Week 8: Back to the Mountains

Week 8

Day 50

Lewistown, MT-Conrad, MT

The coffee was on at 6:00, and pancake were ready by 6:30. Breakfast was provided and cooked by Brittany, a cancer survivor, and Sue whose son, Noah, is a survivor as well. I rode for them, and for Bill and Cleta who my cousin Gina asked me to ride for. Bill and Cleta are the incredibly generous and kind neighbors of my aunt and uncle in Albany, OR. For a few years, I have heard nothing but how special this couple is, and I had the honor of meeting them last year when I visited. It was heart breaking to find out that Bill very recently passed away from cancer. I am very sorry I only got to meet him once.

Somehow, we lost the beautiful mountains and rode through brown, dusty, flat land. It was honestly the worst scenery we have had all trip, but we rode a byway the entire day, about only about 6 cars passed us. It was perfect for long talks, and Jess and I shared our life stories. We then ate a spaghetti dinner outside on the patio and were grateful for this summer.

A high for the day was Chris riding for Camilla.

Day 51

Conrad, MT-St. Mary, MT

Van day. Rachel Hughes and I chalked the 10 turns that we had in total that day while enjoying the views Montana offered. It was hard to believe that we were almost to Glacier National Park because we spent most of the days in the rolling grasslands, and were keeping our eyes open for buffalo. By talking to a local, we learned that Glacier is the heart of the Blackfeet Nation, and is a sacred place. At the very end of the day, we turned a corner and found ourselves surrounded by soaring peaks and glacially carved valleys. The last 5 miles of the day was a breathtaking decent into Glacier National Park.

Day 52

St. Mary, MT: Rest Day 

We attempted to wake up early and go on a hike, but getting 21 people organized, fed, and into the vans is almost impossible. Eventually we were on our way…and then everyone needed to buy coffee. Another hour later we were actually on our way to the Swiftcurrent Trailhead to hike to Iceberg lake. I remember thinking I should bring my raincoat, and then promptly forgot to bring any sort of layer (this is foreshadowing if you didn’t catch that). The hike was about 10 miles round trip, and it was some of the most scenic 10 miles I have experienced in my life. While we walked fast, it took us forever to get to the lake because of the obscene amount of photos we took. I also slowed the team down by picking and eating service berries, thimble berries, and even wild huckleberries!

 Just before reaching the lake, the sky clouded over, and it started to thunder and rain. We immediately lost all thoughts of jumping into the lake that we fantasied about for the last 2 hours, and hiked back down the trail as fast as we could. It didn’t end up pouring on us, so I didn’t feel as dumb for not bringing a rain jacket on a hike in the mountains. While it didn’t pour on us in the mountains, camp was a different story, and we came back to soaking wet tents, sleeping bags, and clothes. Apparently there had been an intense hail and rain storm, and the two people (Halle and Matar) who were at camp had to run around in the hail with helmets on trying to collect all our stuff and throw it into the van. Halle’s impersonation of Matar being hit by hail pellets is priceless.

As we were driving out of the park, we came upon a mass of tourist out of their cars taking photos of something with their massive cameras. It had to be either a moose or a bear to get that kind of attention, and sure enough I saw my first every grizzly bear. After being yelled at by a ranger to keep moving, we made it another two miles before we saw another grizzly bear. That night, Aaron’s mom bough us dinner because we had no luck getting food donations from the three restaurants in St. Mary. Thank you, Adina!

Later in the evening, we had a Secret Subhash (Santa) exchange because it was the halfway to Christmas mark. Leslie was my Secret Subhash and she gave me a non-working fancy watch that is bedazzled with stones and charms. It is pretty hilarious, and everyone agreed it was a very “me” kind of gift. Not sure what that means…

Day 53

St. Mary, MT-Whitefish, MT

Dedicating my ride to Tom Kelly

Glacier/Going to the Sun Road Day. Wake up was at 4:30 am to pack all the tents and get on the road by 6 am. This was an extremely special day for me because I dedicated this day to the memory of Tom Kelly, the father of my amazing friend Emma Kelly. Emma and I met in Fish Ecology last year, and will be friends for life. She lost her father this winter to cancer, and I wanted to save this most special ride of our trip to dedicate to them. Tom was with us all during every minute of the ride. 

