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Peter and I hugged a goodbye in the morning. I didn’t know that his last solo overnight bikecamping trip was when he was a teenager. “Time to grow up” I said to him, while I had my own uncertainty of how I would fare on my solo ride in the coming days.
It was a great joy to ride at my own pace. The route was still along the Clark Fork River. But I became unsensitized to the sceneries. They are still pretty but repetitive. Scenery fatigue?
The map led me to an MRL (Montana Rail Link) service road. It was not a road at all. There were merely two truck tire tracks on the side of a rail track. Very difficult to ride on because of the track ballasts. A train passed by and the train driver must have wondered why this bozo was there. The map showed a switch to a paved road but there is a fence in between with signs of “Private Property”. I could not continue riding on this surface and had to unload the panniers and tent, push the bike over a ditch, and load again on the other side where the paved road was.
Met Wade riding from Portland ME to Portland OR. We exchanged road information. “Enjoy with grace” he said. Also Met 82-year-old Steve who was on his way from Naples FL to Seattle WA on his ebike. He had to stay in a hotel every night to charge his bike. I was not sure how he would do in East WA where small towns are far apart and all of them do not have hotels/motels.
I decided to detour from the planned route which would lead me to cross the Rockies through Butte. In Missoula, everyone suggested me to go through Helena with much prettier sceneries along paved roads. Garrison would be a logical stop for the day for me to pursue that route. There was no road from Drummond to Garrison except I-90. I rode on it again.
I arrived early (2:30 pm) at the Riverfront Campground of Garrison. Its lounge and kitchen were open to campers. It provided wifi and hot shower. I found cold shower was good for me on that hot day.
Chidong Zhang's WA2MA Bike Trip 