Mood:  a-ok

I peeked out the door of my motel room, and it looked pretty good outside. It had rained last night but it wasn't raining now, The sky had typical clouds with blue breaks. My plan was to have breakfast in Sula, five miles up the road. I wanted to leave the motel by 6:30 AM, ride to Sula for breakfast, and be climbing by 8-8:30 AM.

As I got on my loaded recumbent, I marveled at how comfortable the ride was. It is sort of like bicycling from a reclining chair. Your are laid back, and you pedal parallel to the ground.

Two miles down the road it started to hail. So much for my understanding of the sky. I had never ridden in hail before. It wasn't bad. i could hardly feel the tiny particles. Why couldn't Montana have snowflakes instead of these pesky buggers? Oh well, I can take it. Hmm. The hail is increasing in size. Now I'm starting to feel it. My God, its now the size of marbles. Ouch, this is beginning to really hurt. Ouch.  Ouch.  Ouch.  I'm getting pelted, laid out flat on my bike, as if the hail discovered a nice target. Quickly, I scurried off the road and hunkered down behind a tree as the wind became this fury, first going one direction then another. I had to keep moving around the tree to find the lee of the wind at that moment. (Note to self: next time I think its going to hail, remember to wear a protective cup.) After a couple of minutes, the wind quieted and I got on my bike to get to the restaurant. The road was white with hailstones, but not slippery.

Soon I reached Sula, a town which consists of a Country store/restaurant/campground. That's it. Unsure as to whether I would vbe able to go further (its snowing now) a hot breakfast still was what the doctor ordered. The cook had quit two days earlier. So breakfast was coffee, a couple of packaged danishes and some juice.

My new strategy was to sit this snowstorm out--stay at the campgrounds overnight, if necessary, and inquire of pass conditions as travelers came down the hill. This was the first place at the bottom of the pass, and people would want to gas up, replenish supplies, etc. The information I received from travelers was not good. So I sat and waited. Around 9:30 the snow stopped (it was only an inch or less), the wind had died, and things were looking up. Would I be able to go over the pass? It would probably take three hours, and a lot can happen in that time with this mountain weather during that time. At 10:15 AM, the sun was shining. A motorcyclist fresh off the mountain gave a positive report. I brushed the snow off my bike, turned it around facing uphill and started riding again. Chief Joseph Pass, here I come. As ironies would have it, a half mile down the road, I had to stop and apply my 50 block suntan lotion to my face.

It was a long climb, and it was getting colder with the elevation. It snowed lightly, not sticking to the road, and the wind swirled a bit, but nothing serious. A little after 1 PM, I crossed over the pass and headed downhill. The next town was Wisdom, 27 miles away, some of it downhill. In bicycling (actually in everything, but it is accentuated in bicycling), food is your fuel. You need to eat. Alot. I hadn't eaten since that sparce fare around 7:30 AM, and I didn't have anything for lunch but some Trail Mix and stuff. About 12 miles outside of Wisdom, I stopped to put some sustenance in my body (a Power Bar and some Trail Mix), then hurried on to Wisdom. I wanted to stop by the Big Hole Battlefield on the way to Wisdom. The decisive battle between the U.S. troops and the Nez Perce tribes was fought there. The Indians won the battle but at an onerous cost of lives, which spelled their demise and eventual surrender. Chief Joseph is the one who said "I will fight no more forever." As I was eating, I realized that it was nearing 3 PM. I still had to eat in Wisdom and then ride another 22 miles to Jackson, where I had reservations.

I looked behind me towards the pass from which I had just descended. There was a solid line of snow headed my way, and it seemed to be in a hurry. I jumped on the bike and took off.  I fyou saw  the movie "Hidalgo", about a horse race across the desert, the hero outraces a huge sandstorm, gaining shelter seconds before being engulfed.  That was the movies.  This was reality.  It caught up with me 6-8 miles outside of Wisdom. The wind and snow seemed to come from my right. It was bitterly cold. I had a headband that would cover my ears but it was soaking wet from perspiration, and I had taken it off.  Putting it back on (would a wet headband be an improvement in the wind?) my ears warmed up in seconds.

Soon I was in Wisdom (certainly a place which was named for any of my traits) and had a hearty hamburger and fires at Fetty's Cafe. I met another bike traveler outside the cafe. There was 6-10 inches of snow forecast for tonight. I had miscalculated the mileage to Jackson. It was 18 miles, not 22.

I got on the bike and started pedalling hard. The wind was still blowing, the snow parallel to the ground. The oddest thing happened. You would think that this had to be the worst weather in the world. Snow was building up on my whole right side, about 1/2". My right lens of my glasses was snowed over and when my left started to become obscured, I took them off. Yet, I was perfectly warm. Somehow, the heat I was generating was exactly equal to the cold. I also went fast, for me. Although the wind was coming from the side, it seemed to help propell me faster somehow. It was a slight uphill grade for all 18 miles, yet I managed 14 mph for most of it. Ten miles out of Wisdom, the snow stopped. the sun came out. The snow dropped off my right side, and I arrived at the Jackson Hot Springs Lodge, the biggest surprise to me, in terms of lodging, since I left Everett.

The lodge had a huge main hall with  a wrap-around balcony on the second floor, the walls filled with heads of what were once live animals.  A bar stood at one end of the room.  A large stone fireplace with a fire blazing beckoned one to sit for a while in the stuffed chairs.  Much of the flooring was of a dark wood, set up for dancing.  I'll bet they have some grand shindigs here.  At the end of the grand room, opposite the bar, was a door that led outside to an outside swimming pool that was fed by hot springs.

After checking in, I was walking the bike past the front in order to get around back to my cabin.   A voice shouted out "Hey, where in North Carolina are you going?"  (There were a number of stickers on the bike that say "North Carolina or Bust!)  Out into the driving wind walks this distinguished looking gentleman in swim trunks and tee shirt.  I'm fully dressed, and very cold in the sub-freezing wind, as we chat.  Having been soaking in the hot springs pool, he seemed oblivious to the cold.  I am the one that finally had to break off the conversation.  A hot shower beckoned.

After showering, I went back into the lodge and found he and his wife in the pool.  This neat couple, Jim and Betty Walton, live in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and were returning from a week spent in a cabin in Stehekin, Washington (Stehekin is a very remote town on the far end of 60 mile long Lake Chelan.  It is accessable only by boat or hiking overland).  We had a nice chat which continued later in the dining room.  It is just amazing what wonderful people one meets in the most unusual of places.

Tomorrow held a special challenge.  I had two mountain passes to go over that day, Big Hole Pass, elevation of 7,250',  and Badger Pass, elevation of 6,700'.  This is, of course, is predicated on the assumption that the roads would be ridable, and the passes safe.  The prognostication of lots of snow makes me wonder if I would get out at all.  Oh well, I could think of worst places to be stuck than the wonderful Jackson Hot Springs Lodge.

Will McMahan