Saturday, June 15, 2013

Ride Day 106

Today I rode from Bozeman to a bit past Butte Mt 95 miles and 4700' of climbing. The day started out freezing cold. It was 36 when I left the Sunrise campground in Bozeman and it went up to 90 before I got to Butte. I rode almost all day at over a mile high and climbed to 6393' at the highest. I was riding on Interstate 90 all day. That was not so bad for me because they were redoing the road and redirected all the cars to the far side of the split road so I had the shoulder on the right side all to myself with no close traffic for a good chunk of the ride. There was fresh snow up on all the high peaks today from last night's cold snap. That made the mountains look good. I also saw a beaver working on his dam but when he saw me he hightailed it out of there. There were some eagles and other birds around but no big mammals except of course lots of deer early in the morning. Lots of dead ones along the road making a bad smell too often. I enjoyed the ride even though it was kind of strenuous on my tired old body with all the climbing involved and the base elevation of about a mile high. The air is noticeably thicker down at 5000' than it is at up over 7000' where I have been for the last 10 days or so. When I arrived in Butte I looked for a place to stay but the campgrounds all two of them were about $45 each so I skipped on those sites. I tried to ask the KOA campground why lots of KOAs have hiker biker discounts to between 5 and 15 bucks a night but this one did not offer it and the woman got all huffy with me like I was a cheap ass bum. All I need is 42sq ft of space, no electricity, no water, no mini golf and no anything else except some peace and quiet so I can get some rest for the night. I ended up in an RV park outside of Butte for 18 bucks that is really fully adequate for me with a shower, wifi and electricity to charge my junk up. I only need electricity about every thee days to charge my stuff and I can charge in most cafes while I drink my daily coffee so I do not need it at my campsite. Tomorrow I will try to make it to Missoula and should be able to unless the wind starts blowing hard again. I think 40 or 50 miles is my best hope for mileage in the high headwinds so I hope they give me a break tomorrow. Here are a few pics including the elusive beaver, some of the Bitterroot Mountains and the rock formation that inspired the Great divide trophy which is given to the winner of the big football game between the two Montana schools. There is also a pic of the continental divide pass I went over at 6393' with a pic of my Garmin showing 159' less than that at the same spot. I have never calibrated it but still that is a big difference. My Garmin 800 Edge has not been my favorite GPS because it is hard to figure out how to use it since it has no instruction book unless you print it out which I can not do. It also is just not intuitive in how it works. Garmin needs to hire someone from Apple to get with the program of making things easier to use. It also craps out once in a while and I can not figure out why. It is just basically irritating to me but I still use it and post the maps when it actually works correctly that is. Some people tell me they love looking over the stats from my rides. I never look at them myself.

Ride Day 106 by jimfrogs at Garmin Connect - Details

Ride Day 106 by jimfrogs at Garmin Connect - Details