Day 10 - East Glacier to Shelby - A Century Day!

We spent Tuesday afternoon in East Glacier, sorting out neoprene and raincoats.  The Chinese laundry arrangement in Jerry's room was a sight!  We enjoyed dinner at the Glacier lodge - you know the phrase about "couldn't you get a table with a view?"  With an Amtrak passenger depot at the end of the grand drive - I think a train trip is in my future :)

It was cool this Fourth of July morning as the riders left East Glacier headed east.  A beautiful sunny morning.  I checked the rooms for errant items and got in the car.  What a sight - the spectacular rugged mountains of Glacier in my rear view mirror and the plains ahead.  Big Sky Montana certainly lives up to its' name.  As glorious as the mountains, the plains of Montana are a wonderous sight.

Comments from Jerry:  Today could have been either the best or the worst, depending on the direction of the wind.  We really lucked out with West/ Southwest winds at 15mph or more!  Yahoo!  This was better than riding Laguna Canyon to the ocean in a Santa Ana wind.  How often can you go 115 miles and average 22 mph!  We got to our next stay, Shelby MT at noon!  So we decided to go to the next little town - Chester, 43 miles away, and make use of the tailwind.  What a difference a few miles make.  In our rearview mirror are the mtns of Glacier Park and in front of us are endless vistas of grassland and prairie.  In one word - FLAT and endless.  Beautiful in a totally different way.  Fourth of July in Shelby will be a challenge since everything is pretty much closed.  I think we will eat at the local truck stop!!  Tom said that tomorrow might be 10 mph headwinds so what comes around goes around and we will pay the price for our fun today, tomorrow.  

Comments from Tom:  "Oh beautiful for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain.  For purple mountains majesty above the fruited plain."  This was our 4th of July.  We put the beautiful mountains of Glacier National Park in our rear view mirrors, and headed east to experience the amber waves of grain.  We've paid some dues to the gods of weather, and today we got a return.  As Jerry said, we rode gradually downhill on a sunny warm day, with a big tail wind, making it our longest mileage day so far.  Today this ride became the longest multi-day ride for me--my previous longest was 725 miles in Washington and along the Oregon coast.  I haven't added up the actual mileage, but we're close to 800 miles so far.

I hope everyone has/had a great 4th of July.