Miles: 549.6
Start: 7:00 AM PDT
Stop: 9:30 MDT
Temps: 59 degrees to 89 degrees
Hotel: Mid-Town Motel, Great Falls, MT - $51.00
Day 3 of our journey turned out to be a lesson in patience and a bit more advanced riding skills. Of the 554 miles we rode that day it felt like 200 of them were under construction. Actually, it was more like 70 miles of road construction but as any motorcyclist can tell you, road construction absolutely slows down the journey. There is nothing fun about riding through road construction. You have to go slower out of respect and concern for the road workers, the pavement can be anything from fresh wet tar to loose dirt and gravel, cars naturally tailgate regardless of the speed, and you often find yourself in conditions similar to off-roading.... not a real attractive adventure for a 1,000 pound (when fully loaded for a vacation) Goldwing. Lots of road construction will turn a planned relaxing 10 hours of riding into an uplanned frustrating 14 hours.
After a great night's sleep in the Dog Bark Park Inn Bed & Breakfast Carole and I awoke at 5 AM and had a quick breakfast of yogurt, cereal, and fruit before loading our bikes with our gear and headed back on the road at 7 AM. The sunrise was over the meadows was gorgeous as we made our brief run south on Hwy 95 to hook up with Hwy 13 that would lead us to Hwy 12 along side of the Middle Fork Clearwater Wild and Scenic River (nice descriptive name for the river, eh?). We both were looking forward to Glacier National Park and our goal for the day, the worlds largest penguin in Cut Bank, Montana.
Our run up Hwy 13 was peaceful and free of other traffic. Although we were in agricultural country it appeared as if everyone was still sleeping. We stopped in Kooksia, ID for fuel and a cup of coffee and both of us noticed that this entire town still seemed to be sleeping at 8:00 in the morning which seemed odd. Another motorcyclist on a BMW was the only other sign of life in the sleepy little town as we pulled out and made our turn onto Hwy 12.
I was extremely pleased that I had been practicing my one-handed camera skills while riding. The river along side of the highway made quite a backdrop as we wound our way through sweepers and a few tight curves. The air was clean and the traffic still non-existent except for the occasional group of motorcycles heading in the opposite direction. In other words we were having the perfect mid-morning ride that any touring motorcyclist could hope for. I was surprised to see quite a few GL1800 and GL1500 Gold Wings headed in the opposite direction as we hadn't seen that many Gold Wings previously during this trip nor any other long distance trip we had taken. Perhaps the six years of production was finally adding up? Naw, as I later found out we were pretty much riding toward the motorcycle mecca for touring bikes and we were simply passing the travelers that were coming from Montana-Wyoming-South Dakota on their way from the east to California. Until this trip I had thought the best riding found in the US was in Northern California between the Pacific Ocean and the Sierra Nevada's. The next 3 days would permanently change that perception.
I continued to snap pictures along Hwy 12 and was somewhat disappointed when we finally rolled over Lolo pass and met up with traffic in Missoula, Montana. The only mishap we ran into along the way happened when Carole let me know that I should find a restroom. As we were passing what looked like a simple turnout I looked over my left shoulder and saw that there was a public restroom nestled in its corner. I slammed on the brakes and quickly turned into the turnout without having the chance to first warn Carole. She did fine, quickly applying her brakes to slow down for the entry into the turnout. However, she didn't have time to downshift and had no power to pull around the slanted driveway with its uneven surface. Smartly she simply came to a stop but could not hold up the 700+ pounds of bike. It tipped over and came to rest on its crash guard. Thank goodness Honda had the foresight to put a simple $17.00 cover over the crash guards. No big deal, I had spare covers waiting at home to replace the severely scuffed one. I picked up her bike for her, apologized for my bonehead maneuver, and made sure she was alright. Everything turned out fine.
In Missoula we again stopped at a gas station to top off our tanks and to call our family that was concerned about our safety during the journey (all motorcyclists are pretty much used to this routine when taking long trips). Additionally, my mother was following our route on a map and was living our ride vicariously through us so I caught her up to date on what we had seen so far. With the tanks full, the parental units informed, and re-hydrated we set out for Glacier National Park. One of the fun things about this trip was that we were riding on unfamiliar highways and I wasn't even sure of our route. I had plugged our route into the GPS a couple of months earlier and quickly forgot about it other than the major landmarks. I had nothing but positive experiences with our GPS and was completely comfortable with letting it be our guide. It allowed me to relax and take in every moment of the journey without worrying about how far it was to our next turn and what the name of the highway or street was supposed to be. It is a navigational dream!
As we rode out of Missoula we passed a couple of Harley riders also headed for northern Montana. The four of us made our turn onto I-90 for a few short miles and then onto Hwy 93 with Carole and I in the lead. Within a few short miles we began to experience what Montana roads are all about during the summer months.... road construction! And the way they do road construction in Montana is the worst kind for a motorcyclist; they tear up the road and let you ride in dirt and gravel until they get around to laying down pavement. We probably put in 50 miles, off and on, of dirt and gravel on our way to Glacier National Park. I was nervous at how Carole would take to it, but I shouldn't have been. The ST has the balance and spirit of an enduro bike (Honda... take notice... raise the frame a bit and make some knobbies available for the ST... it could compete nicely against the BMW K1200 GT and even the R1200 ST!). Initially Carole was tentative on the dirt and gravel but she quickly got the feel for things and was soon anxious to pick up the pace. I got a kick out of watching the Harley's trying to follow her, they were obviously way out of their comfort zone. The Wing handled it okay... I just kept the throttle constant and relied on my previous years of dirt biking on my CB350 to keep me out of trouble.
