Day 22 Miles: 101 Mileage from start: 1,965 We fell asleep under quiet trees and woke up to the sound of strong winds blowing through them. And also the rumble of thunder. The thunder turned out to be a fluke isolated storm that passed just miles north of us, but the wind was with us […]
Day 21 Miles: 139 Mileage: 1,864 We got up early today for a long day. We knew it would take big miles to make it to Fargo tomorrow night, so we made the decision, gritted our teeth and committed. When we got started it was chilly and windless. As the day warmed up, the wind […]
Day 20 Miles: 112 Mileage from start: 1,725 The first week of biking the Northern Tier was very hot. The second week was very cold. This week has been very windy. Now I’m ready for a week of very nothing. No extremes. All pleasantness and progress. We’ll see. We slept in, of course, and had […]
Day 19 Miles: 66 Mileage from start: 1,613 When we looked out the window, the trees were bending west. Not a good sign. Weather apps confirmed it: the wind was out of the east, and blowing fast. All day we pushed east against 20 mph headwinds. The town we planned on stopping at for lunch […]
Day 18 Miles: 90 Mileage from start: 1,547 It was another sunny day in Montana. We rode off from our hotel in Circle into a slight headwind. It wasn’t a huge deal at first, but wore on us by midday. We stopped in Glendive to eat and ended up staying there for a couple of […]
Day 17 Miles: 108 Mileage from start: 1,457 After the storm passed last night, the winds went back to their regularly prevailing direction — out of the west. We slept in until 8:30, made coffee, slowly got our things together and left around 10:30 a.m. But no matter. With the wind at our back we […]
Day 16 Miles: 89 Mileage from start: 1,349 Breakfast at Sandy’s Stagecoach Inn and B&B was egg and veggie bake, waffles and venison sausages. The conversation and accommodations were great. We could tell before we started that today was going to be harder than the last couple of days. The wind had changed overnight and […]
Day 15 Miles: 109 Mileage from start: 1,258 We joined U.S. Route 2 in Cut Bank and have been following it for the last couple hundred miles. It is mainly chip and seal pavement of various ages and roughness. It doesn’t make for the worst riding ever (that’s large pieces of gravel) but it does […]
Day 14 Miles: 96 Miles from start: 1,149 This Montana wind is no joke. After a lovely sunset, I spent the night trying to sleep through the sound of the tent getting bashed by the wind. In the morning, still with a chill in the air, I left the loud wind outside and spent some […]
Day 13 Miles: 109 Miles from start: 1,053 We left Waterton Village under clear skies and with that wicked wind to our backs. It didn’t stay at our backs all day, however. Much of the day was spent at a tilt to the south to accommodate for the strong wind. In front of me, Richard […]