We left the hotel in Red Lodge a little after seven o’clock, knowing we had a full day ahead of us. Our first destination was Yellowstone National Park, but something wonderful happened on the way there. We went down a highway called the Bear Tooth Pass and ended up seeing the best views of the trip so far. Many of the views, in/around the Custer National Forest, were quite breathtaking. (And we know there are some avid Seinfeld fans reading this from Little Rock and other places, so we must assure you that this use of breathtaking is meant to be taken in the most positive way. And for you poor, non-Seinfeld fans, sorry for the confusion.)
At the top of one of the mountains, we were at 10,947 feet. The temperatures this morning were down right chilly, with it being in the low 30’s up on the mountains. From watching any weather man or program, you’re all familiar with wind chill. Well, for a temperature of 33 degrees and a motorcycle speed of 50 MPH, that gives you about a 16 degree wind chill. We were all bundled up, but were still feeling the cold. It was so cold, Carey even wore his funny looking sock hat to keep warm. At stops, you could find Ed warming his hand on his Road King’s motor.
We made it to Yellowstone after several stops for construction and many miles of riding on gravel and/or dirt roads. Yesterday, Tom had promised Ed that there would be no more gravel roads, but by 10:00 a.m., Tom’s promise wasn’t worth spit. We all decided that if that’s the kind of guy Tom was going to be (making promises he knew would be broken), he should run for some political office. We rode through the middle of the park, going in the northeast gate and exiting through the west gate, with a zig and a zag south to see Old Faithful. Along the way, everybody but Carey got to see a black bear cross the road. He was off somewhere else snapping a picture when he should have been staying with the group. The bear crossing really backed up traffic in both directions, and we were surprised to see so many people of all ages get out of their cars and run toward the bear to get a glimpse or picture. We ate lunch inside the park, before heading on to where Old Faithful is. We couldn’t have timed our arrival there much better, as we weren’t there more than 10 minutes before she blew. Eruptions occur on average about every 90 minutes, so we either planned really well, or it was just dumb luck. We know which side most of you will fall on this issue.
Not too long after leaving Yellowstone, dark clouds were converging in the direction we were headed. We stopped and put on our rain gear – hoping we wouldn’t need it. Well, we did need it for about 20 miles. And it was a cold, hard rain. An hour or so later, we ran into another little shower, and this one included some sleet and/or small hail. It was right before this shower that Ed decided he would go on to Alaska without the rest of us. Ed normally rides last and sometimes, for a number of reasons, gets pretty far behind. We had just made a turn to the west and stopped to discuss routing preferences, and when Ed caught up, he didn’t see us and kept on truckin’ north. (He was still trying to get around the truck that the rest of us had passed sometime earlier.) Carey caught him a few miles down the road and gave him a good shock when he pulled up beside him. Ed’s thinking, how in the heck did Carey get behind me?!? It worked out for the best though as we (really, just trail bosses Mark and Tom) decided to take Ed’s road on north in the direction of Butte. We made it to Butte about 6:45 p.m. and after finding a hotel and checking in, walked to a nearby restaurant for dinner.
We travel about 350 miles today. We had planned to get to Missoula before calling it a day, but the stops for road construction and bears slowed us down. We’ll try to make up some time tomorrow.