Finally we broke free of the road construction just as we approached Flathead Lake. I was alarmed to see all the traffic go to the left and continue on US Hwy 93 while the GPS was telling me to turn right onto State Hwy 35. I pulled over long enough to make sure the GPS was indeed taking us to Glacier National Park, which it was, and we continued on our way with no traffic at all holding us up. (After we completed our journey I went through our route again and remembered that I had deliberately programmed in this alternate route hoping to avoid highway traffic. It turned out to be a very lucky decision!) Our ride on the eastern side of Flathead Lake took us past acres and acres of cherry trees full of ripe fruit. I had never seen so many cherries on such large trees in my life. The combination of red and green with the blue lake on the left was incredibly beautiful.
The temperature was in the high 80's and we were beginning to feel a little road weary so we pulled into a market to grab a couple of drinks (Diet Pepsi for me, Lipton ice tea for Carole) and stretch our legs a bit. After all the road construction and the ride along the huge lake we wondered just how far it was going to be to Glacier National Park. We mounted our bikes and moved on to find that the entrance to the national park was just a half hour down the road. We turned off of Hwy 2 and on to Going To The Sun Road at around 3:45 PM.
Originally I had planned our trip to go around the south tip of Glacier NP on Hwy 2 with our goal being to reach the Worlds Largest Penguin. But the day before we started our trip I had seen some pictures of Going To The Sun Road so I had changed our route at the last minute. What a wise, wise decision that turned out to be! Our ride into the park was along side of a glacier fed lake on our left. Traffic was moderately light allowing us to move along at a leisurely pace to take in the scenery. Past the lake the road straightened and was sided by huge trees that perfectly framed the jagged peaks ahead. We stopped at a turn out just long enough to snap a couple of pictures and then quickly approached the climb up to Logan Pass. Although the road was extremely technical traffic was moving so slow while tourists checked out the scenery that Carole and I were able to handle it like a Sunday drive through the park. It actually took all the fun out of riding the twisties but we were more than compensated by the view.
About halfway up the climb we stopped at a turnout to take some more pictures before continuing on. We met up with a couple that were riding a Harley and shot the breeze with them for a few minutes. They were from Canada and had been riding with a group of Harley's. Their route had already taken them through Yellowstone, the Bear Tooth Pass, and Chief Joseph Hwy. They mentioned some road construction around Bear Tooth pass that would best be avoided if we rode out of Yellowstone into Cody and caught the Chief Joseph Highway up to Bear Tooth but I didn't quite put the picture together correctly in my mind. I was too dependent on the GPS and didn't want to work through re-routing things there. Besides, how bad could road construction be? I was going to rue my stubbornness the next afternoon.
We continued on up Going To The Sun Road to Logan Pass. We passed quite a few waterfalls along the way but there were no turnouts to pause and take pictures. So I rode the technical road with one hand on my throttle and the other blindly pointing and shooting with the camera hoping that some of the pictures would turn out. We crested the pass, quickly made our way to the park exit along another glacier lake (perfect symmetry... a lake on the way in and another on the way out) and took Hwy 89 to Hwy 2, rushing to our next destination: the worlds largest penguin! I kept my eyes peeled for wildlife and did manage to dodge a couple of deer along the way. Every time I saw deer I would warn Carole, but they were usually into the brush in a flash and she never got to see them. But we both kept our eyes peeled none-the-less. We soon left the wooded area and again found ourselves in road construction, gravel on dirt for about 15 miles. Again Carole had a blast on her ST1300 while I tried to keep the speed down so that the gravel wouldn't ding my lower cowl.
At around 6:00 PM we finally pulled into Cut Bank, MT and quickly found the worlds largest penguin, a statue right along side the highway. I've always had this thing for penguins since I used to hang out at their enclosure as a little kid at the San Diego Zoo, so I was thrilled to death to see this statue. I quickly snapped a couple of pictures of Carole by the Penguin but there were some other tourists there so we moved on and hit a gas station a few blocks away. After fueling up I convinced Carole that the other tourists should be gone by now so I wanted to go back and get a couple of pictures of the Penguin with the Gold Wing in front. She agreed and we accomplished the deed.
Finally, with the day's goals behind us we headed toward our hotel for the night in Great Falls, Montana. We quickly made our way to I-15 where we picked up our speed for a mad dash to our night's stop. But of course, soon as we settled into a nice groove we came across more road construction. Luckily this section of construction was almost completed so we were simply stuck behind a slow moving horse trailer for about 40 miles as we made our way south. Lordy, how I have come to hate road construction.
We finally made it into Great Falls, Montana at 9:30 and checked into the Mid-Town Motel across from the court house. We checked in and didn't bother unpacking the bikes right away. Instead we asked the owner of the motel if their restaurant was still serving. He said no, and when we asked where in town we could get a meal he paused for a bit. He finally told us that there was no where worth eating in town at that time of night on a Monday but he relented and offered to keep his help on long enough for us to order a meal. We thanked him over and over again and sat down in a booth out of site from the street so as to not encourage other folks to come in. The waitress came by and took our order. Carole asked if they had any beer since it would be nice to wash the road construction taste out of our mouths with a cold brew. The waitress said, "No, we don't serve alcohol. All of our kitchen staff are on pre-release from the local jail and we aren't allowed to carry alcohol." We both nervously chuckled, wondering about our choice of our stop for the night.
As it turned out the room was perfect and the bikes were secure for the night. We slept peacefully, but not nearly as wonderfully as we did the night before at the Dog Bark Park Inn. Every time I heard a noise during the night I would wake up and look out the curtains to make sure that the "pre-release kitchen staff" wasn't gaining interest in our bikes. In hindsight, I really was being foolish. These guys would be risking an awful lot just to mess with a couple of covered motorcycles, and I think anyone in a pre-release program from jail understands the consequences of taking unnecessary risks.