Other considered Titles:
The Last Climb
Yurp! And other Glacial adventures.
MONTANA! (Shouted in a Isaac Brock growl)
Lee’s Epic Finish
Michael’s Big Comeback
Lenny’s Audacious Debut
Who is Ben Harris?
Alright ladies and gentlemen back home, it’s time to finish this.
Bill Gravely. Bozeman, MT. Seems like so long ago. Days have been packed, like they have been all summer. Bill housed us up for two nights in the fine city of Bozeman. Unlike most towns in Montana, Bozeman is home to college kids and yuppies alike. At checkout, you can pick up coupon books at their multi-story food coop. In the back of Wild Joe’s coffee shop, you’ll find bike and truing stands for doing your own bike work. You can get a tasty meter long sub at the Pickle Barrel while eating pickles right out of the barrel. Hell, I know one of my favorite parts is the one way streets going either way on the north and south side of main street, saves you all those lights. What a paradise.
On our second day, we rode downtown for a parade that weekend. We all separated – some of us going to bike shops, some of us looking for their helmet (->me), but we all ended up seeing ladies doing aerobics while marching down main street, that crazy science club float, and Bill on his longboard. When I arrived, the parade had already started, but I was riding down the street on my bicycle. I was part of the parade and it was pretty awesome, seeing all those happy faces while riding down the strip. It was all part of this sweet pea festival, which I had almost taken my father and sister to the year before as we were setting off on our cross country road trip. That time, it had been in a car.
I ended up at the Bozeman Library – I was going to write letters home to potential donors about this Hazon bike ride I’m doing in a couple of weeks, but fate had something else in mind. I picked up the Zen of Motorcycle maintenance instead and over a coffee read a couple of chapters. Sure enough, Phaedrus was on his way to Bozeman, was in fact a professor at MSU, and I read more about his view of maintenance. He had a whole chapter on the scientific method and how to use it to diagnose issues with a bicycle. I was enthralled, so enthralled in fact that the next stop was wild joe’s to work on adjusting the brakes on my bike and fix the creaky peddle.
Lunch at the pickle barrel, sitting out in the shade of a tree by the MSU campus, we talked about past summers. I felt slightly embarrassed – Bozeman had put me on cloud nine and I was reminiscing about the beautiful summer past and sharing it with my trip mates who could only listen. I guess I just don’t like being the center of attention sometimes. I took them on a trip through the campus and told them about where I lived and some stories. It was a sweet experience nonetheless.
The afternoon approached and we rode back to Bill’s apartment. Lenny wanted to send some stuff home, as did I, and Lee was checking out Wild Joe’s. With Wild Joe’s closed as well as the post office, we all ended up chilling in Bill’s apartment for the evening. I tried to write letters to no avail, and we just ended up sitting and talking all night. It got a little stormy, so we didn’t go for any hikes. Lenny and I played some hacky sack and talked about the difficulty of starting something new.
The night approached. Bill was asleep at weird times throughout the day. I was a bit thrown off. We had planned to go out and it was getting late and we needed a key to get back in. We tried waking our sleeping host – I tried using a light and Lenny literally shouted at Bill until he rolled off. What excellent guests we are. We got the key card and invited our host downtown – he said he might catch up. We spent the night riding around, looking for a show that had already ended, chatting with some dudes outside the library, and listening to some solo gigs at the Haufbrau.
Out of bed by 7:00, Lenny made breakfast burritos at the suggestion of Bill. Did I mention that Bill is a good cook? Did I mention that Lenny is a good cook? In any case, we enjoyed those burritos to the max and packed to get on the road, but not before getting all the stickers we could possibly want from Bill and signing his board. Bill, if you’re reading this, thanks for housing us up and giving us good feeds buddy.
Thus began our five day journey, the final stretch for our threesome. The first day, we road past the Bridger mountain range north of Bozeman. There were a ton of bicyclists riding down from Battle Ridge Pass on their Trek Madones back to Bozeman. About 10 miles in, I got a glimpse of what looked like bicycle peddles. I hadn’t had a good road find all trip, so I considered for about a half mile going back to pick it up. When I finally did, I had to ride for about five minutes while Lenny and Lee waited up. What I found was one of those large bungies, crushed, one of a million we had seen on the trip. I was so embarrassed that when Lenny and Lee asked me what I found, I told them it was a bicycle peddle and that I was going to use it for its reflectors at some point. I don’t know if they actually believed me, but in any case, there’s the spoiler gentleman :p.
After Battle Ridge, it was an incredible downhill, hitting over 40 mph on the bicycles. For the next 16 miles it seemed, we were at a slight decline. I zoomed. The rest of the riding would be north. A tough, tough ride north.
