Day 32 - REST DAY in Glendive, MT

 Stats: 

Today's miles: 0 miles

Today's feet of elevation gain: 0 feet

Total miles traveled: 1,268.1 miles

Total feet climbed: 44,323 feet

Dead Rattlesnake count: 26

Initial/Final elevation 2,471 ft / 2,139 ft

It's been a long six days riding through central and eastern Montana. The terrain, environment and remoteness have combined for some challenging rides. Rather than recap each day, I’ll summarize some of the notable experiences of the week.

Amazing Changes Every Fifty Miles:

I am constantly amazed how quickly the environment, terrain and eco-system change while crossing Montana. Within distances of 10 to 20 miles the terrain changes from wheat fields & grassland pastures to mixed Ponderosa pines & upland and to arid canyons/buttes/badlands. These transitions occurred everyday of the ride.

 

 

Groundhog Day in Eastern Montana:

Every day, riding through this area there are a handful of things I could count on: the high temp would be between 90 & 100F, the sun would be intense and the air would be so dry that my mouth would dry out enough that I couldn’t chew gum (I could drink water every 15 min and still experience this). The special treat started on the 14th & 15th (note the total ascent numbers while dropping) This portion of Montana is made up of a series of north-south ridges that east-west Hwy 200 crosses from Winnett to Circle. The route is a series of climbs and descent over these ridges that are spaced about every mile. While the climbs were physically manageable, it became mentally taxing to look out from a ridge crest at the end of a climb to the next ridge. Ryan Van Duzer (YouTube cycle touring personality) advises that as part of every bike trip you have to “embrace the suck”. I have now internalized that.

Remoteness and Small towns:

There were two back to back sections of this ride; Winnett to Jordan and Jordan to Circle (76.5mi and 67.6mi respectively) that had no services (town, convenience store, café, camping/motel,…etc.) between these towns. Even the towns themselves are small (pop. 182, 343 and 615 respectively). Each had a general store (grocery & hardware), one or two bar & grills and a small old style motel. These businesses, in addition to their service, function as the social center and hold these communities together. It's amazing to me how hard it must be to maintain a business in these small towns. Winnett is a great example of the challenge. In the early 1900’s Winnett was a boom town supporting the oil fields in the area. It had grown to a pop. of 400+ in the ‘30s. Today Winnett has a pop. of 182.

Winnett MT, looking down the street from the motel

Winnett, MT - The other direction down the street

Storm rolling in

When in Rome…:

I rolled into Jordan at 3:30 on Sunday afternoon. Since I had been riding in one of the remote sections, other than a granola bar and dried mangos I hadn’t had anything to eat. So, my first stop was any place that looked like it served food. With several pickups parked in front of the Ranchers Bar (R-) I pulled in and unloaded my bike. I went in and grabbed a seat at the far end of the bar. Perhaps it was my fluorescent yellow jersey or my spandex bike shorts; but I definitely got the ‘you ain’t from around here’ look from the ranchers gathered around watching NASCAR at the other end of the bar. As a token effort to fit in I drank Busch Light with my burger and watched 100 Days of Rodeo on the TV at my end of the bar.

Cowboy Humor…curious how they make snow angels

Stormy, stormy night:

I camped at the Kiwanis Park at the edge of Lewistown. The park was situated between the MT200 and the airport perimeter. It was nice enough and offered running water and restrooms. Since it was more than a mile to the restaurants in the downtown area, it was fortunate that the grocery store was right across the road. After a deli dinner, I finished setting up camp and turned in. Earlier in the afternoon the weather forecast indicated a chance of showers in the evening. Around 9:30PM a weather alert popped up on my phone. Thunderstorms with 50 mph were forecast to hit Lewistown within the next hour. After checking around, other campers were planning to hunker down and ride it out. While there was limited thunder & lightning, the winds at times threatened to collapse my tent.

Lewistown Camp Ground

Deli Dinner

Storm Moving In

Rain Blob from earlier in the evening

A couple conversations along the way…

Before leaving Jordan I stopped at the Summit Corral for breakfast. A rancher in his 70’s came in and grabbed his regular table. Shorty asked about my ride and then talked about his life in the area. His father came to the Jordan area as a 2 yrs old in a covered wagon from Texas. In addition to ranching Shorty was an outfitter guiding elk, mule deer and antelope hunts in the area. Shorty was clearly a character who could tell stories all day, unfortunately I had a lot of miles to cover that day.

On the road into Glendive I met a west bound cyclist. Randy pulled over and we exchanged information on the route ahead for each of us. Randy had started in Maine in mid-June and had planned that he had about 2 more weeks to end up in Seattle. With the sun getting higher and hotter we wished each other safe travels and pushed off.

Notables… During this portion of the ride

• I crossed the 1000 mile mark
• I crossed the halfway mark of Montana.

The first day out of Glendive (planned for Aug 18th) will end my time in Montana and start the ride across North Dakota. Lots to look forward to, stay tuned!