5 days in Gotham

Pic - Brooklyn Bridge

This will get wordy and long - so strap yourself in.

Soo.. where to start? Getting to NYC was a day wasted in-transit. I had to fly from Redmond, OR, to Portland, OR, to LAX, to JFK. Started the journey at 6am, and was at my hotel at 11:15pm.

I'd done a bit of looking around for the best way of getting from JFK to Manhattan, and given the time and how tired I was, I decided to go with a Taxi which is a flat rate of $45 plus tolls and tips. I'd read that to be wary of anyone other than an official taxi dispatcher for accepting rides, and was glad I did. As soon as you leave the terminal, guys every 10 feet or so are offering rides I must look like a tourist, coz I got asked by everyone of them :) The line was huge, but it didn't take long to clear. The driver had trouble understanding me - surprise - he was Indian, or similar. He had an interesting style of driving. Rather than just sit on the accelerator with a steady foot, he would gas it, then coast, then gas, then coast - for 30 bloody minutes. Lucky I don't get car sick! I reckon his fuel bill must be horrendous. Driving into Manhattan everything was lit up and the sky was clear - the only thing I could make out was the Empire State building. I had to point out to the driver that we were in the wrong street when we got to Manhattan and that we were about 5 avenues past where we should have been. Given it was a flat rate, I think it was an honest mistake.

The hotel is pretty good - the room is small and I mean small. I think it's about 10 steps from the door to the furthest point away. There's no shower or toilet - they're shared on the floor. Overall, it's really good. It's clean, it's cheap (for NY), it's only 3 or 4 blocks from Times Square and about 15 mins walk from Central Park. There's a small cool private park just up the street from here as well which, because of the waterfall, makes you feel like you're not in the middle of huge city. Overall I'd give it an 8./10 - the hotel that is. I'd come here again.

I was pretty shattered that night, but found a market open at 11:30, grabbed a couple of beers and pretzels (which didn't make me thirsty!) and realised I was walking around NYC at midnight - kinda bizarre and cool.

Friday

That night I passed out rather than slept. I didn't really have a plan the first day, I thought I'd just wander around and see what I could see. So I saw a heap of stuff - Rockefeller Plaza, FAO Schwarz (toy shop that has the big piano that was in the movie "Big"), the Apple Store (nearly bought an iPhone), Central Park, 5th Ave, Times Square, Broadway and a heap of other stuff I can't remember right now.

I was walking down a street and thought I recognised the bloke walking toward me - turned out it was the guy who plays Detective Stabler (sp?) in Law & Order:SVU. A bit later down the street I saw some catering vans and a lot of people with camera gear - they must've been filming there that day.

In the early evening, I was walking past some orthodox Jews when one of them asked "Are you Jewish?". I shook my head and kept moving, thinking nothing of it. About 3 blocks later, another orthodox Jew asked the same question. Do I look Jewish? I have no idea why they were asking me?

That night was "Fashion's night out" which marked the end (or start?) of Fashion Week in Manhattan. Every second fashion shop had something on - red carpets and exclusive shopping, or had DJ's in store. In Herald Square, the group Train were playing a free concert. I don't know if I've heard of them before or not, but they did play a great cover of Led Zeppelin's "Ramble On". Most of 5th Ave and the garment district was like one big street party - New York style. It was pretty cool. I nearly walked into P. Diddy (Sean Combs - whatever he calls himself these days) - except for the crowd of people around him. I'll say one thing. There are many fine looking women in New York - esp. on a night like that. I'd left the hotel at 9:15 in the morning, and got back at about 10:00pm that night. Again, I think I passed out rather than slept.

Saturday

Again, I didn't really have a plan of attack, so just started to wander around. I returned to a coffee shop that I found the day before that actually serves Flat Whites - not a big deal you might say? Well, it's about the only place that I've been to (of about 30 coffee shops - not a huge sample I know) that has them. Anyway, they make an awesome coffee and it's worth the 30 min walk from the hotel to get one each day - which I have done so far.

Today was the 9th anniversary of the World Trade Centre attacks. At one stage I thought I might go down to watch the ceremonies, but I thought it was too touristy a thing to do - I would've felt like I was gawking, so I ended up not going. All the flags in the city (of which there must be thousands) were at half mast and there was nearly a full day of coverage on many of the tv channels.