Into the wind we went at what seemed like a snail’s pace. Man, I hate that headwind. We rode another 50 or so miles like that, arriving in White Sulphur Springs at around 9, beat as hell. I was feeling a little sick before the last 20 miles, but Lee was very firm about making it to town. I whined a bit, but I swallowed hard. Not sure if I would have done those last 20 miles if I was by myself, but I’m glad I did now looking back. We camped out in front of the National Forest Park Offices, which a bunch of interns had pointed out, and we went downtown to have some burgers and hang out with them. I was pretty tired though and the interns were a pretty tight knit group so we were early to bed after eating.
The next day, we began ride through that forest. The Lewis and Clark national forest. On our left, there was a fresh water spring the whole way. At one point, we saw cows pastured beneath the shade of trees. “Those must be pretty happy cows,” I said.
Onward- we stopped again on the side of the road so Lenny could continue to diagnose his haphazard rear derailleur, which he had lost a bolt to back in Bozeman. Lee and I ate and I shared some Longitude with him. Felt infinite out there on the Montana plains listening to the opening of “The Last Anniversary.” Thinking about the crew from Fredonia – man, I hope to see you guys again soon!
We had a climb ahead of us – King’s Hill Pass, elevation 7323 ft. Here’s an excerpt from the personal log from that day:
“The climb began. Lee dropped out pretty quickly and I stayed right behind Lenny until about halfway up when he pulled in front of me. I thought that was the end of it, that I’d be pulling in as Lenny stood there all smug from his yet again powerful hill performance. No, not this time. I shifted into a higher gear and hammered. My breathing became quick, I felt the blood pumping and a pain in my heart and my stomach and, of course, my poor legs. I didn’t care though. It was mind over matter. I was going to catch Lenny. He was 200 meters ahead of me, but with every meter, I was gaining a little bit. And a little bit. You could barely tell. The doubt was strong at times, but I peddled harder. I don’t think he knew what was coming, but I passed him on what I thought might be the last climb to the top. I wasn’t going much faster, but I knew I had to keep it up else he would be passing me again. Not only that, but I had passed to early. Around the corner, there was a hill or two more. I kept it up though – I wanted it bad. I looked back and saw that Lenny was going to make a dash to get ahead of me at the last hill. I wasn’t going to have it. I thought back to when my friend Justin had pulled the same move back in cross country. Nope, not this time. I peddled like Hell. I made sure to show Lenny that there was no hope in catching me. “
Riding down that hill was just as fun too, another double digit mileage of downhill. Through Neihart and into the town of Monarch. We stopped at the Lonely Doe, owned by a fine gentleman named Darvin who let us camp in his little village. He had a little village right beside his bar it seemed – a trailer home, houses for company and guests, picnic areas, garages. This man had built it all out in the mountains. I floated down the creek and took a cold bath and we spent some time at the bar busting chops and hearing the stories of the locals. Darvin liked baseball and the Red Sox along with another fellow who hailed from NH, and we watched them beat the Brewers in the final inning together. We cheered and it felt like home. I spoke with a lovely elder lady named Linda who was from the city and was visiting home with her son. She was an artist and her son was entering college. We had a great conversation about following one’s bliss.
One guy, Tom, was pretty drunk and talking about peeling logs in the morning. Sounded like hard work to me, but I guess Lenny was looking to make some cash, so the next morning when we set out, I joined Lenny in a search for the log cabin they were working on while Lee kept riding to Great Falls. We went up and down a big hill looking for them. Lenny got ahead of me, but when I arrived, he had already struck a deal with the contractor. The contractor was going to throw in a lunch, not because he was negotiating with us amateurs, but because he said he was a nice guy. We had to make fast work because we still wanted to get to Great Falls before the end of the day, so we skipped peeling and went straight to sanding with hand sanders. After about 2 and a half hours, we had finished a single 50 foot log. At 50 cents per foot, that was 25 dollars. For the both of us. Ouch.
We did get that sandwich though and had our pay in cash. Furthermore, we were rewarded with a nice downhill nearly the whole way to Great Falls.
Lee, in his side travels which only he knows the full details of, did some work at the bike shop in Great Falls. On his way in, he found a young man in a biking jersey giving a sandwich to a homeless man. That man happened to be Ben Harris, on his way to Nehelem, OR. We added another member to our crew.
