Wise River

We leave the KOA campground and gather supplies for the day. A quick stop at the bikeshop and hotel to update the blog and we go. We ride the frontage roads for the whole day, skipping the incredibly steep Fleecer Ridge, and putting us ahead a day. We take the highway along the river and see many people in boats fly fishing! What a cool site. We race through the valley and just miss getting hit by a rain storm, only to be faced with an intense headwind that takes a lot out of us.

We reach the "town" of Wise River. The only thing going on there is a mercantile where we buy microwave dinners and sit outside to eat. We meet a group of people in an RV who are traveling, one who biked from Pennsylvania to Oregon back in the 70's, and then hitch hiked back! Cool group of guys. We also take a generous helping of candy from a basket at the post office. Thanks U.S. postal service!

We bike 10 miles down the road, slow from the wind and dinner, and find a nice clearing off to the side with people's camping gear there already. It looks as though the wind destroyed half of it, and we set up on the other side. The guys come back later in the night from fishing and we chat for a bit. Again, no tarp tonight, only a clear sky filled with stars. And Jeff's knees are doing great.

Butte

Fred and Paul head off on the trail while Jeff takes the interstate to favor his failing knees. They take a wrong turn yet still have an amazing time even in the rocky mountainous terrains, at times having to throw boulders into creeks so they can make a bridge and cross.

We all ended up on the interstate and arrive in Butte, after some monsterous wind going uphill. Paul and Fred run into a nice lady after using the casinos for free food. They ask her for directions to the local bike shop where they will meet up with Jeff. She unexpectedly arrives there and offers to buy us all a large pizza, plus a six pack of Pepsi. We head to the local park where she tells us stories of the town and we chow on food.

That night we decide to stay at the hotel and have a rest day the next day. We eat a gallon of ice cream, rolos, and some green apples while watching our old friend television.

The next day Jeff hangs around in the park to rest his knee while Paul and Fred try and get more free casino food, to no avail. The town is interesting, split between historic buildings and scary places. We see Transformers 2 (AMAZING MOVIE) and head off to the KOA campground for the night.

Almost 500 miles down so far. Off to Wise River tonight.

Helena...and TOM!!

Toms House, the white roof house, 3rd floor

We leave Deadman's creek to Helena. The roads are washed out and are totally mucky and muddy around 7000 feet. As Jeff slogs on in the front, he stops and sees a bull less than 20 feet away staring right at him. We freeze and grab the bear spray (if that'll even do anything), and back up to work our way around him.

By now our bikes and shoes are covered in a mixture of mud and cow poo. The fire road has vanished and become a dirty farm road. We spot a truck down the way and head to it, only to be stopped by more scary dogs. The cowboys are asleep on the side of the road and wake up, giving us directions to Helena. We avoid more cows, at times having to hop over barbed wire fences. We finally hit Helena.

At the local outdoors store we ask about lodging/ cheep camping. An employee, Tom, tells us his house is a block away and we can crash there. The third floor of an old building with tons of space and even a view from the roof over the entire town of Helena and the mountains. Its almost too perfect! We walk to the store and freak out a bit more as a car of teenagers come by yelling Paul's name, multiple times and following us for a few blocks.

We hang out with Tom for the rest of the night and in the morning, after grabbing breakfast, we hit up Glacier bike shop. Jeff has his drive train changed, Fred gets new tires/tubes, and paul has his rack fixed up. Awesome shop and employees! We check out the town while we wait for the bikes. We grab lunch and depart to Park Lake, only to find it closed due to danger of falling trees from Beetle Kill. We must push on to Basin, another tiny town, to camp. At this time its already 6pm. We still have uphill, difficult single track forests to go through, almost all uphill.

The ride down was scary and exciting, not really being able to see without sun. Paul takes a graceful spill, Jeff loses his sunglasses, and we see a few elk/deer.

We roll into the Merry Widow Mine campground around midnight. We cook in their rec hall and hang out before going to sleep (difficult not to sleep on the couches). In the morning we depart early so we dont have to pay, but nobody even came to ask us for money. We were'nt the ones to find them.

Deadman's Creek

We leave after saying bye to Andrew and buying a huge floor pump at the local hardware store. The ride to Deadman was quite difficult with steep continental divide crossings...and we mean steep!!

