Day 39 rode 79 miles to Bismark ND

We woke up early and beat the morning parade and run in Hebron! Actually none of us slept all that well. With the emergency siren going off at 10pm, and a train blaring its horn about 200yrds from our tents and feeling like they would come right through the tent, it was hard to sleep..  Then out to Old Hwy 10 most of the way, but did have to hop onto the I94 for 15 miles. It was the worst stretch so far the rumble strip took up the entire shoulder! Made it to New Salem for lunch, ate at there only cafe, which wasn't bad. Hit the road to Bismark. Bismarck does have a nice bike/street path to ride. We ran into two other guys that were going to the opposite way of us on the Northern Tier, and had a nice chat with them. Made a pit stop at Target and replenished our Cliff Bar/Luna bar stash and grabbed dinner and headed to the General Sibley City Park, and they had showers, Wahoo!

Getting ready in Hebron's Pavilion

New Salem, ND

Missouri River, Bismarck, ND

General Sibly Park

Day 37, Kayleen's bike good as new ...hopefully

We woke up at 7:30... That's considered sleeping in now!! We went to the chuck wagon buffet again to have breakfast... And again we over ate!!! We ran some small errands, and headed back to the campground! We found out at 2 that Kayleen's bike was in working condition and ready for a test ride! It rode like a champ... Let's keep our fingers crossed!! We went to the Theodore Roosevelt play, done by a guy how looks like him, entertaining play on his life. On the way back we went to the ice cream shop Sally had been eyeing since we arrived in Medora! She was sad to learn that they were out of the chocolate raspberry flavor she wanted :( but she made do with a different flavor! We organized our stuff for an early departure in the am, and hit the hay!! Oh by the way every night we have been here we have been lucky enough to be serenaded by some off tune karaoke! The park manager has built into the  side of their convenience store a stage with mic's, amp, and flat screen tv...very official!!

Day 36 Broke down in Medora

So here we are, in yet another small town in the middle of no where with a broken bike in need of parts that have to be over nighted from somewhere else! Lets start at the beginning of the day though. Jennifer was gracious enough to take us for a drive and short hikes around the loop road of Theodore Roosevelt N.P., and it was very pretty. Great views of the Badlands, saw some Mule deer, wild horses, bison, snakes, and lots of prairie dogs. It was a nice relaxing morning. Then we headed back to the Chuck Wagon (they recognize us as the "bicyclers") for lunch, where we again ate loads of food. Then back to camp for Kayleen to take a nap and relax. Then we got a call from the bike shop asking us to come back, they needed to talk ...doesn't sound good. They figured out the problem. The guy who "set up" Kayleen's bike for touring doesn't know that shimano road and shimano mtn bike components don't mix and max. For the record, neither did the Portland bike shop, or the Whitefish bike shop, and the shop here spent most of the morning on the phone and online figuring it out. Just want too make a shout out to Shimano, way to go letting bike mechanics know you made everyone's life more difficult! Anyway, got parts ordered and they should be here tomorrow. Just like to thank Loren and Jennifer for figure all this out! So we're spending another night in Medora. Tomorrow will be spent figuring out a new time line and possible a new route.

Wild Horses and the Little Missouri River

Bull Bison

Mule Deer Buck

There is a 2000lb Bison in this picture

Little Missouri River and the Badlands of ND

Teddy's 1st ND Ranch

Day 35 rode 70 miles to Medora

Started our day as usual, breakfast of cyclist everywhere, oatmeal. Filled up our water bottles and headed out on I-94 for Medora, ND.  Finally getting out of Montana, seems like we've been riding through this beautiful state forever. The interstate was actually pretty nice to ride on, low traffic, big shoulder and smooth tarmac. Come to think of it, it was better than many of the back by ways we've covered! Lunch was in a little cafe in Beach ND where we learned that Old Hwy 10 (soon to be our new friend crossing ND) was just chip n' sealed, so we headed back to 94 and on toward Medora.  Got here in plenty of time to take Kayleen's bike in for yet another tuneup and walk around town, all 4 blocks of it! It is a nice place, and the Dakota Cycle's husband and wife seems to really know their stuff. Mom and I pumped up our tires while they looked over Kayleen's bike. It needs more than just a quick fix and they'll have it till tomorrow sometime, doesn't sound good, and looked even less. Then we headed over to the chuck wagon for the buffet and made it worth our $12. We all had two dinner plates of food, and Matt ate 5 cookies on top of that! Finally full we headed back to camp for a shuttle up to the Medora Musical, a nice little show. Plus Loran and Jennifer (of Dakota Cycle fame) gave us 2 tickets and Mom was able to use her seniors discount! Was a nice change of pace, and a late night, we were up all the way to 11ish.

Little Piano on the Prairie

Finally out of Montana

Seriously!

Medora, ND

 

Medora Musical

Day 34 rode 107 miles! Glendive, MT

We chowed down on a continental breakfast provided by the hotel! With full bellies we hit the road headed to Glendive Mt. Headed south on the 13 to Circle where we planned on a lunch stop. We made it 7 miles into the day and Kayleen got a flat on her front tire :( all fixed up, we started our very hilly ride to Circle, which was made difficult by a nasty side/head wind! We made it to Circle (53 miles) by one to find out there only cafe was closed as were most places due to Labor Day! We sat on the church bench and ate or cheese bagels accompanied with convenience store delicatessens, such as ChexMix! From Circle we headed southeast to Glendive on the MT-200S, we had a great tail wind... Wahoo! We had a minor climb out of Circle but then it was pretty much all downhill, the next half of the ride just rolled by beneath our wheels , 54 miles in 3 hours. Had dinner in town and then found our campsite at the Manakasi State Park! Fun fact-BNSF's head quarters is in Glendive!

And we haven't even started yet!

cross the Missouri River

Variety! A corn Field

and a burnt one!

and now back to wheat/barley, yeah

These grain cars go for miles

Day 33 road 56 miles to Wolf Point.

We had decided to make today a short day, and stay in a hotel and rest up for a 100+ miler on Monday! After changing Sally's tire that had gone flat during the night, we rolled out. The weather was a perfect 80 and sunny with a nice strong tail wind and we were off the US 2 for 30 miles, and we got here around 1240e. The ride today was what I'm sure you've come to expect from the plains. Flat, rolling, lots of fields of amber waves of gold, and green, and tan, with a smudge of cotton woods near any available water source.We were tipped off from the guys we had met in Chester that Wolf Point was a little sketchy, and they were right. Good thing we had decided to stay in a hotel!  They do have a nice green park in the middle of town. Had an early lunch at one of the other hotels, most of the restaurants are closed due to the holiday and it being Sunday in gods country. We were able to find some ice cream after checking in.

2nd breakfast, we made it 17 miles!

green fields

harvested fields

soy fields

hay fields

where it all goes

Day 32 road 88 miles!

We had a very restful/warm night! We got up and packed up all of our stuff in a hurry, to avoid the massive swarms of Mosquitos! Sandy (the B&B host) made us a wonderful homemade breakfast, after we stuffed our faces we were off to Glasgow. We decided to stop 46 miles in at Saco for lunch, there was a group of fans cheering us on and throwing candy at us! Then we realized that it was the Saco town parade, which we had kicked off a little early :)  Mostly flat and rolling again, so much easier and faster than Washington and western Montana! Just field after field and sprinkled in for variety a few grain transfer silos with attached small outpost/town.  After lunch we set off to Glasgow, rolled into town at 4:30 and found our campground. Made dinner and hit the hay early! We had some lightning an light rain, but it blew over by the morning.