I’m beat. Today is the longest I’ve ever ridden. Honestly, I could have done more, but I’m glad that I didn’t have to. Yesterday morning I was in the Pacific Time Zone. Now I’m in Central.

I didn’t really get that much sleep last night. It was cold. Really cold. I woke up to 40 degrees. The sun was sort of out-ish and I wandered to the bathroom to shower.

And so begins another day on the road. I think I must have written the above paragraph more than a handful of times. It’s been a pretty cold trip.

But unlike the other times, I didn’t have any colder riding gear. I mailed home my winter gloves. So by about ten miles into it, my fingers were numb.

I was taking US 2 around Glacier National Park. And I’m glad that I did because along the whole way, I was right next to a BNSF Rail line. And I got to see tons of trains pulling up the continental divide! Sure, it’s not super exciting to all that many people, but it made my cold little morning a bit warmer.

So did finding the Izaak Walton Inn. It was built by the Railroad to take care of those who worked at the yard where the helper engines would wait to push the eastbounds up the hill. Now it’s just a normal Hotel, but with a great view of the trains.

I parked and took it in. Thanks!

It was also a great place to warm up. I didn’t go inside or anything, but not cruising along at 70mph, you tend to warm up.

I even checked out a few cabooses that are now being used as cabins. Lucky folks.

And then it was up and over the divide for the FOURTH time on my trip. There was a monument to Teddy Roosevelt (who I am seriously not a huge fan of and would gladly burn in effigy). There was a little rest area which I took advantage of. And then it was back on the road.

This is all being written very sloppily and I apologize.

Somewhere east of East Glacier, the cup holder on my glovebox gives way for only the second time on my trip. That’s not bad considering what I put it through. My poor water bottle falls to the road and in my rear view I see it tumbling end over end and spinning to the side of Route 2. I return for it since it’s my only water source. The bottle has seen better days (as have I), but both it and myself are as fine as can be expected.

Shortly thereafter I found Camp Disappointment. Lewis & Clark stopped here (or at least Lewis) and found it to be fairly crappy. Thus the name. It’s sort of depressing. But there’s a great monument to it on a hill with some fairly old graffiti.

Here I ate my breakfast.

Until this point, I had an incredibly horrible headache. I’m not sure why, but after the stop at Camp Disappointment it went away.

And though I’ve failed to say so, I’ve had headaches every day since leaving Seattle. Just like I had a headache after leaving SLC and Berkeley. I’m not sure what this means, but it’s the truth. But three headaches in three days is no good at all.

Here is where the straight-flat part of the day started. Oh, it was probably around Shelby, Montana. Here, the towns ran together. I entertained myself by tracing, with my eyes, the old alignments of Route 2. Nothing really all that interesting except in a few spots. But even that just followed the railroad.

There are tons of little towns along Route 2. Most of them are farming and railroad towns.

My planned stop for the day was Malta. But I reached it at 1:30pm and figured that I should probably keep going.

I found out that, including small stops for gas and bathroom breaks, I was averaging about 50 miles every hour (which is sort of different than 50mph). When I was at speed, I was doing about 70mph, sometimes more if I could get behind a truck. But when you figure in the stops, I could do about 50 miles in one hour.

Route 2 follows the Milk River for quite a long time, even crossing it on several occasions.

Unlike like Route 66, US 2 doesn’t have a whole lot of kitsch. On 66, you can enter almost any town and find something fun. On Route 2, most of the towns are off the road (sometimes the newer alignment of US 2 bypassed the town, sometimes it just never went through it). I entered a few, but there was precious little to see.

Sometimes I got lucky, like with this dinosaur thing. Dinos are kind of big out here. I’m not sure if they ever lived in these parts, but giant horses and woolly mammoths did! That’s pretty cool. And it wasn’t that long ago either!

The towns were mostly depressed. Kind of depressing too.

I kept an eye on the sky and was checking out a steadily growing cloud formation. I wasn’t sure if something was going to come of it, but it gathered quickly.

I rode through Glasgow and Wolf Point. I was nearing the end of Montana and ready for another new (to me) state! As I hit Colbertson, I was ready to call it a day.

There were a few motels, but nothing really did it for me. I rode on.

The closer I got to the border, the higher the mile markers got. 654, 655, 656… “only ten miles till what would be the coolest mile marker ever known to man!” But I figured Montana would end before it hit the mythical “666.”

I was sort of right.

My odometer is actually fairly accurate. My speedometer, however, isn’t - it’s optimistic. Meaning, if it says I’m going 75, I’m probably going 70. That means if my odometer was reading that I traveled a mile, it would actually be a little less (though, somehow, it’s accurate).

I kept track of the mile markers to see how closely they matched my odometer. They matched perfectly. I was surprised.

They matched perfectly until about mile marker 662. It was short by a tenth of a mile. And when 663 came around, it too was short by a tenth of a mile. The same was true for 664 and 665. And as I descended a small hill, there it was, mile marker 666, less than a quarter mile from the border. Woo!

Ok, so do you know what this means? It means that someone in the Department of Transportation squeezed in mile marker 666. There is no 667. Technically, there shouldn’t be a 666. North Dakota should begin a little over a half mile after 665.

Someone in Montana’s Department of Transportation is my new favorite person ever.

Oh and then there was North Dakota. Williston was my destination. Smartz did a little footwork and found the stupidly named Airport International Inn. The International Airport, next door to the Airport International Inn, makes short flights to Canada.

But what I pulled into hardly seemed like a motel.

