Day 34: July 17: Whitefish, MT to Eureka, MT: 61 miles

We are all feeling much better with clean clothes and good showers. It was a late night though to get everything clean. We did not wake up very early, so the start was not too early. It was suppose to be a hot day, but we needed the sleep too.

Hwy 93 was not a good way to start the day. It was very busy, no shoulder, a crumbled edge of the road, and a terrible graveled/ muddy edge. We were in the gravel a ridiculous number of times because cars would not move over for us. We got off the hwy according to our route as many times as possible. It was so bad Katie even dumped off her bike into the grass after being pushed into the gravel by the cars and then hitting a big rut. She was not hurt and her bike was okay, but the road and traffic were awful.

TJ had a bolt hole strip on his handlebars. Chris had a thinner one to use temporarily, katie and TJ installed it.

Towards the end of the day we got off the hwy and we were much happier. We were able to see a bull elk off in the distance. It was huge and had enormous antlers. We did have to get off our bikes on the back road a couple of times in order to walk our bikes over cattle grates. Thank goodness they had signs before each of them or someone would have wrecked their bike!

When we pulled into town, we stopped at a grocery store and met two cyclists who started in Alaska and were planning to bike across the NT to Maine, down to Florida, across on Southern Tier, and back up to Alaska. They think it will be about 17,000 miles, and take them at least a year!

TJ now has pink duct tape holding his stuff together in three places.

We found a room and are hoping to get some sleep and be up early to beat the heat. They are talking heat warnings for temperatures in the high 90's. Why couldn't it have been hot to cross Logan Pass? I think Mother Nature has it in for us with new tactics other than the wind...hmmm.

61 miles (1462 total)

Comments

Another Great post Laura.

I find it interesting the difference between the phone call info. and the post info. Tonight I talked to Roger, Chris, Katie, Chris and Roger, yet not one of you told me about Katie's dump. Hmmmm, then you post it so I know anyway. As long as she is alright, just tell me.

I just want to know who caused it. Revenge could be soooo sweet.