Explosion!!!

Sunday 5/13 Day 23

Jo & I

After the mountains

Happy mothers day out there to all the mothers :) started today off by calling mine. She was a little worried because my spot did not go off last night. But I told her I was alive and things got better :). She did a great job on me, it's her fault that I'm so adventurous and i think I get it form her my ability to talk to random people, that's a good thing. After the call I went to breakfast with Jo and some other ladies to celebrate mothers day and the opening of the resteraunts in east Glaicer. They close down in the winter time because there are not enough people; but the town of eastglaicer is just starting to wake up. Breakfast was good and on the way home Jo got me a brownie from brownies the shop :). It turned out to be great but I ate it later for lunch. When we got back to Jo's place I packed and she made me some peanut butter and jelly for lunch later in the day. Man it was if my own mom was there taking care of me, it was really great staunch with Jo and I'm excited to see her again. Again she is famous if you do bike ride through the area make sure you visit her. Choteau was the next town I was going to, about 70 miles south east. As I left east Glaicer I had a bit of a culture shock. I had been used to all these mountains for a couple of weeks and about ten feet out side the city you realize there are no mountains directly east of you for miles and miles and miles. It is just dead grass and some rolling hills. So my next part of journey was without mountains and also it lacked sufficient amount of trees. So you guessed it if I'm to take a break I usually sit in the shade of a street sign. works pretty well.


Leaving Blackfoot Res.

Also the wind had become a bit more pradominit today since the wind comes whooshing down off the mountains and onto the plains. But hopefully I will outrun that the further south I go. As I branched off of highway 2 and went on 89 there were rumble strips on the shoulders. Oh man do those suck for two reasons. One they take up the shoulder so I was riding on the white line and two if you hit it you get this vibration through your entire body. Now it is a great massage for like one second then the longer I was are on it the more numb I got. It could almost be considered a light electrical shock that's what it felt like. But I got over it. I wanted to play my cloud game today but I could not, no clouds in the sky(cloud game is in previous posts). For lunch I was able to find a little river with some trees which totally saved me. Gave me a chance to cool down and eat my packed lunch. About 25 minutes after lunch the explosion happened, and it left my ears ringing. I was on a straight away and my tube exploded, it exploded through my tread creating a one inch hole. Total bummer, I was about thirty miles from civilization. Shit there wasn't even cows around me to cut open with a light saber and sleep in for warmth, if I had to. Ever since seeing Empire Strikes Back I still want to try that :). Well I replaced my tube and realized I would not be able to ride on what I had. So I pulled the thumb out and did some hitch hiking. Guess how long it took to get a ride. . . One car! Unbelievable! A truck stopped which had two kids a wife and a grandma in it along with Chuck. He said I could squeeze into the truck bed with their gear if I wanted. I said yes!! I couldn't believe it, he took me into Choteau and dropped me off at the place that I was staying for the night. It was pretty funny because he asked who I was staying with and I said Jennifer, then he asked Jennifer who and I didn't know. He gave me a weird look as if I was crazy to stay with someone I don't know haha. Once I was unloaded we went our separate ways.

Ride to Choteau

I called my parents to see if they could locate a bike shop that was open and there were none since it was a Sunday and mothers day. Actually there were no bike shops in the area, the closet one was about 45 miles away. My morning plan was to hitch hike over to Great Falls and get the new tires and then head off from there.


Yard sale my bike

The afternoon was relaxing I was able to set up my tent and take a shower. Afterwords talked with Mikes daughters Faith and Ashley till Jennifer and Mile got home from scuba diving. Dinner was some salad and hot dogs roasted over the fire with a dessert of smores. it was a great time in the evening we were able to talk about anything and everything, which helped me wind down from the day. The family put out a few calls to see if anyone was going to Great Falls in the morning but no one was. So before we went to bed Mike let me know that he would give me a ride in the morning. He owns his own plumbing business so he would be able to start work a little later.
As I was going to bed I was thinking which route I would go tomorrow. It probably would be from Choteau and that would be a little over 100 miles. And with me going to Great Falls and back I would not be able to start till after 11. Its gong to be a Long day tomorrow.