Friday, June 25th, 2010: The day was looking to be pretty nice. The temps were in the mid 80′s and there wasn’t a cloud in sight. This was somewhat of a spur of the moment trip, but I had done a lot of packing the night before so that I could ride out straight after work. All I would have to do is stop by home, gear up, strap the sleeping bag on and head for the hills! Unfortunately, as luck would have it, the beautiful day turned rather ugly right about the time I decided to leave.

Just before I had planned to leave work, some coworkers and myself headed upstairs to the cafeteria for a quick break. Since it had been warm out all day, we decided to go sit in the courtyard. As we were out there, I could see some thick black clouds rolling in from the west. Not even five minutes later, those very same clouds decided to open up, so we headed back inside and down to the dungeon (IT people always work in the dungeon it seems). I hung out for about another 30 minutes finishing up some last minute work and then headed out for the day. As I got back upstairs and to the parking lot, it was no longer raining, although it was still pretty dark out. I wiped the raindrops off the seat of my Road King and headed for home, hoping for better luck than I had encountered so far.

I rode home and geared up. I got everything to go, strapped on the sleeping bag and other gear, said goodbye to my girlfriend and headed out. Still no sign of rain, but the skies were still not looking very friendly. I made it to Rock Creek, about 30 miles east of Missoula, and suddenly the winds started picking up. I could see the telltale rain streaks coming down from the clouds over the nearby mountains, so I thought it was probably time to pull over and strap on the rain gear, just to be safe. I had just gotten this rain gear about a week before, and had not had a chance to actually test it out yet, so this could have been an interesting trip. Fortunately, once I got the pants slipped on and the jacket all zipped up, the water was firmly sealed out and the ride was still comfortable.

As I got back on the highway, I started noticing a few rain drops on my visor. They were not too serious, but I was glad I had stopped and put the gear on. The wind started gusting a little bit, but again, nothing that was a trip stopper, so I kept rolling along. As I approached Deerlodge, the rain started getting a little more intense. This would prove to be a great test of my new rain gear. So far, so good. I was now traveling through a pretty steady drizzle, and I was keeping plenty dry. I opted to leave my perforated leather gloves on (the dealer said they were “waterproof”) as it wasn’t all that cold out and I wasn’t too worried about my hands getting wet. The rain kept up like this until my first fuel stop just outside of Butte, MT, which was about another 40 miles. I was still totally comfortable and had not problems with either the rain or the gear.

After stopping near Butte and grabbing a sandwich, I again hit the road.  It was starting to get kind of late, so I was a little bit concerned about how far I would make it and if I would find a good campground to stay in.  Hopefully the rain would let up enough to pull out the tent and sleep comfortably.  As I proceeded past Butte and over Homestake Pass, I knew I would not be so lucky.

Heading over the past east of Butte was somewhat of a challenging experience.  The rain had picked up quite a bit, and it was now getting difficult to see.  Night was  approaching, and it was getting more difficult to see the road through the rain, and to top it all off, my helmet visor was starting to fog up.  Cracking the visor let in some much unwanted rain “spray”, so I could only do that in moderation.  As I climbed higher up the pass, I encountered more and more slow moving trucks which forced me into the fast lane.  I was having a difficult time seeing, so I slowed down, which made things even more interesting.  Most of the cars in the fast lane had no problems traveling at the speed limit.  I, however, did not feel comfortable going that fast.  Switching to the fast lane to pass trucks moving 25 MPH was really pretty scary.  Cars in the fast lane crept up on me a lot quicker than I liked.  Spray from truck tires coated my visor even more, and the wet roads were not reassuring while taking tight corners.  I was extremely glad when I got to the other side of the pass, the road straightened out and the trucks all sped up again.

As I approached the turnoff for Cardwell, the rain began to get even more intense.  I pulled off the interstate and began my ride along the two lane highway winding past Lewis and Clark Caverns.  At this point, the skies were really dark and I could barely see the mountains in the distance through the rain.  As I was riding along, I began looking for a campground to stay at.  I spotted a couple, but they were full.  I got down the road a little further, and I noticed why all the campgrounds in the area were full.  There was some sort of country music fest going on in a field in the middle of nowhere along this road.  There were at least a hundred RVs parked inside this small area and a stage was set up along the far side.  Police officers were nearby directing traffic.  Looks like there would be no good camping for me in this area, so I decided to trudge on, heading towards Ennis, MT.

While I was riding towards Ennis, I was still on the lookout for a  good campground to stay at.  Unfortunately, there isn’t much in this area, so the campgrounds seem to be fairly sparse.  Daylight was almost completely gone, so I decided that maybe it would be best to find a cheap hotel room.  I could get an earlier start that way and not have to worry about unpacking and packing wet camping gear.  I got to Ennis and found the first place that looked like a motel and pulled in.  I looked up at the sign:  “Sportsman Inn – Vacancy”.  Yes! This place did not look too classy, and it had at least one room!  I was pretty confident I would be able to get a good, dry room for not too much money.  Well, it ended up being dry, anyways.

A mere $56 bought me a single bed cabin style room for the night.  It had a bed and a bathroom, so that worked for me.  The cabin was set up in a “duplex” type configuration with one other room separated by a thin wall in the center.  I figured this would be fine as I only planned to sleep there until early morning, and I am not too picky about my accommodations, within reason of course.  However, in this case maybe I should have been.  When the neighbors arrived home, things got interesting.  The center wall was paper thin so I could hear everything they were saying, and every time they flushed the toilet or turned on a drain, the toilet in my room would start gurgling.  Luckily, nothing “spilled over” and the noise stopped as soon as they went to bed.  I took a couple of Tylenol PMs and hit the sack myself, hoping for much better weather and smoother traveling the next day.