Not a bad ride report. Nice distance, good average speed, a little climbing. (OK - let's be honest, the worst grade I saw was 5% and at that only for maybe a half mile. Mostly it was around 1% uphill all day.) But as the reader will note form the pics, it was cloudy, and correspondingly cool, all day. I tire of cold and long for some warm mornings. Thus far I've had to start at around 0830 each day in order to give it time to warm up enough that I don't freeze. When doing a BAK we're up and around at 0500-0530 in order to get out early and beat the heat. Not so much the case here in Montana (or Idaho) as today's pics will bear out.
Susan took this one for me when she kicked me out of The Rig in Lolo. This is the same parking lot where I met her yesterday before our side trip into Missoula. Wouldn't want anyone to accuse me of cheating by using The Rig to "skip" a few miles. 1. Note the fetching black vest, arm warmers, and matching black riding shorts. I just LOOK fast. 2. Since the course is mostly flat today, Delta is handling the duties. This is good because Sig got with me late last night and told me he thought he'd ought to pass on today in order to recover fully from yesterday's "events". That's fine since tomorrow is Chief Joseph Pass and it'll be a big climbing day for him.
The snow capped mountains in the background lie on the West side of the valley we're riding up today. There is a corresponding set on the East side that lie a bit further away. Kudos to the reader who can predict what these mountains will do in relation to the valley floor as we continue up.
I worked fairly hard for the first 25 miles, which resulted in some "wet" gear. (It was sweaty.) Seeing as how it was cold outside, I didn't wanna put wet stuff back on, so Susan came to the rescue and pulled the old "dry em with the dash heat vents" trick again. One snack later and they were dry - back on they went. Hey - its either that or do laundry 4 times a week.
I'll just say that highway 93 out of Lolo to Darby sucked. The surface wasn't too bad, even on the shoulder, but the traffic was horrific. There was just so much of it, and all roaring by at 70 mph. As a result, the ACA worked with local politicians and established a bike trail that runs all the way from Missoula down to just past Hamilton, MT - some 48 miles away. We tried the shoulder for a while and moved to the bike path in short order. I'm not usually a big fan of these bike paths since they tend to get taken over by people walking yappers on those stretchy leashes. Nothing worse than a yapper wrapped around your cranks because his stretchy leash let him get on one side of the bike path while his fawning owner was on the other. Unless, of course, its a cranky yapper lover bemoaning the demise of her Fluffy by bike. Plus, then ya gotta get all that leftover Fluffy out of your front chain ring. Yuk. But in this case, the vast majority of the bike path was between the few small cities along its route, making for an absence of yapper lovers and a corresponding absence of yappers. This was a good thing.
As always, when going up a valley between mountains, there is a river. In this case the Bitterroot River. And yes - Bitterroot is spelled that way.
If Delta and I saw one of these today we saw 30. While its adjacent to the bike path most were not, leading us to conclude that they more likely memorialized people driving vehicles rather than cyclists. I think if that many cyclists had died along a stretch of highway, I'd have heard about it - especially since it's on the T/A. I'm not surprised. I observed a plethora of stupid driving from the relative safety of the bike path.
This is Maria. We met her in Hamilton where she was selling cherries from Mt. Ranier. I couldn't buy a bag since I had nowhere to carry them. She was very curious about what Delta and I were doing. So I filled her in. She gave me a good handful of cherries. I thanked her and we were off. Having nowhere to carry even a handful of cherries, I stuffed them all in my mouth (sorry Mom) and was spitting pits for a couple of blocks. They were great!
This is The Rig in Hamilton for the prearranged lunch stop. Apparently I'm not as fast as I think I am because while she was waiting, Susan elected to open up a fireworks stand to help pay for the trip.
#whodathunk
We included this pic in order to prove we were in Hamilton. We're a couple of days early tho. Susan's nephew Scott, his wife Erin and their FOUR kids (two of which are twins) are moving to Hamilton, MT later this summer. They are arriving on Monday to look for housing, etc. Too bad - we were hoping to get a chance to see them on the trip. So - Scott & Erin - we can see why you like the views around here...
One of the views around here...
And another one. Delta likes this one better because because it has a road in it - and him.
This shot was taken from the same spot as the previous one. I just zoomed the camera a bit. We were basically looking at this as we rode South all day. It inspires both awe and dread. Awe owing to the beauty of the geography of the region, dread because we have to drag ourselves over those cursed things tomorrow.
Ya see a lot of this around here. This guy is watering a field of... grass. That stuff must be 3-4 feet tall. Somebody needs to tell him that the more he waters, the more he has to mow. And I hope he's not planning on bagging that!
So - that's it from Darby (population 733) for the night. God bless em for having internet access. The next few days will take us to Jackson (38), Twin Bridges (381) and Cameron (262). I don't think there is a snowball's chance in Hell that our luck will hold. Its kinda like road construction - be prepared for delays.
Till next time...
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