I made it. It was a wonderful trip. Here are some pictures and a few stories about the trip. It all started Tues. morning at 6 am. We met at a gas station by the Cable bridge. There were six of us. David Mills only went as far a Dayton where we stop for breakfast. There was only one bike problem. Of course it was my bike. I went to fill up my bike in Dayton and my bike would not start. My battery was dead. They push started me and I drove to Lewiston Idaho were I purchased a new battery.
Once we got into Idaho John Mayfield went to Missoula, Montana to do some work. The four of us headed south towards Boise. Along the way we saw several fires. This one we stopped and watch this helicopter dip his bucket into a river and fly away to dump it on the fire a few miles away.
I saw some of the prettiest country. Mountains, streams, trees and blue skies. It was absolutely wonderful. The smells were strong and wonderful. We did run into some road construction. It give a chance to rest our bottoms. We rode about 445 miles the first day. That a long time in the saddle.
My bike is in front I placed a pillow against my T-bag for a back rest. It worked great. All the other bikes were bigger and had music to listen to. I forgot to take mom's mp3 player. So I would sing at the top of my lungs and no one would hear me.
The 1st night we spent on the Salmon River in Stanley Idaho. Small town - it's main income tourism. River Rafting Businesses. Our motels was about 5 feet from the river. We were on the 2nd floor with balcony that over looked the river. We got up at 5:00 and left at about 6:00 and followed the river. Again beautiful country. We saw a lot of deer along the river.
We were heading to Butte, Montana both Dick Brown and myself were getting low on gas. What an interesting feeling that was.
We got to Butte, Montana and headed straight for John's Pork Chop Sandwich's Shop. John Mayfield and Dick Brown had some shirt made up just for the occasion. ON the back it says Butte, Montana - Pork Chop Run - 2007
I was more than alittle concerned about a pork chop sandwich. However it turned out to be very good.
On our way out of town we stopped at the big open pit copper mine.
Interesting.
After Butte we headed to Virgina City. On the way we stopped and did alittle mining for garnets. You can't see it very good but the owner, who is standing next to me went and got some big garnets, one of which I am holding in my fingers. We are trying to act like I just found a big garnet worth a lot of money.
After about an hour there we were off for Virgina City.
As you can see it is an old town. Population I believe was just over 100 people. However during the summer streets are full of tourist.
Big gold mining back in the late 1800's and early 1900's. When the gold ran out everyone just left. A man and woman saw that town was dieing in 1940 or 50's. They bought up most of the town and started to maintain it until they died. The state stepped in and help to maintain it for tourism.
This is the hotel we stayed at.
It was built back in the early 1900's.
Two beds and sink. The toilet and shower were down the hall where we shared it with the other guest.
This is the lobby of the hotel. It is actually pretty cool.
This is the theater we visited. We watched a play and some vaudeville acts. It was all very good.
One of the acts was a girl that sang and walked around flirting with men. So we all moved away from Dick Brown so she would flirt with him but the manager was sitting behind us and motioned to the girl to come over to Greg Rose. We all got up and left Greg by himself. It was a lot of fun and laughs.
The next day we were off to Yellowstone. We came in on the Northwest side. Back in the 50's there was a big earthquake and land slide. We stopped and learned all about it. We actually enter the park at West Yellowstone. We saw all the animals, mud pots, and gyserys. As you can see from the photo not a lot of clouds. It was about 10 minutes to Old Faithful. We waited about 45 minutes at the lodge for it to blow. It started to sprinkle.
We put our rain gear on and continued north to where the road cuts back to West Yellowstone. There is a big pairie where the bafflo roam.
By now we are in hard rain, a thunder storm, with lightening and thunder all around us. The traffic in the other lane is stop because of a stalled truck and we bumper to bumper in the middle of the bafflo. A park ranger truck is coming down the middle of the road trying to get to the stalled truck. There is no should but we have to pull of the road to let him by. The only problem was there were to bafflo 5 feet from the road where I was to pull over. I just kept moving. It rained until we where almost to Rexburg.
We spent the night in Rexburg. I spent the night with Bailey, Mike and Kooper.
In the morning we drove up by the temple to check it out.
We were off for Baker City via Arco.
It was hot, hot, hot. 102 in Boise.
This is five guys tring to beat the heat and cool off at the Cracker Barrel in
Boise.
We spent the night in Baker City. The motel had a pool. We spent about an hour, maybe two in it cooling down. We drove that night to the next town. The town I believe is Hanes, very small. However, it had a steak house where Greg Rose paid for dinner. It was fanastic.
The next morning we drove to Sumpter and checked out the old dredge. We then drove up Cracker Creek to a minning camp. Yes this is the same creek where I got buckets of dirt to pan for gold in the back yard. We did about 3 hours of minning. and about 3 and half hour trip home. It was great. I am ready to go again. I would like to take mom this time. We are planning a trip around the north cascade highway sometime in August. Only three day and with mom on the bike. So stay tuned.
Check out the bottom of the fence. The snow right now is up the bottom of 2x4.
