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My ride today put me in Pierre, the capital of South Dakota (the nice one).  Be sure to say it PEER, not the Frenchy way (PEE-AIR).  I guess all the places in the US with French names that are now anglicized were founded by the French, and the names (but not pronunciations) were kept when the Brits took over.  I immediately think of Detroit, Des Moines, Baton Rouge, and Boise.  (Want a rough phonetic equivalent of their original pronunciations? DAY-TWAH, DAY-MWANZ, BAHTAHN ROOJ, and BWAHZ.  The last, my favorite.  The preceding feeble attempt is why they say you should NEVER try to write in dialect.)

I got past the rest of the road work pretty easily, but I was on SD 14 all day.  It’s a big road with big vehicles (lots of asphalt delivery trucks oddly).

Typical interesting farm architecture along the way.

I crossed the 100th Meridian today. Interesting historical note:

I post both sides in case one is easier to read.

Besides that, not much to report until I got to Peer (Pierre).  (BTW: This post’s title means I’m half way across SD.)  Here in Pierre, I bumped into fellow cycle tourist Ryan.

He’s from Missouri, and has been doing a big looping tour.  We both thought it odd how few other long distance touring cyclists we had met.

I also got my hair cut.  Leigh Ann at The Cutting Edge did the honors. Nice work Leigh Ann!

The haircut she gave me is something they call a mullet(?) around here.  I’ll post selfies later.

Dinner included something called Tin Tators.  It’s potatoes cooked with onion and spices in a jacket of aluminum foil.   The ones I got