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Wednesday....

We Started the morning with breakfast at Dori's Cafe in White Sulphur Springs...

From then on it was pretty much just gas up and go for the next 630 miles... We arrived in Gettysburg, SD just as the sun was setting.

One of the things we like to do on a road trip is, never make a plan or a reservation. It has worked for us. I'm sure there are others that have to plan each day and never travel without making reservations for the night.... Not us... We found an affordable motel in town.

I'm sure it was a very nice place back in the 60's, and it has survived time quite well. It was still a decent place for a $49.00 double/$39.00 single. The bathroom was interestingly tiled..

Thursday...

Back on to east bound US-212...

Another day of gas up and go... I split off from John near down town Minneapolis and turned to go north. After a 537 mile day it was good to be home.

Even the Deer were waiting for me to get home. I saw several along the side of Hwy 63, and Momma Deer and her baby were waiting in my driveway.

15 days on the road and 4663 miles...

I'm glad to be home!

A Low Mileage Tuesday.

We set a new late starting time record this morning... 10:15, but it doesn't matter, we're on vacation. There was a railroad trestle right behind the Super 8 Motel in Cut Bank. We watched a few trains cross it the night before. This morning we must have timed things wrong, no trains.

We continued our western direction on US-2 to Chester. At Chester, we turned south on 223 down to Fort Benton. There were some scenic old farm buildings weathering away in the fields...

From Fort Benton, we took 228 down to Belt, then 89 past Sluice Boxes State Park...

Through the little town of Neihart...

Over the Kings Hill Summit...

We stopped for a late lunch at Dempsey's in White Sulphur Springs. After a good burger, we walked outside and looked at the sky. there were big dark clouds in the direction we wanted to go. We decided to stop and stay at the Spa Hot Springs Motel. We took advantage of there hot mineral pools... I should sleep good tonight!

Tonights sunset...

The Motel...

Monday in Montana...Leaving the Mountains

After waking up in the tent to a 43 degree morning, I learned that sleeping on a cot was nice, but I should have added my insulated air mattress. My back was cold. We packed and continued north. We had breakfast at the Hungry Bear. They had an interesting appetizer on the menu...

Rocky Mountain Oysters..... eewwww.

We stayed on 83 up to Big Fork, the over to Kalispell. From Kalispell, we took US-2 west, to a few miles west of Happy's Inn. We turned right onto a Forrest Service road. It was scenic but a ROUGH 50 miles!

Trego, MT was the point where we stopped heading west and made the turn east towards home. Momma deer was with her 2 babies eating apples under the apple tree...

From Trego, we turned right onto 93, and eventually picked up US-2 again, and rode towards Glacier National Park. The weather in the mountains looks bad, so we elected to ride US-2 around the park rather than go up over top to ride Going To The Sun Road.

Once out of the park, the terrain turned rolling plains. We'll continue east and south, and will try to avoid the oil fields and road construction of eastern Montana and western North Dakota.

Saturday and Sunday in Montana

We spent Friday night at the Super 8 in Butte, MT, and Saturday we went riding. John has a book about motorcycling in Montana, so we had a pretty good idea where we wanted to go.

We left Butte on I-90 and got off near the city of Anaconda. We rode MT-1 south to 569. We followed 569 down to 43 and took that east towards Wise River. We turned right onto The Pioneer Mountain Scenic Byway... an awesome road!! We took the byway to 278 and turned to the east. We followed 278 all the way to I-15 and took the frontage road to Dillon. We stopped for gas and a snack and then continued out of Dillon on 41. At Twin Bridges, we turned onto 287 towards Nevada City and Virginia City, two VERY touristy towns. We eventually turned onto 359 and followed that back up to I-90 and back to Butte. Except for a small down pour near the end, it was a very nice 282 mile loop! Dinner was at a Mexican restaurant across the street from the Super 8, Mexicana Fiesta!

Nevada City...

This morning, we packed and were on the road by 9:30. We headed for Anaconda again to get pictures of the only remaining part of a large copper smelting operation, the stack.

We rode all of MT-1 out to 271, another great road! We turned right onto 141 and followed that to US-12 and into Helena. From Helena, we took 229 up to 279. 279 was just as good as 271! We took a short break at Flesher Pass, along the Continental Divide. While we were there, an old man and his dog appeared out of the woods and shared a hand full of Huckleberrys with us. They were delicious! We rode through Lincoln and turned up 83 and stopped at a motel in Seeley Lake that offered Tent Cabins.

John stated that he likes the 45-55 MPH sweepers, while I'm partial to the downhill, 20-25 MPH tight curves!

Bob, the first pic's for you.

Google maps, check out Sundays ride between points "d" and "e" and "f" to "g"

Saturday, August 10, 2013

Friday.... A day late.

The weather played a big part in Friday's ride. We were going to leave Cody, WY and ride the Chief Joseph Highway and the Beartooth Pass, but the dark clouds that hung over the top of the mountain made us change our plans. We took the "around" rather than "over" route to Red Lodge.

We passed by the site of Montana's worst underground coal mine disaster, the Smith Mine near Bear Creek.

WE rode to Red Lodge and took a short break and walked up and down the main street and checked out a few of the shops.

We were going to try and take the long way to Butte, but the black clouds south of I-90 made us change our minds, again.. So we just hammered it out on the Interstate to Butte, MT. We may stay here at the Super 8 Motel for a couple of days and use it as a base for our day rides.

The Weather Channel has said things will improve for the next few days...... Fingers crossed...