Sunday, July 8, 2012

South Dakota and Iowa. Mile 8711.

Mile 8711.  To Tyndalll, SD and West Des Moines, IA.

I met Bill Barrett, while looking for a place to live in Costa Rica in March of 2010.  I had just arrived in San Jose and was staying at La Cuesta, a very cheap hotel in the downtown section.  I met Bill in what might loosely be called its lobby.  He had been in CR several times before and knew his way around the capital.  I went with him to observe dental surgery he was having done in a nearby town, Santa Ana.  We became good friends, sharing interests in the local flora and fauna.  He was a retired microbiologist.

Anyway, he visited me this year in CR and I visited him in Tyndall during our North American odyssey.  Tyndall is a typical small SD town with a population of 1300.  It has a few bars, an Ace Hardware, a convenience store, two gas stations and several other small businesses.  Real estate is very inexpensive there.  A two bedroom home with a very nice sized lot can be had for just over $20,000.  That said, winters are cold and summers are hot.  It was close to 100 when Jo Ann and I visited Bill.

We had a very nice, relaxed stay.  I was able to work on the motorcycle, changing the oil.  Bill helped me replace a broken lock mechanism on the trailer.  We visited nearby Yankton, SD, a much larger town. Rachel, our young waitress and cook, made us a mushroom, swiss cheese, hamburger with a generous side of fries--the best we had on the trip.  We washed it down with the local brew, Fat Tire, an adequate ale.

I loved listening to Bill and Jo Ann reminisce about old 45s-music from the late 50s and early 60s.  They were so knowledgeable about the music of that era.  They played some really obscure stuff, my favorite being Hooka Tooka My Soda Cracker, by Chubby Checker.

Bill and I got to do some male bonding on a fishing trip to the nearby Mighty Mo (the Missouri River).  We accessed the river near Springfield, SD.  The river is gorgeous and wide here.  We went at dusk and fished until almost 2 AM.  Larvae were hatching in the river and the air was filled with Mayflies, even this late in the year.  The water was teeming with larvae of various creatures.  While it was interesting to watch, the fish were gorging themselves on the larvae, not our bait.  I caught only one pan-sized channel catfish.

However, the outing was a success.  It was great to hang out with my friend, and to watch the abundant wildlife around us.  Bullfrogs were croaking non-stop behind us.  A muskrat paddled a few feet in front of me.  The milkyway was suspended above us.  In the other side of the river we could see Nebraska, and we could hear the Santee Sioux Indians talking in their community cross river.  At about midnight, we watched an orange gibbous moonrise, as it played peekaboo with a few clouds.

This morning, when I got up, I noted the appearance of a severe papular urticaria on my thighs and knees.  All day long today, as we rode from Bill's home to West Des Moines IA, new lesions arose, around my belt and sock lines.  While fishing with Bill I sat right in the middle of an area infested with chiggers, the 6-legged larval (juvenile) form of a common mite of the family Trombiculidae.. This attack was worse than the one I suffered ar Rincon de la Vieja in the Guanacaste region of Costa Rica.  These mites are invisible and their bites are painless.  The trouble begins 8-24 hours after they attach to your skin.  Very, very itchy for 2 days to 2 weeks.  I have hundreds of lesions and, in a rare outburst of comon sense, I will spare you a picture.of these.  Suffice it to say, it is the worse case I have ever seen.

Oh well, I'll survive. Were this Africa, I might not have.  These mites carry Scrub Typhus, sometimes known as Tsusugamushi Fever.  I love the name of that disease, but the disease is wicked. Fortunately, for us at least, the disease is largely confined to Africa. 

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1 comment:

  1. Eek! At least you knew what the bites were! Oh the beer fat tire, has obtained a significant national recognition--well at least in DC! I've tried it. :)

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