June 20 - June 24

6-20-78 - 8:00 - 708.7 Missoula Hostel. Came over Lolo. Stay at Jerry Johnson last night and found out later that there were some hot spring[s] that were supposed to be excellent. It was colder than a well diggers shovel when we got up. We met a fellow, Mario, from Germany, he would talk our leg off if you gave him the chance. Wendover CG was about 16 miles west of mile post 158.

We stopped at the town of Lolo and had a beer and 1/2 a hamburger weaved all the way to Miss. Damn we met Mickey and Harold [Boss and husband from Glacier] at the pass.

Isn't that the shits!

6-22-78 - 12:30 - 763.3 Left Missoula this morning at 7:15. Stayed there all yesterday just bumming around. Got hold of Sterling [friend from Glacier] but we never got together. I found a Montana patch, although they didn't have an Idaho of Wash. I think I'll be able to find them somewhere in Mont. along the tourist route. We're in Ovando now. An old small town which is cute, eating lunch on the front lawn of church. The road has been quite nice the big hill out of Bonner isn't bad. It's a good

grade w/ 4' foot shoulder. After the pass the shoulder narrows to 6" but the entire road is not bad. As the valley widens the road gets better. It climbs a little but not much. The road is interspersed with extremely bad surface areas, not meant for bicycles or beast. The truckers are nice and are quite patient w/ us even though the road rolls a lot.

891.3 - 8:45 - Lincoln. Almost no problem with the road quite nice shoulder. Tired to go swimmin' around 2:00 but we got up to THAT point and decided it was a little too cold. We got to Lincoln about 3:10 and inquired about places to go

further on [down] the [road, but] the supposed next place is 60 miles away. We chose to stay here b/ we want a hot breakfast for it will be plenty cold in the morn. Watch[ed] a baseball game tonight btwn Lincoln and Conrad; the latter won 17:3.

6-23-78 885.4 Great Falls. Bucked a head wind all day. Started out from Lincoln with a strong head wind. The climb was very gradual, turning more and more alpine. About 2 miles from the pass the climb steepen but not badly. All in all the pass was easy

for Jim's and J broke a another spoke. This part of the road was poor [as] shit. We walked the rest of the way to Jim's (about 2 miles). We went out for pizza & beer (1-12" & 1-14" w/ 2 pitchers of beer). God. That's 133 in3 Arrrgg!

6/24/78 9:00am Stayed at Jim's last night had a hell of a thunderstorm about 2am. Thirsty as hell, too. This morning we snuck out w/o breakfast. We [got] to the Kiwanis Park and worked on the bikes. The patch didn't hold so I had to replace it and J had to true his tire. We went to breakfast and I ordered a full stack of hot cakes. Cheeerist. Full isn't

the word for it. Anyway we will probably go for Big Sandy today but we'll see how we feel.

8:55 ~966 Camped in the Big Sandy City Park. If there's anyway around it By-pass Great Falls the road is horrid. As we left G.F. 10:00am here was a big hill, Hwy 87. At the top of the hill you can see the road for just about 17 miles before the first corner. At the top of the hill the road improves and starts a series of gentle rolls. The shoulder is quite nice. Went by Black Horse Lake, it's just a marsh. J broke another spoke about 7

to get to. There was a good descent on the other side about four miles. Cloud cover was thick and it looked like we were going to get rained on. The road goes trough many severe rolls. The worst at the Dearborn River crossing. Ate lunch at Downman's Corner. Continued into Simms the road continued to roll. The entire road doesn't have much of a shoulder but there's still room for a bicyclist; the truckers are courteous. Just outside Sun River J. broke a spoke. The wind nearly stopped and it got very hot. When we got that fixed we looked to the SW to a huge rain storm approaching. The

next fun adventure was road const. The[y] were grading the road after first covering it w/ 1" gravel. God. We couldn't stop, couldn't speed up, could[n't] turn, Hell!! The road was level and only a short slight grade to I-15.

The shoulder of I-15 fair except piece for glass that gave me a flat tire. It was a slow leak and we could get away w/ pumping it up twice. We took the 10th Ave S exit instead of Central, which we should have taken. We stopped at the Concoco Stn. and fixed my flat tire. We started

miles out of Loma and we fixed it. The road was perfect all the way to Loma. Loma is a very nice town. It has a private museum which is fantastic for the town. We were able to finagle our way into a café w/ our own food to eat lunch (my personal charm & the fact we were on bicycles did it). The 3 people that were there did a good 3-part harmony of "on your bicycles?" when we told them of our plans. There's a hell of a hill out of Loma and once on top of it just kind [of] rolls around eventually you'll reach an obvious summit and can see Big Sandy off in the distance.