 Our permit required us to finish the 50-mile stretch before 11 am, so we had keep a tight schedule. We donned as many layers as we had, and started the 18-mile ascension of the Rocky Mountains. At one point a ranger drove by and yelled out the window “something, something…bears!” This definitely stressed my team out, and sure enough, 15 minutes later we saw a black bear on the side of the road gorging on service berries. Later we saw a heard of elk, and the other group saw elk.  

Bear country

During our uphill bike our team was either in silent awe of the mountains or whooping when there was an especially incredible view. That morning, we were Team Tortoise because of the amount of photos we took, times we stopped to enjoy where we were, and the layers we had to remove as we started to sweat. I was especially sweating because the week before I bent my derailleur hanger, and couldn’t shift into my lowest gears.

Glacier

St. Mary Lake

All the teams congregated at Logan’s Pass, ate a snack, and then biked over the continental divide. On the other side we split into pairs of riders who like to go down at similar speeds, and let the fast people go first. 

Subhash and Josh may have hit 50 going down the mountain, while Hannah and I had a marvelous time sticking to 25 mph. The other side of the Going-to-the-Sun-Road is 10 miles is steep, narrow, winding, and at times runs along a cliff with a small barrier. The entire way down I sang Kate Wolf’s Across the Great Divide. Thank you to Sarah and Brita for introducing me to that wonderful song.

We were 10 miles from the park boundary when it hit 11:00am, and we had to pull off the road and wait for the vans to pick us up. Luckily, the place we found to pull off was where the rest of the team was already swimming in Lake McDonald. The water was perfect in temperature and crystal clear.  While we were hanging out, a ranger pulled up and expressed his appreciation for us following the rules of our permit because there had been some accidents with bikers who ignored the 11:00 time cap. It is unfortunate that bikes are the minority, because there is no better way to experience that road than pedaling it.

Directly after the park, we biked the scariest road I have every been on for 5 miles. We all made it, and rolled into the beautiful town of Whitefish without a scratch. Whitefish was also our last mail drop. Thank you to Sarah, Josie, John, and Emma (the letter never actually made it, but it is the thought that counts) for the mail.

Day 54

Whitefish, MT-Libby, MT

Riding through Kootenai National Forest 

Today would be our longest ride to date at a 114 miles. Western Montana showed herself off well as we biked 65 miles straight through the Kootenai National Forest. We had 7 cars pass us the entire day, and got to talk and play the game Contact to our hearts content. Highlights included jumping into a mountain stream and eating donated veggie spring rolls for lunch. We stayed at the Libby High School, and apparently in the room I was not sleeping in the alarm spontaneously went off throughout the night, and no one got much sleep.

Day 55

Libby, MT-Bonner’s Ferry, ID

Kootenai Falls

Yay Brita!!

We only had 50 miles to bike that day and we couldn’t be at our host until 5:00pm, so we had a lot of time to kill. We started out by getting inline at a drive through coffee house, and then sat on the lawn to soak up the sun and mountains. We only made it ten more miles before stopping at the Kootenai River falls and swinging bridge. We burned about 2 hours there wandering and taking selfies on the bridge. Rachel is our professional selfie taker as you can see here ( I didn’t tell her my point and shoot had been zoomed in).

Another hour was burned when we finally reached the Idaho State sign, and again took an obscene amount of photos. Everyone kept asking me if I was going to cry of happiness at being back in Idaho. I didn’t cry, but I certainly was happy. What also made me happy was that my good friend Brita drove up from Sandpoint to hang out for a few hours with me. We planned great adventures for the fall and caught up on life. It helps to have fun things planned for the future when the end of 4K for Cancer is less than two weeks away.

Instead of just crashing on a church floor that night, we got to stay in the houses of community members and sleep in beds! Hannah, Liz, Rachel, and I stayed with Beve and Mike who lived about 3 miles south of the Canadian Border. Since we were so close, we drove to the country line and took photos. I actually had my passport with me, but it wasn’t worth standing in line twice to get a stamp.

Day 56

Bonner’s Ferry, ID-Newport, WA

The highlight of the day was stopping for 5 hours in Sandpoint. Sandpoint is only 3 hours north of where I go to school, and I come here in the fall to go hiking and the winter to go skiing. We swam in the lake, wandered the town, and played ukulele on the beach. We also talked to SO MANY people about what we were doing. Everyone wanted to know who we were, what we were doing, and how they could help. Sandpoint is a very generous community and only made me fall in love with it more that I already was.