Montana Ride 2006, Day 2 - Spokane to Helena
| Distance ridden |
400.5 miles |
| Departed |
9:45 am Pacific |
| Arrived |
7:20 pm Mountain |
| Riding time |
7 hours |
| Average moving speed |
55.1 mph |
| Number of fuel stops |
2 |
| Average fuel economy |
55.2 mpg |
Route map
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| The lovely 70s mansion
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Day two dawned early, as I awoke several times in the night, chilled.
I had gone to bed with no covers, since I was overheating. However, by 2 am,
it must have cooled off to the point where I would have been happier
with something insulated over me. It took me until 6 am before I
finally woke up enough to both realize that, and do something about it.
By then, it was close enough to the time I'd wanted to get up that I
gave up on sleeping and roused myself.
Everyone else was asleep. I was intending to take state highway
200 most of the way to Helena, while they were taking I-90. I just
couldn't face spending 5+ hours at 80 MPH, dodging inattentive parents
driving the family out to grandma's place. My route, while more
pleasant, would also be longer, at nearly 8 and a half hours estimated
by the always-optimistic GPS.
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| See? Sleeping |
I had breakfast, and gathered my stuff together. By the time I was
ready to leave, most everyone else was awake, so I bade them farewell,
and got myself rolling at 9:45. Of course, before I could get there,
I had to run the gauntlet of the earplugs -- the pair I was using would
near-instantaneously expand, but only the tip. This made them, for all
intents and purposes, impossible to put in. Fortunately a new pair
solved that problem, but I had a momentary vision of arriving in Helena
with a pounding headache, only able to hear a permanent rushing-wind
noise.
And, I'm Off!
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| The film crew |
I was filmed riding off, for the road-trip movie the band was
making. Fortunately, I didn't immediately fall over and injure myself,
making myself ripe fodder for America's Funniest Home Injury Videos.
Instead, I rode off into the Spokane morning, and turned my little
mount northward, to follow US2 up to 200.
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| Ready to ride |
2 quickly turned into 200, and I found myself droning happily
along, looking at the scenery. There was a little confusion at the
2/200 interchange, as I'd somehow forgotten that I was intending to get
on 200, so I made the turn for 2 and spent a few confused minutes
riding around following the GPS's occasionally weird instructions to
get me back on track. Of course, as soon as I found 200, I also found
that it was a 35 mph construction zone. Fortunately, it only lasted
half a mile, then we were back up to 55 mph.
I stopped in Newport to powder.. well, my shorts, actually. I was
using this stuff called Anti
Monkey-Butt Powder to see if it could keep me a bit more comfy in
the saddle. Ultimately, it didn't help that much (or I wasn't using it
right), and in any case, most of the butt burn I was suffering from was
due to straight up muscular bruising. No offspring of talcum powder
will help with that. Anyway, Newport was in Washington (I thought),
but half-way through town, I started noticing that I was on Idaho 200,
not Washington 200. I guess the state line goes right through town,
which for some reason strikes me as a bit comical.
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| Now I'm in Idaho |
A few minutes later, I found the "Welcome to Idaho" sign, and posed
briefly in front of it.
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| And now I'm in Montana!
|
Then, a few minutes later (so it seemed), I found myself posing in
front of the "Welcome to Montana" sign (set your clocks forward by an
hour!). I had just traversed the very narrowest section of Idaho, and
had spent perhaps 30 minutes in the state. Well, I guess that was
quick gratification as far as getting to Montana.
Of course, state lines don't modify geography, and Washington,
Idaho and Montana along state route 200 all look pretty much the same.
Vast sweeping mountains all around, riding through valleys next to
rivers or lakes or reservoirs. Occasional houses, occasional cows,
occasional slow-down-to-35-or-get-ticketed towns.
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| Lake Pend d'Oreille
|
What I hadn't anticipated was that in Montana, the speed limit is
normally 70 mph, or 75 on the freeways. I gamely upped my speed until
I was barrelling along at 70, keeping traffic flowing. There was more
wind buffetting, but hey, I was getting there faster, right?
Lunch Time
As I entered the town of Thompson Falls around 2 pm (it felt like
1, because I was still thinking Pacific timezone), I knew it was lunch
time. I spied Minnie's Montana Cafe on main street, and knew equally
well that that's where I wanted to eat. I parked in conveniently plain
view of the cafe's windows, and got myself a seat where I could keep an
eye on the bike.
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| Yow, 100° F? |
Lunching in a public restaurant for the first time in my riding
clothes (close-fitting Underarmor shirt and Spandex biking shorts --
and I'm no chiseled Adonis or anything) was a bit odd. I had the
feeling people were staring, then looking quickly away. I don't know
if it was all in my head or not, but it definitely felt strange.