Lee also found a nice woman at the bike shop named Becky, who was willing to provide us with warm showers, a nice dinner, and a roof. Lenny and I, at the time, were on our way. A storm started, I was tired, and we did more riding back and forth on a road to get to Lee, who kept changing plans. We held on though and eventually sorted out how we were going to get there – we rode out of the storm and I napped on a street while Lee got a ride to the house and another truck came out to pick us up.
Oh man, this family had it made. A beautiful house, a beautiful ranch, a beautiful view, and beautiful food! Becky had the largest type A personality of most people I had ever met and she knew how to cook for a group of bicyclists. Whooping portions of burgers and sausages on rolls with potato salad, beans, and salsa with some gourmet root beer to wash it down. Finished with an oreo cookie ice cream cake. After dinner, we went outside and carried in wood into the shed, a job Becky might have been able to do by herself looking at how lean and tough she looked. We had heard how she had done the trip down to White Sulphur Springs in a day. It had taken us two.
Ben arrived, after being delayed by a phone, and we all got to meet our fourth member. That night, we watched Almost Heroes together, a parady of the Lewis and Clark trip and seemingly our own. Did my journal entry and fell asleep on the couch.
Woke up to an amazing breakfast of sweet rolls, eggs, bread, and bacon. Drank some AMAZING coffee. That morning, I replanned my whole end game. Instead of taking the Amtrak from Glacier, I’d take a plane from Seattle. Pushed back all my appointments just so I could make it happen. We rode into town and spent some time at the bike shop while Lenny got a new tire. I sent some stuff home along with Lenny’s stuff. Ben had to pick up some cheap sunglasses. Finally, at around noon, we were off together.
First 20 was good, we ate, squared up the bill and restarted the tab we were keeping, Lee got a flat. We rode another 20 miles, one where I was trailing behind big time. Took a tablespoon of salt to help with the hydration. Rode another 20 and a little bit of miscommunication on my part led to us racing into Choteau, MT. Lenny won big time, Ben wasn’t too far behind, and I came in third. Lee wasn’t too far behind. We found a place in town to set up our tents, which was just in a public park. We stopped at the local market for groceries and cooked wheat berries and calarabi. It was pretty good, considering we were putting two things together you would never expect to see on a cross country bicycle trip.
When we woke up the next morning, some people began working on the sprinkler system. For this reason, and perhaps others, we were really slow to get going in the morning. We left at 11:30, with plans to make it to East Glacier, 90 miles away by the end of the day. Thus began a long day of hard riding. We couldn’t even stop in the next town over because we had heard it was a dangerous town – Browning, MT. Big town in the Blackfeet Indian reservation. In fact, when we arrived, Lee had a talk with one of the locals “You staying here tonight?” “Nope” “Good!”.
We started the last 20 miles at around 8:00 PM. It was maybe one of the hardest last pulls of the trip. As we rode, we noticed all the unfriendly traffic getting out of Browning. We saw all the white crosses displaying motor vehicle fatalities on the side of the roads from drunk driving. We had our blinkers on and our lights to avoid such a tragedy. We rode over glass shards, praying that we wouldn’t get punctures, and up a large, large hill winding out of town. I stayed on top though, didn’t fall behind, stayed with the group all the way. About halfway through, the downhill started. We still had to watch for glass, but it was smoother sailing. And, we just had to stare at the mountains set against the setting sun. Such beauty.
We arrived in East Glacier and set up our tents behind the house of another warm showers host, Sam. He offered us pies and we ate pb and j sandwiches before going to sleep. Sam was a park ranger in Glacier and also taught at the university in Browning. He had an interesting life, struggling to help the Native Americans through Western education.
A theme of the trip for sure, I even feel uncomfortable choosing the word “Native American” rather than “Indian.” It seems too cautious after centuries of the mistaken name and yet, unlike a settler of the West, I can’t identify with its derogatory connotations. Nope, I am an outsider of this distinction between Sioux and Dakota, assimilation and preservation. The next day, this became a topic of conversation on our way to an Indian Pow Wow. Riding with some locals, we talked about how Western education was to blame for a lot of the problems in the world and it made sense for the Blackfeet to resist it. Who wants to be carried off the ground with all their thoughts and explanations about the world? I’d rather live closer to the earth.
We stayed that extra day in East Glacier because we heard that Sam’s wife, Jo, who made the amazing pies would be home and that there would be a “party.” We were thrilled and planned a trip to see Two Medicine lake in the mean time. We heard about the Pow Wow at the store and all got prepared to go, even though it was a 12 mile trip on dirt roads. I also made French toast that morning, which I was really proud of. Last minute, Lee pulled out of it and he and Lenny went to Two Medicine while Ben and I found a ride to the Pow Wow. The celebration itself was sort of quiet, with lots of names being called in order and gifts given out and some drumming. I had an enormous Indian Taco, which was awesome. I hope to go to another one, a bigger one, someday. We all met up at the end of the day for a big ole potluck, which was delicious and mostly vegetarian J. In fact, I’d say it was the best potluck I’ve ever been to.
