Kalispell to Helena

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Last night KC and I had dinner with his friend "Big Ernie", a 6'6" native Montanan whose career includes 13 years as a Forest Ranger.  Over dinner Ernie told us stories of his time as a Ranger, including the time when his his supervisor ordered Ernie and another Ranger to hunt down and kill a problem Grizzly.  As Ernie said, "When a fish jumps the Eagle sees it, the Deer hears it and the Bear smells it".  So with some rotten bacon as bait, the lured the Grizzly bear into their camp and "dropped him like a bag of nickels".

This morning we started out with a visit to Ernie's home in Bigfork, MT which has fabulous views of the Flathead National Forest.  He told us how he cleared the land with a chain saw and the help of his two boys, then had the logs sawed into lumber that he used to build the house and workshop/garage.  He built the house by himself including the cabinets and the rock fireplace.  It is a warm, comfortable home in a spectacular setting.  I'm jealous.

With a couple hundred miles to ride, we had to cut our visit with Big Ernie short.  We made our way to Hwy 83 and headed south through the Swan Valley.  For a while we had Flathead Lake along our right side and the Bob Marshall Wilderness along our left.  The scenery was breathtaking.

At Seely Lake, MT we stopped for a late breakfast and topped off our gas tanks (lesson learned).  The waitress was a young woman who loved wisecracking with customers, so we obliged her and socialized.

Note:  It was at this point that I really knew that I had a charging problem with my iPhone5.   I brought the phone into the restaurant to charge it.    I had just done an OS update...don't ask me why....  and I found that the Powerlet charging cables would no longer work with an iPhone running OS9.  Powerlet admits the problem is in combination of the chip in the Lightning tip of their cable and OS9.

South of Seely Lake, Hwy 83 ended and we turned east on Hwy 200, crossing over the Blackfoot River,  the river that Norman Maclean wrote about in his classic book "A River Runs Through It"....although much of the movie was filmed on The Gallatin River (a favorite fly fishing haunt of mine).

We turned south on Hwy 141 and entered The Avon Valley which was stupidly beautiful.  It is classic Montana ranch country...cattle grazing on rolling high plains that ran up to dense pine stands and The Helena National Forest to the East.  We stopped for 20 minutes along a working cattle ranch and an abandoned home site to watch a couple of guys working cattle from a pickup truck and a four wheeler.  The sky was partly cloudy and the temps were in the mid 60's with a gusty wind blowing.  It was a gorgeous setting and I hope I never forget the scene.  If KC cares about our friendship at all, he'll buy a  ranch there soon.  While Ethel probably wouldn't visit, I'd commit to a twenty year friendship pact.

Here's KC after he picked out his home site....very good choice sir.

At the town of Avon, MT we turned to the east on Hwy 12 which took us over MacDonald Pass.  The Pass offered sweeping views of the valley below and was our last stop before pulling into Helena, MT for the night.  It was a surprisingly beautiful route and a great 200 mile ride.

We arrived at the hotel (another Hampton Inn) before 3:00PM which was a welcome and early end to the day.  I'm feeling the effects of having ridden seven straight days and hope to chill for the next 18 hours.  Tomorrow will be a long day as we are now focused on Getting to Denver.  However, I want to keep the mileage reasonable and safe...after such a tremendous trip, I do not want to start pushing our luck.  KC are having pizza delivered to the hotel tonight and plan to spread our maps out and plan our route back to Denver.  It is roughly 900 miles, so I'm voting for 4 days...roughly 225 miles per day.  That would put us in Denver next Wednesday night and home by Friday night.  I think both us us can smell the barn.