Mon(ton’a) Problems

Mon(ton’a) Problems

It all started so innocent, so bright, such an unassuming day. The wind rustled through the trees, Yellowstone River a stone’s throw away (if you can throw 900 ft) was gurgling contentedly and fellow campers dropping by to shoot the breeze. My mood had lifted from the windy, tiring day before and things were looking good. I warmed up some breakfast (Campbell’s chicken and dumplings if you must know) and went down to the river just to sit, think, and take a few photos.

Leaving Columbus, I90 was pretty much the only thing on the schedule that day. My rear tire was getting pretty worn down, so I figured Missoula was my best option for finding a replacement for said tire. Around the time I hit Bozeman, I too was hit. Hit with the realization that I didn’t remember pulling the keys out of the side case when I left Columbus. I searched everything on the bike and myself. No dice. Which was a bummer, because now I can’t play Yahtzee. Also, I found no keys.

Luckily I had one spare key for my clothing case, so the only case I couldn’t get into was the one holding all my bedding stuff; air mattress, pillow, sleeping bag, stack of reading material and so on. In other words, I needed in there, but as I was getting a motel in Missoula, it wasn’t critically urgent. More about that motel later.

I stopped for lunch in Bozeman at Clark’s Fork. Pretty neat place, its a cafe decorated with excerpts from Lewis and Clark’s journals taken out of context to advertise their menu items. Novel idea. I had the Southwest breakfast burrito (yes, breakfast for lunch. I love breakfast. I will not apologize for that. If I ever decide to run for President, my platform will be on breakfast menus being served all day long).
The burrito was good, the freshly fried chips were even better.

Grinding down I90 once again, things were going well. Well, until Butte, that is. After riding through Butte, the wind got crazy. If you’ve never ridden in high winds, especially crosswinds, allow me to give you an example. Say you’re sitting in an office chair. Now imagine a midget standing behind you, or a regular height person crouching if you’d rather. Now whichever person you chose grabs your head and shakes it up and down, side to side with varying force and intensity for 3 hours. Got that? Good, now imagine that your office chair suddenly gets jerked 4 feet to the side randomly. That is how high winds do.

There were several times I was blown a lane over, despite steering into the wind. You have to stay alert, looking for trees bent over, etc to point out the really windy spots so that you can take early action. After about 3 hours of this, I was sick and tired of the wind. What could make things better? How about some rain? How about the bike sputters, coughs and shuts off? How about all of the above?

Out of gas. At 180 miles, I usually have between .75 to 1 gal of gas remaining. Fighting the winds must really have sucked some fuel down. The fuel gauge that had been showing 3 bars jumped straight to empty.

I called my insurance company for roadside assistance, and I figured it’d take a while, being Montana. Boy, was I right. The initial text said an ETA of 75 minutes. The closest available truck was in Ronan, while I was 11 miles east of Missoula. I was 11 miles away. 11 miles away from my warm, dry motel, that long hot shower I longed for, and the laundry service that I also direly needed.

It ended up being over 2 hours of sitting in the rain, 50 degree temps and high winds before help arrived. And then came the cops. Apparently as I sat propped up against the mile marker sign, trying to stay dry and eating beef jerky, someone phoned 911 and said I was slumped over my bike, so a Missoula County Sheriff came out to check on me. When he realized that I was fine and that the truck had just shown up to bring me fuel, we talked for a while, he wished me luck on my trip and left. One of the flyest cops I’ve ever met.

It turns out that the service truck had been in Polson when he got dispatched to me. That explained the longer wait, but I was glad to be finally going again, thanking myself for paying that $5 a year for roadside coverage. When I pulled into my motel, I had two things on my mind. Bed and a hot shower. But first, I needed to get my laundry going. I had selected this particular establishment based on their advertisal of having a 24hr coin op laundry. Well, in keeping with the day, it was out of order despite the LED billboard out front loudly boasting it’s existence. I rode around town trying to find a 24 hour laundromat, but all the laundromats closed at 9PM. Ridiculous. I ate McDonalds out of spite and went to bed in my nonsmoking room that reeked of smoke. So goes it.

Today’s Takeaway: That light at the end of the tunnel? It’s a train.