don't understand
what he is getting at. "Less trees means
less logs, means less logging trucks,
means empty roads, means better skating
for you, right?" Whoa, here's this old guy,
sitting on a log, fishing flies in his hat,
weathered hands and face, just summing
up skating in his own roundabout way. Paul
walks out of the office with a smile and we
hit it for the night.
RANGER RICK, OPERATION RESCUE,
THE TWIST, CODY, WYOMING, JULY 8,
74 MILES
"But Mr. Ranger, sir," Paul said in his best
Yogi the Bear voice, "we're skateboarding
for charity." Ranger Rick didn't care and
wanted us off the park property. We
decided to cruise the grounds looking for
bears and sit and wait for Old Faithful to
blow its top.
The afternoon found us skating deep in
Wyoming with its red soils, raging rivers,
and tall buttes. I was skating through this
beauty, sort of unaware, when all of a
sudden I came up on this wild scene. Paul
was pulling the van around, Starsky and
Hutch style, as a cowboy was walking out
of this raging river with a small, uncon-
scious, 3-year-old girl in his arms. They pile
in, the van pulls away, and I start wondering
what's going on. It turns out that this little
girl fell in a small creek and floated down
for about a quarter mile finally catching on
a branch only feet before the wild rapids.
The cowboy type was "riding the range,"
so to speak, and became involved when
he heard wild screaming from the girl's
mother. Our van was the first car they had
seen for quite a while, so it became an
impromptu ambulance for the girl. The
seriousness of the accident didn't really hit
us until we thought of what might have
happened if we hadn't arrived on the scene
when we did. A trip to Cody Hospital later
revealed she was in stable condition and
awaiting a helicopter flight out of Cody.
Later that day, I was checking out a killer
ditch on the roadside and I twisted my
ankle. I mean twist, crack, scream, pain,
swelling. I limp over to the van and
everyone stares at it in that "ignore it, dude,
we don't want to hear it's broken" way. We
pull into a KOA, Paul smiles, and we fall
asleep in a "swollen ankle" silence.
ENDLESS DOWNHILL, DIRT CHICKS,
SHERIDAN, WYOMING, JULY 10, 89
MILES
The climb up the Big Horns was traded
for the best downhill any of us had ever
skated. 10 miles-plus of 20 to 30 mile-per-
hour glassy smooth asphalt. A skater, Pete
Clapet, linked up with us from hearing an
interview on a local station and he became
our tour guide. We decide to hit a halfpipe
in the second story of a barn, and en route
Pete filled us in on life in Wyoming. "There
are chicks and then there are dirt chicks.
Chicks are girls, normal types, very few.
Dirt chicks are numerous. "How do you tell
the difference?" I asked. "It's easy, dirt
chicks chew tobacco."With that comment,
we arrived at the big red skate barn and
sessioned.
That night at dinner we were reminded
of why we were taking this trip. A woman
came up to our table and thanked us for
what we were doing, as her husband has
multiple sclerosis. The pain and frustration
showed on his face as well as the members
of his family as he slowly made his way to
his car. We thanked her and she went on
BOOMTOWN, GILLETTE, WYOMING,
JULY 11, 110 MILES
"Sa you were all friends before the trip?"
"Yeah, we were, before the trip." The
newswoman laughed, but it was true,
tensions were running a little high
sometimes. We were sitting in the Gillette
Chamber of Commerce, answering
questions for the local news and enjoying
the air conditioning. Interesting fact: We still
had a long way to go.
CENTER OF THE NATION? BELLE
FOURCHE, SOUTH DAKOTA, JULY 12,
128 MILES
Skating today is flat and straight. South
Dakota puts signs on the side of the
highway where an auto death occurred, X
marks the spot sort of thing. Really
reassuring when you're skating down along
the shoulder of the road. We made good
time, for obvious reasons, and arrived in
Belle Fourche to be greeted by two
surprisingly young and attractive women at
the city chamber. Maureen explains why
her town is considered the center of the
nation, even though we figure we have 200
more miles to go to reach our trip's
midpoint. With a little imagination, certain
factors taken into account, and Maureen's
mile, we agreed with her and celebrated
being halfway done with our trip.
ng
A sign of relief somewhere in Wyoming
Dropping into a tuck, Bob Denike
Paul Dunn pushes by a South Dakota hayfield
OREGON TO A
madrid
Maureen's smile at the halfway point.
MISSILES AND INDIANS,
GETTYSBURG, SOUTH DAKOTA, 157
MILES
The day was weird right from the start.
Gary and I had noticed the fenced off areas
miles ago. The extremely smooth and thick
(12) asphalt highway seemed kind of out
of place in the middle of nowhere, so our
curiosity pulled us off the road and over to
the fence. The sign slapped us in the face.
"Warning Restricted Area-Unlawful to
Enter Without Permission from the
Installation Commander-Internal
Security Act of 1950-While on Installation
All Personnel are Subject to Search-Use
of Deadly Force Authorized." Nuclear
missiles? No way, right here on the edge
of the road? Yep, big, hairy nuclear-tipped
missiles. Couldn't believe it, every three
miles or so there was a fenced off area
enclosing a big sliding metal hatch. Really
an ironic setting among grazing cows,
sheep and fields of hay. We looked on the
map which said we were entering a
"Government Experimental Farm."
The missiles ended and so did the good
pavement as we skated through the
Cheyenne River Indian Reservation,
another one of those wonderful "govern-
ment projects." It's getting interesting lately.
seeing what the U.S. will do now that these
Indians are finding heavy oil and coal
deposits on their land.
The day ended with a laugh with some
classic Mudd Butte bathroom graffiti. "In
case of an air raid, hide under the toilet, it
hasn't been hit yet." "Players with short
bats, stand close to the plate," and the
classic "If it's yellow, let it mellow, if it's
brown, flush it down." It appears they have
a water shortage in Mudd Butte.
PIGS, POODLES AND PAIN,
LITCHFIELD, MINNESOTA, JULY 15, 135
MILES
We are in Minnesota today, "Land of
10,000 Lakes," which we quickly changed
to "Land of 10,000 Pig Farms." The roads
were a smooth four-star rating. But the
smell in the air reduced it to a two-star. It
had to be the foulest smell I have ever been
violated with, and it might have affected the
neighboring animals also as I got attacked
by a killer poodle. It chased me down the
street, bit the tail of my long board and
dragged itself about 20 feet. It eventually
released itself and took a nice chunk out
of my sock. No other injuries were reported.
WINOS, USA TODAY, SHOE SHINE, ST.
PAUL, MINNESOTA, JULY 16, 65 MILES.
Skating today was easy except for an
occasional dodging of frisbeed (smashed)
turtles in the roadway. Skating ended today
in St. Paul where we met up with some
M.S. volunteers at the local chapter office.
Paul Dunn strikes up a conversation with
a wino who claims to have "put the word
"happy' in the town of St. Paul. "We all agree
this guy has had one too many "happy"
times in his life, so we look elsewhere for
entertainment. USA Today calls us at the
motel and quizzes Paul on our trip. We all
flip out the following morning when Jack
reads the article over breakfast. Finally,
national coverage. We make desperate
calls for a shipment of new shoes, but we're
shined.
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