Yes, welcome to the Williston Area Junior College. Founded in 1968, WAJC offers classes in High School, TV/VCR Repair, Computer Programming, Child Day Care, Auto Mechanics, Bookkeeping, Learning the Personal Computer, Electrician, Legal Assistant, Veterinary Assistant, Interior Decorator, Medical/Dental Office, Gun Repair, Hotel/Restaurant Management, or get your degree.¹

Check out their dorms!

I can’t wait to enroll! My roommie and I are going to be the bestest friends ever! We’ll hang out after class and sneak cheap beer into the room! I sure hope our RA doesn’t catch us!

I can’t wait to hang up my Doors poster!!

Yes folks, this hotel is indeed as crappy as it seems. From its stupid name to its amazingly unhelpful girl at the front desk, if you have any desire to not shoot yourself in the face, do NOT stay at the Airport International Inn.

And with that said… Goodnight.

Here are today’s pics!

Miles today: 554
Miles total: 8,881

1. Anyone have any idea what I’m talking about? [↩]

This is the first time I’ve ever been in Montana! Only three continental states to go before I have them all!¹

I rose with the sun (or possibly with the old guy hacking next door to me), showered and ate the last of my Might O’s Doughnuts. These are the last good vegan doughnuts I’ll get until I get back to Seattle (unless Smartz comes up with something awesome).

As I was packing up, a nice couple from Spokane struck up a conversation with me about riding. They have a couple of Harleys and ride mostly on the weekends, though not this weekend. Again, it was strange for me to say “I’m heading back to Pennsylvania.”

Some people never get to cross the country. If they’re lucky, some scrimp and save and plan for months and then cross the country. And then there’s me who is crossing the country and not really even thinking of it as that. I’m just getting back to Pennsylvania. That’s sort of obnoxious of me.

It’s not that I’m not enjoying it, or that I’m planning on not enjoying it. I love riding. I could ride all day. I’m just spent on appreciating things like scenery. I explained this to the nice couple who then talked about the sage brush they saw on their way from Spokane to Wilber. I saw that very same sage brush about an hour later. Riveting.

I packed it all up and rode off towards Montana. I haven’t really looked at a map to see how not straight this road actually is. Sure, there are long straight stretches, but it also winds its way through eastern Washington, Idaho and western Montana. Who knew?

US 2 took me through Spokane, which really reminded me of Hagerstown, Maryland. Weird, huh? But it did. It was still up and running, but kind of used and abused. I didn’t stop to take pictures.

But soon, and actually before I thought it would be, was Idaho. Going east, the mile marker numbers go up. I have no idea when they’ll end. Going west, on the other hand, you’re counting down to zero. Idaho crept up on me!²

And that’s how it was. How long would I be in Idaho? No idea, really. Couldn’t be too long, I was going through the tiny chunk of Idaho, the panhandle.

But it was longer than I thought. Maybe 80 miles. Reason? Well US 2 turned north, straight north, while following US 95. That took more time than I figured, but it was a nice ride.

I don’t think I’ve seen a part of Idaho that I didn’t really like. I’m not sure many other states can say that. And I’ve been through quite a bit of Idaho!

Idaho seemed to last forever, though, like I said, it was only 80 miles or so.

But not too long after I had given up hope of Idaho actually having an eastern border, I crossed into Montana.

And things probably got a lot prettier. I’ve heard Montana was really fun to look at. And I’m betting they were right. It’s not that I didn’t look. I mean, I sort of have to, right? I saw mountains off in the distance. Or maybe that was in Idaho. It’s all pretty mountainous.

Thankfully, it wasn’t very touristy.

Not a huge fan of tourists.

Montana was, well, so far… Montana is full of trees. Big green ones! Not California big. Not even Oregon big. But still, big. Conifers! I bet there was a larch!

One way to tell if you’re on a Montana road is that they mark their highway fatalities with white crosses. Each cross represents one fatality. They’re placed in the “exact” spot where they died (or where they were hit before being taken to the hospital where they died). It’s kind of creepy.

Usually, there were one or two crosses, signifying one or two fatalities. Those were all over. You could hardly go ten miles without seeing some.

This might have something to do with US 2 being a 70mph two-lane winding its way through hills and along cliffs. Maybe?

But I saw one that really made me pause. Actually, it made me turn around to make sure I saw what I thought I saw.

And I was right. 17 fatalities in one spot, probably in one accident.

As macabre as it might seem, I’d really like to know what happened here. I think it was near Kalispell. I could be really wrong about that, and I doubt anyone would really know (anyone who reads this, I mean). But 17 fatalities in one spot can’t be a good thing.

I shook off the grizzly reminder of how dangerous the road can be and traveled on.

Not too much longer and I was nearing West Glacier, where the KOA is. Ah, my home for the night! I entered and it was pretty busy. I didn’t figure I’d get a spot.

Honestly, I thought about just riding till dark. It was only 4pm. Yeah, 350ish miles before 4pm. And that’s with losing an hour due to crossing into the Mountain Time Zone! Go me!

But I didn’t have to keep going. While they didn’t have any spots open, they had “overflow.” What’s that? It’s a small strip of grass along the road. Hey, it’s only $20! AND I get a pretty ok WiFi connection there.

In retrospect, I probably should have kept moving. There’s this drive to not be traveling when you’re on your way home. It’s happened on all of my trips. I have an entire continent to cross! I even considered doing an IronButt Challenge (1000 miles in 24 hours or 1500 miles in 36 hours). I think I could totally do it! But I’d have to print out forms and such and don’t have that ability. And then laziness kicks in. Maybe tomorrow I’ll do 500 miles. Work my way up to 1000.

Oh tomorrow. Where will you take me?

Here are my pics from today.

Miles today: 344
Miles total: 8,328

1. North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin are yet to come [↩]
2. Sneaky Idaho! [↩]