We come down from the mountain into a dry farm land with shotgun shells echoing off the nearby hills. As we round a corner we hear a voice asking if we want water. Jeff gladly accepts and we all ride in. The man who owns the farm, Kier (K-ear), talks to us about our trip. He then offers us a box of powerbar gels. Then asking about our Ramen dinners, leaves and returns with 2lbs of frozen, fresh ground beef. Then follows that with a bag of homemade bread, onions, ketchup, mustard, and a bag of cookies. Our tears of happiness could not be stopped. He would have given us a stove if we asked (and maybe his car), but his wife dragged him off before he could.

We looked for the campsite after making a small wrong turn, yet we could not find it at all. A couple driving down the road with mean looking dogs informed us of some areas by the crick (creek in western terms), where we could sleep. We find a nice spot by the stream where we make a great fire and enjoy lots of beef!

Big Nelson & Lincoln

We leave Seeley Lake for Big Nelson camp area. Not much to report there. Jeff got a flat and we camped on a gorgeous lake. And a chipmunk ate some of our food.

We head to Lincoln, a one stoplight town. We climbed 6 miles up hill and the rest was downhill, but it was not that easy. Jeff's tire was low on air, and oddly enough both his and Fred's pumps did nothing but let more air out. So much that he could not ride down the hill. After walking for 5 miles, a car finally came up the road and we were saved with their bike pump. We cruised on into Lincoln.

We set up camp at the city park and head to Scapegoat Eatery. Fred and Jeff each got a 15" pizza (taco and bacon respectivly), and Paul got a massive fried chicken dinner with jo-jo's (steak fries battered with chicken breading...weird). Back at camp another biker shows up (Andrew), he is doing the Lewis and Clark trail and is 30 days in. Andrew joins us for a walk to the store where we pick up food for the next few days. Andrew is pictured above feeding a deer that wandered up next to us.

Seeley Lake

So we left the camp ground and purchased some candy bars at the lodge before setting off. There was a 5.5mile climb in which at the top we had to hike through the pass of deep snow and tight trails (terrible conditions). Jeff's knee started acting up and forced a slower travel speed for a bit. The downhill was great and the scenery was fantastic. We entered the town of Seeley Lake. We immediately found food down on the lake at a little shack called "Lindsays Bayburgers", where we each devoured 1/2lb cheese burgers, chips, and drinks.

At the gas station/ hardware store/ subshop/ pizza place, we asked a ranger for places to camp. Who then shows up but Tallahasee! He is looking for his other racer buddies. We follow them to the local hotel and again, a bit pricy for us, so we head to the local camp site and stay for the night.

BEARS!!!!!

We started the day off with a long 6 mile climb. We were all focused and ready for business, not saying much on the way. On the ride up we met a GD racer from Tallahassee, FL (nicknamed Tallahassee by us). We all rested at the top and he left 10 minutes before us. As Jeff flew down the trail, he slammed on his breaks and started screaming "PAUL!!! BEAR MACE!!!!" Fred soon joined the screaming and Paul was quick with the mace to be ready. About 100 yards ahead were three bears, two cubs and the mom. The little ones bolted while the mother stood her ground and did a short charge towards us. Meanwhile, the three of us stood screaming our heads off and acted as big as possible. It worked, luckily it was a black bear and she bolted.

Later in the ride we missed a turn and ran into Tallahassee (who also missed it). We ran into a local construction worker who was a jerk and made sure we didnt camp on his property by following us out in his truck at less than 5mph. We stopped and went slow on purpose. The local ranger made up for the jerk by giving us directions to Holland Lake lodge, 20 miles down the highway. On the way we got caught in a lightning storm and had to rest off at a local motel. We met a family from Arkansas and relaxed with a delicious cherry coke under the protection of the motel.

The hill to holland lake lodge, we met another racer named Bruce from Iowa. Paul talked to him he knew Paul's hometown of Glen Ellyn. Bruce had relatives in Naperville, IL. The lodge was a bit expensive for us so we camped next to it in mosquito country. We ate beans and rice in the shelter of the bathroom. They had plastic chairs for us to sit in. Somebody got the toilet as a throne.