I noticed as I was sitting there eating what ended up being an
excellent lunch that the sign across the way read "+100° F" as part
of its rotation. That's pretty damned warm. I don't think it was
actually that hot, though. It didn't feel that hot, and I suspect the
sensor was sitting in the sun. Still, it makes for an impressive
picture.
As I was leaving, I paid the waitress who'd served me, and she
seemed a bit shocked at the size of tip I left. It wasn't enormous,
$2 on an $8 check, but she seemed very pleasantly surprised. I hope
Thompson Falls isn't a town of bad tippers.
I had reached 1831 miles on the odometer, which meant that I was
past-due to oil the chain. So, sitting there in front of
Minnies, I oiled it up good and proper. It was surprisingly easy
and clean, when the oil is applied lightly. Then, amidst a small
swarm of curious hornets, I headed out of town.
The Post-Lunch Ridingness
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| Somewhere on highway 200
|
After lunch, I don't have a lot of notes, and I don't have a strong
memory of what I did. I know that riding down highway 141 was really
enjoyable, partially because it seemed very very remote, and quite
unpopulated. I saw maybe 10 cars on that road, and I was on it for
over 30 minutes. The road swooped and twisted between rolling hills,
with grass, cows and the occasional farmhouse running out to the
horizon, where mountains suddenly rose up. I explored the limits (so
to speak) of the speed limit, and tucked down into the bike's
slipstream. It was a very pleasant, almost perfect road.
Unfortunately, I also realized as I was rolling along 141 that the
trip odometer was going to be quite close to 200 miles by the next
junction. 200 is my "I must now get gas" break-off point, and after
200 miles, I start to get very nervous.
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| There is a certain bigness of sky, now
that you mention it |
In this case, it was justified -- when I did eventually find a gas
station in Elliston, several miles down highway 12, I found that I
had achieved all of 52 mpg. The tank required 4 gallons of gas,
which meant I was a theoretical .8 gallons away from emptying the
tank. That's a reasonable amount, at least 40 miles if you're
getting 50 mpg (which was a safe bet on this trip, 52 was the worst
I saw), but it's still uncomfortably close to a lot of walking, in
a state where gas stations may be separated by considerably more
than 40 miles of road.
Also, that .8 gallons is very strictly theoretical. Kawasaki
says the tank is 4.8 gallons, but motorcycle manufacturers
like to publish numbers that sometimes have very little bearing on
reality. The term "unuseable fuel" springs particularly to mind.
One of these days, I'll have to strap a spare fuel tank on the back
and see how much fuel that tank can really hold.
Anyway, I made it to the next gas station safely, and that had me
covered to Helena, which was only 25 miles away.
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| Helena's somewhere down there
|
The ride up 12 to MacDonald pass was pretty, and I stopped very
briefly to get a picture next to the elevation sign. I was
dissappointed that there wasn't also a sign naming the pass. In any
case, I didn't want to stop for long, as it was nearing 7 pm, and I was
feeling some urgency to get to Helena.
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| Dinner at Bert & Ernie's
|
I did finally catch up with the rest of the group after a quick
stop at the theater. Unfortunately, Cingular (my cellular carrier) has
no service in Helena, so I was ROAMING according to the phone. ROAMING
apparently also means "terrible service," and so I ended up resorting
to text messages to locate everyone else after a few very brief phone
calls, which consisted mostly of me saying, "hello?" a lot. Text
messages use airtime very efficiently, and don't require a strong
signal to get through, so they're great for situations like that.
We dined at a restaurant called Bert & Ernie's, which reminded me
strongly of "Tchotchkies" from Office Space. Our server had the same
kind of vat-grown improbable high-energy perkiness about him. It was a
bit frightening. The veggie nachos were really quite good, though.
Let's Load This Sucker In
After dinner, we trundled up to the theater again, to look at the
space and load in our gear. What a nice theater! It was actually a
great space, with about a 150 seats, and a real projection room/tech
booth, a fly system; it had it all. We didn't know what to expect as
we were planning the trip, but there was a certain amount of "oh
come on, it's Montana!" punctuated by eye-rolls when we
discussed it. City slickers can be so obnoxious.
Stuff successfully loaded, we tried to gather up and head for the
hotel. I say we tried, in that a few of us waited with some of the
cars for the others who were on foot. The others who were on foot
sneaked past and went in the other cars, and by the time we got
frustrated enough to call and see where they were, they had arrived at
the hotel. I followed behind the late posse, to arrive at the Wingate
by 10 pm.
After another Keystone Kops performance trying to figure out which
room I'd be in, I was safely shuffled into my chamber. Needless to
say, with a group of 15+ rowdy theater hooligans occupying a large
number of adjoining rooms in a hotel, there wasn't anyone going to
sleep early.
Created by Ian Johnston. Questions? Please mail me at reaper at
obairlann dot net.
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