Monday June 29th

I never would have believed it. Someone sent a plague of mosquitos to greet us at our campground. We had heard other people talk about the mosquitos but figured they were just overreacting as they probably weren’t used to them. Why heck, we’re from Michigan! Now Michigan has mosquitos. Some of them big enough to carry away small children! Well the mosquitos here in Sula Montana aren’t nearly that big. But what they lack in size, they more than make up for in quantity. We’ve taken refuge in our tent so are safe for the remainder of the evening but you should have seen our dinner routine. And we even had mosquito repellent! The only defense if to keep moving so that’s what we did. We had to eat while walking around. We had to walk in circles to keep watch on the Ramen noodles. Fortunately it will probably be pretty cool in the morning so we should be able to make a clean getaway without having to deal with them. We currently are at an elevation of over 4000 feet above sea level. Tomorrow with a bit of pedaling we top out at our highest elevation so far. We’ll be climbing Chief Joseph Pass that will have us over 7000 feet high.

Now you’re asking yourself ‘What did they do during the riding portion of the day?’ An earlier than normal start had us away from the closed down motel/RV park/campgroung before 9:00. We hot-footed it into town to find an internet café and to get some coffee. This accomplishment meant we could now relax a bit. We took turns on the computer and read some e-mail. I had 4 or 5 cups of coffee, easily the most in one morning since leaving Shelton. Lewis and I walked the half mile to the post office to fetch the package that Moritz sent us. Everything was there as promised. Good job Moritz! It was after 10:00 when we finally pedaled away from Stevensville.

It was promising to be another beautiful day of cycling. There was abundant sunshine and as the wind picked up in intensity during the day, it was always behind us. We made good time reaching Corvalis where IceCream cones were enjoyed by Donna and Lewis. This was all of 16 miles. The next community we came to was a scant 6 miles further down the same road. In Hamilton we had some lunch, went to a playground (playground pictures), stopped at the Army Natiional Guard Armory (Tank pictures) and then hit my favorite spot in Hamilton, the local brewpub (Brewpub pictures). We had to have spent nearly 2 hours in town before getting back on the road. The remaining miles were covered with little or no effort as we are such superior athletes now (it also helped that the wind was blowing us towards our final destination). At just a bit after 7:00 we pulled into the Motel/RV/campground area that is doing a great job of keeping mosquitos. Total miles covered today: 58

That was our day. Tomorrow promises to be just a bit more challenging. We’re going to call it an early night so we can get an early start. Adios.