Finally, our ascent into Glacier began. The next morning, we packed up, ate a fantastic breakfast courtesy of Jo, who was also a fantastic cook with an amazing herb garden with CSA vegetables. We rode about 40 miles to St Mary’s at the east entrance to the Going-To-The-Sun road. Along the way, we ran into some other cyclists who were doing a supported tour with Habitat for Humanity, known as the Bike and Build team. Thus began Ben’s obsession with “Dinosaur Face,” the girl with a dinosaur tattoo on her face.
There was a nice climb ending in a swift descent with the most scenic view. (Second of the day actually, there were two epic descents, the first of which I just shouted real loud the whole way). I felt like I was flying into outer space. We stopped in St. Mary’s and had ourselves some nice pie and lunch. We considered riding a lot further into the park, but Lee admitted he wanted to stay another day in the park. So, we stayed the night at the campground right inside the park.
We looked for the Bike and Build team and hung out with them for a bit. I met Alyssa, a beautiful girl with a deep voice who I was immediately attracted to back at the Café where we bought our pies. Ben and I bathed in the ice cold creek and we all ate some quick summer sausage sandwiches for dinner before heading to the ranger station for a ranger talk about birds of prey. Unfortunately, we arrived a little late and caught the tail end, which featured the owl from the Tootsie Pop commercials. Very hilarious, unable to describe completely with words. Maybe someday I’ll recreate that slide show and post it to YouTube.
We ended the night with some star gazing. Lenny told me for days afterwards about the moon he saw that night, the way it lit up the Razor Mountains at St. Mary’s. I got to see M-13, a star cluster in the sky. That was the night we also learned about Skirp!, the cry of delight invented by Miss Maggie from the Biker Build team. Oh, and Ben got to say hi to Dinosaur Face.
The rest of our stay in Glacier was fantastic. Here are some pictures, as the words probably don’t do it justice.
We climbed over Logan’s Pass the next day, hiked through a few falls, and stayed the night at Apgar campground. While we were hiking up at Logan’s Pass, I remember Lee telling me how I had become more independent since the beginning of the trip. Not to sound like my father or anything.
I remember riding along Lake McDonald and telling Lenny had the ride reminded me of our ride from Glimmerglass back in June. I said it with a sort of sadness, realizing how the trip had come full circle.
That night, I went to sleep pretty cranky since we had split up at some point going at our own pace and only finally found each other at 10 o’clock at night. And, of course, Ben had some burgers for us to cook. It tasted kind of sour that night, so when I mentioned that it was time to split the next morning, It didn’t feel so good. But, as the day passed, we softened to one another for one last time. Riding the shuttle up to the pass, we took a hike along the highline trail hugging the mountain ranges. Here’s a FB video of it.
I told Lenny again how thankful I was for what he had to teach me on the trip. He accepted graciously and repeated one of my favorite lessons “I don’t know what I learned from you, but I’ve learned to just trust I have without having to point it out.”
I stopped the gang at a small clearing where we shared reflections from the trip. I said how I enjoyed learning about the interrelation between independence and depending on one another. Lee talked about how much had happened that summer and Lenny talked about how enormous the whole trip had been. We exchanged animals. We exchanged stones. We looked each other in the eyes, and parted. But not before taking this picture.
It was a lonely, sad walk back to the shuttle with Ben. I felt like there was a hole in my heart. Another life experience – saying goodbye.
I slept in the shuttle on the way down and felt a lot of fear, being alone with Ben and without my two cornerstones. However, I knew what to do, I had the habits and the way of living formed and so I just went with it. We rode out of Glacier as Lenny and Lee were finishing their hikes and ending on the other side.
Ben and I slept that night in Columbia Falls. We’ve separated since and now I am in Bull Lake, MT, about five days away from my plane flight, which I hope I catch if I can pull myself away from this country music festival I’m staying at. I don’t know about my companions. I imagine they are all safe and well on their way.
I started writing like this out of sure creative energy. Soon, I began to think of myself as a writer, then I started writing these entries for a book. Ever since having that intention, I’ve doubted the sanctity and beauty of this craft. I don’t want to make a book out of all of this. It’s too much work. It’s too many details and such.
But my God, this trip certainly seemed like a lot to. I guess I could just take it step by step.
Thank you all for reading. I hope the rest of the gang posts soon so I can catch up on their travels.
