Thunder road

The very unrealistic “What Was the Idiot Who Planned this Ride Thinking?” mileage for this day was 122. All three of us have ridden that much in a single day before but not in rain, thunder and lightning, which is what we met with today.

We had a hearty farm breakfast at the Huckleberry Tent and Breakfast and got on the road at 8:45. Weather was clear, temperature perfect and the road light on traffic and hills. We went up Montana 200 to Highway 56 and took a left. Highway 56 is my nominee for the best road so far on this trip. We had it mostly to ourselves and were clipping off miles as we rode north toward Libby.

Mary Jo getting ready to leave the SAG stop Friday.

The SAG team set up a food stop at our 35^th mile, and that’s when the first sprinkles fell. We hurried through our bananas and chia seed-cinnamon-peanut-butter (?!!) sandwiches and hit the road.

This rain kept you guessing: Put on the rain jacket and sweat yourself wet under it? Leave it off

There was an osprey nest right above our SAG stop.

and hope the rain doesn’t get any heavier? I had my jacket on, then off and then it didn’t matter because the thunder and lightning started and I did not want to be on a slow-moving piece of metal about to be melted into my favorite highway.

By then, Kathy had come back in the truck to find Mary Jo and me. John Barrett rode into the rest stop where we had lunch in a covered shelter as the rain poured around us. That's when the final decision was made to not ride the 20 miles into Libby, which had been our planned destination at the beginning of the day. (The 122-mile delusion of grandeur has been off the books for the past two days. What Was He Thinking when he came up with that idea?)

Lunch in the rain at the intersection of Highways 56 and 2 near Libby, MT.

Baby birds in the eaves outside our hotel room.

 So we clocked 47.1 miles (John Barrett did two more than that) today and squeezed into the truck and RV for the drive to The Lodge at McGregor Lake.

Breakfast of fruit and pumpkin bread at 7 a.m., and then off we go for the 80 miles that will take us through Kalispell and on to Glacier National Park.