Day 62: So Cold, So Windy, or ...Why Didn't I Start This Earlier?

Today was a great day… Waking up is hard, but as soon as you climb the annoying hill on the west side of town, it flattens out pretty nice. We get an early start to beat the headwinds, and boy am I gad we did. This is to be one of the final days on the prairie, and what is great about today was that the towns are all spaced out about 6 miles apart. As soon as you leave one town, you can see the next on the horizon. It makes for some great riding.
I was moving along at a pretty good clip. At the halfway point in Gildsford, I sat and talked to an old guy for a good 45 minutes. He was really nice, though hard to disengage from when I got itching to get back on the road.
All day was fantastic, I must say… and there WERE headwinds, albeit slight.

When I got into Chester I ran over to the museum to kill some time, but it was closed. It looked kinda low-rent anyways. So I found the town park… It had 2 really nice pavilions with huge picnic tables where I could curl up in a sleeping bag for the evening. About 45 minutes later, Matt rolls up and we grab some dinner at Subway. I am starting not to like food very much. I think I’ll be excited for Burger King the next time I see it, but little else motivates me to eat nowadays.

When we get back to the pavilion, we discover that the electric outlets do NOT work, and just like that… the perfect evening of shelter and internet is ruined. So I end up going to sleep at 8:30pm. When the rain comes, it brings with it a freezing wind, so I tighten the “face-hole” on my sleeping bag as tight as it will go and shove my black stocking cap to plug the remaining hole. It’s nice and warm, albeit a bit claustrophobic. So windy, so cold.

Tomorrow is likely the last day Matt and I will be riding together, since he will be heading into Canada, and I am going to spend some quality alone time in the mountains. It was really nice to have someone to ride this barren stretch of Eastern Montana with. I need to wash my clothes before I go into the mountains. The amount of food I have spilled on these clothes would attract every dangerous forest animal in a 5 mile radius. But alas... I might not have time. Montana is still beautiful.