We last updated this blog when we arrived in Butte, Montana. Entering this fine city consisted of riding for 8 miles along a strip-mall-lined four lane highway, with the terraces of Butte's Berkeley Pit lining the hillside ahead of us. Butte was nicknamed "the Richest Hill in the World" by the late 1800s for its copper resources: during the early 20th century, Butte was the leading producer of copper in the world. However, as you might imagine, the town has been destroyed by the mining. Pumps lowered groundwater levels for a century, allowing miners to dig a pit mine over 1200 feet deep. This pit grew and grew until miners started digging under the city itself. Now that the mine is no longer running, the pit is filling with noxious water, and is projected to overflow by 2020 and destroy the town for good.
What a beautiful pit! I did not take this picture.
So we didn't have a positive opinion about Butte from the beginning. What really sealed the deal, however, is getting food poisoning after eating in Bob and Sally's Cafe, or "B.S. Cafe." Thankfully, we were soon rescued by Nate, Cate's friend from Idaho, who happened to have a couple days off. We realized we were way ahead of schedule for our flight out of Helena, so we were happy to go on a side trip to Glacier in Nate's truck.
On the drive from Butte to Glacier, we found some dinosaurs. Awesome.
After arriving to the east entrance of Glacier National Park, we were told that every single campground in the park within 30 miles was full, so we had to turn around and find a private campground. As we wondered about, discouraged, we passed a cafe offering pies. Now, Cate and I recalled we had a friend from Alaska working at a pie place near Glacier, so after some debate we pulled into the parking lot and wandered into the place, asking the host "Does a Lauren Johnson work here?"
"Yes!" he said, "Follow me!" So we ran around to the back of the building, and burst into a common room, where he announced, "Lauren! Your friends are here to see you!" What a happy surprise to meet Lauren so serendipitously, and so far from Alaska! We camped behind the cafe that night, and had pie in the morning.
Cate, Lauren, and I in front of Park Cafe, near Glacier National Park.
We spent the morning on a hike to Iceberg Lake, and the afternoon driving through the park on the Going to the Sun Road.
Driving along Lake Sherburne to the Iceberg Lake trailhead.
Iceberg Lake has icebergs and the tiniest glacier I've ever seen.
Some Germans were also enjoying beer by the shore of the lake.
Driving over Going to the Sun was spectacular and terrifying. Construction along the road caused bumper to bumper traffic for much of the 2 hour drive, and we witnessed drivers actually filming out their windows rather than looking at the narrow road in front of them.
Spectacular mountains.
Lots of snow at the top of the pass!
Weeping wall along the Going to the Sun road.
We camped that night on the other side of the park, and went on a hike along Bowman's Lake the next day.
Bowman's Lake.
At the top of our hike.
On the way down again.
Then we stopped for a night in Missoula, Montana before going back to Butte the Butt the next day. Cate and I did not linger long--we stopped only long enough to buy some food. On our way out of town, we passed this sign.
Butte is an environmental disaster.
We first had to follow the interstate out of Butte; after six miles, we were able to get on a frontage road. The frontage road soon turned to a cattle track, which was lots of fun, but still followed the highway. We had to camp that night immediately under the highway, because the cattle track was lined for miles in each direction by a barbed wire fence. The fence made even going to the bathroom difficult before Cate opened a convenient passage through the barbed wire. It was such a nice spot, we convinced three cyclists arriving from the other direction to spend the night there with us.
Tom, Richard, and Leah were from Washington.
The campsite wasn't all the bad though: there were lots of tiny but delicious wild strawberries.
The next day, we got very lost trying to find Lava Mountain. Along with Fleecer Ridge (see our last post), we had been hearing about the difficult Lava Mountain for the previous three weeks from other cyclists we had met. The directions on our maps are written from the other direction, which is occasionally very difficult to follow. When southbound cyclists are on a trail leading to a well-used road, it's very clear which well-used road is meant. From the road, however, there are many small, narrow tracks leading up the hillside. So after much exploration, we ended up in this grassy field.
This was not the way to Lava Mountain.
So, we turned around, got back on the road, and went down a little farther to another track, where we faintly spied the bike tracks Tom, Richard, and Leah left the previous day.
Still looking for markers.
Surprisingly, our feet didn't get burned.
Still uncertain where to go.
There were only two sections where we had to push our bikes, and then we got to ride downhill for three miles on extremely rocky, rolly, muddy terrain, which was tons of fun.
We camped that night at Park Lake, an extremely beautiful--and popular--recreation site only 20 miles away from Helena.
Helena was a magical city. We biked all downhill into the center of downtown, without having to pass through the miles of sprawl we found in Butte. Immediately, we passed a library, a brewery, an ice cream shop, and a bike shop, which pretty much sums up what we do in any town. We couch-surfed in Helena--while we were in Butte, Cate contacted a person through the couch-surfing website who offered to put us up for two nights. We ended up staying with 4 people about our age, plus various friends and coworkers, all working for Americorps. We ended up lawn-surfing because the couch was already taken, and they had a very nice backyard.
Jordan and Mike in their backyard, where we set up our tent.
We had two days before our flight. We went to the bike shop one day, and met this couple from Scotland. They were the first northbound riders we met! They started in South America, and had been riding for a year.
Riding some single track right above the city.
Other people we met during our two day stay in Helena.
It was very nice having the opportunity to meet lots of people. Certain people we met volunteered to help us a LOT, by giving us rides with our huge bike boxes to the UPS store, and a ride to the airport at 4:45 am. Thanks!
So, Cate and I ended our bike trip in Helena, and flew home to New Jersey. While it was sad to end our trip, we are extremely grateful we got the chance to have such an amazing adventure, and the opportunity to meet so many people along the way. Thanks to everyone who helped us, offered us a place to stay, unknowingly gave us a place to stay, made us fires and gave us marshmallows, or were even just slightly friendly. You all made all the difference!
