Cy and Sue (our guide & chef) had risen early to take a drive up the road to see what the state of construction was going to be today. Turns out that the "candles" (tall cones in the middle of the road) only went on for a mile & a half, so the plan they developed was to have us ride in a peloton with the SAG vehicle behind to protect us from traffic. Traffic was light at that time of day and there was only one ya-hoo who decided to pass us. On the plus side, we had fresh pavement all the way up the pass to the summit and the Montana border.
We started the day with 13 miles of uphill to Lolo Pass Summit. Another classic pass along this route. This is where Lewis & Clark crossed the Bitterroots in September of 1805. Apparently they were also greeted with cold and wet weather. The rain pretty much held off for those of us who got up fairly quickly. Apparently some of the slower riders got quite wet. Not a lot of stopping for me along the way. Once I get in the zone going uphill I like to just keep plugging away. There wasn't great visibility, so any pictures wouldn't have done it justice. Many of the trees have started to turn up high and they would have been very pretty on a sunnier day. The temperature had dropped from about 9C at the lodge to 5C at the top. The rain started to pick up, so I did a quick tour of the visitor centre, grabbed a PayDay bar, put all my clothes on and headed downhill. It rained harder for quite a while and my hands and feet were pretty darned wet and cold. Thoughts of a hot bath kept my legs spinning. In spite of the amount of climbing we did today, it was my second fastest average speed day. Of course, a tailwind and miles of slight downhill helped the cause.
I did stop for a while at Fort Fizzle at about mile 40. Restroom, snack, change of layers, etc.
Shortly after that some of the other riders caught up with me as we headed onto the bike path in the town of Lolo. Some stopped there for food, but four of us carried on together into Missoula. It's always good to travel in a group when we come into a larger city, especially with a bike path. It's good to have multiple sets of eyes looking for street signs and bike path turns. As luck would have it, one of our four riders got a flat about 6 miles from the hotel. Here's a picture of 2 of them calling the SAG. I'm not sure they really wanted a ride; I think they were just excited about having cell phone coverage again.
Turns out we got the flat fixed just as the SAG found us. Actually, I'm kind of glad we had that delay. The rain had stopped, the sun had come out and it had warmed up quite a bit. It turned into a rather nice day and I might have missed that fact if I had kept riding directly to the hotel.
Margaritas today for crossing the state line. Cy amped mine up a bit to compensate for the fact that my rental bike has been causing me some grief. It's going into the bike shop tomorrow to see if the gear shifting can be improved a bit. We have our last rest day here tomorrow.
Stats for the day:
94 km / 58 miles from Lochsa Lodge ID to Missoula MT
2588 feet up, 2915 feet down
Temps: 5C to 15C. Light drizzle on the climb. Steady rain and cold on the downhill. Much nicer once we got into Missoula. The forecast looks pretty good for the next week. Dare I hope that that was our only yucky day??
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