The day was shaping up to be a ripper - I don't know how hot it got, but there wasn't a cloud in the sky and was just perfect. I ended up back in Central Park for a bit, and had a better look around - went to Strawberry Fields, which is an area set aside for, and paid for, by Yoko Ono as a tribute to John Lennon - who was killed not far from here. I was expecting a huge grassed area, but it's really just a small mosaic inlaid in the ground with the word "Imagine". It was still good to see. The magic of Central Park is that you don't believe you're in one of the world's largest cities - it's really peaceful - even on a Saturday afternoon with people everywhere. I saw an area in the park that was in "When Harry Met Sally" - it would look great in Autumn.

Again I walked past another actor from SVU - this time the bloke who plays Det. Munch (sp?).

Sunday

Well, how quickly things change here - the day started off a bit grey and the forecast was for rain. So packed my jacket and wore jeans for the first time. I had booked a bike tour of lower Manhattan in the evening that was supposed to have a great outlook from the Brooklyn bridge at sunset - so I hoped the rain was going to stay away. The starting point was nearly 40 blocks away, so I thought I'd wander down there via Broadway, which is one of the few streets that aren't organised in a grid fashion. By the way, I'd always been confused by the Streets and Ave numbered naming convention in NY, but once you get the swing of it, it makes it so easy to get around. The Avenues run north and south, while the streets run east and west - the centre avenue being 5th avenue. Most of the avenue's are numbered, (like my hotel is between 2nd and 3rd), but there are some, like Park Ave and Madison Ave, that aren't. Anyway, it's much easier than trying to remember street names like Melbourne has.

In the morning I returned to "my" coffee shop with a paper and time to kill. It will probably sound cliche, but it was great to just sit in a coffee shop, sipping one of the best coffee's I've had in months, listening to some blues music while watching the rained and reading the paper. Life is good!

Around 3:30 I ring the tour guys to see if it's going ahead, they say "Yep, rain should clear by 4:00pm". The tour was supposed to start at 4:30pm. I thought they must be dreaming as it had been raining for the past 3 hours and didn't look like letting up - it was a gentle, but soaking rain.

Anyway, I show up and decide - what the heck, I might as well go. The other option was to be crowded in a museum (coz that's what everyone supposedly does on a rainy day), or go back to the hotel room. So even though I'll baulk at the slightest hint of rain when I'm at home and wanting to go for a ride, here I am on holidays in NYC and I'm about to go for a 5 hour tour in the rain! Yeah, I don't know either. Our group was 8 - but it was supposed to be 20 - some people aren't made of the right stuff obviously. One of the organisers was a bit of a salesman and assured us that the rain was just about stopped - well, it did - 2.5 hours later! The ride was pretty relaxed, and is a great way to cover a lot of ground and to get from interesting point to another. I was pretty well soaked by the time we had a break at the World Financial Centre - which overlooked the site of the World Trade Centre. There's plenty of work going on with a floor being added every 8 days (I think?) to one of the towers (now at 36 stories) with the second tower having just got off the ground.

Wandered into a shoe shop and saw a pair of Blundstones - for $145! erk.

We went through the financial district and stopped at the federal reserve. The guide said he liked to stop here as it's the closest any of us are likely to get to so much money. 5 stories below ground level there is 720 BILLION dollars of gold! Wouldn't mind a percentage of that. Later on, we were going to have a look at Wall street and the charging bull statue. However, when we got there, a fair portion of it was fenced off - which had the guides scratching their heads, then we saw another bull - a replica in front of it. There was a bit of a crowd around, so we asked a guy with a walkie talkie what was going on. He said they were getting ready to film a bit from the remake of the movie "Arthur", and that this scene was going to be Arthur crashing his Batmobile (which was there as well!) into the bull - obviously the fake one. I didn't get any photo's (because I'm a doofus), but it was a great thing to see.

We then road up the Brooklyn bridge - there's a cycle way and pedestrian path over the roadway. It's the biggest hill I've done on a bike in a long time!. The view was good, but as with the rest of the tour, the overcast and low cloud made it less impressive than it would've been. Later we road through Little Chinatown and Little Italy - which was closed off to traffic as it's the beginning of the festival of San Genaro (a patron Saint of the area). Again, this was pretty cool as it had a street party atmosphere about it.

There were a few other things we saw as well - I can't remember them all already! I'd recommend this to anyone - the bike riding isn't strenuous, but it allowed us to see a heap of things without sprinting everywhere. The guides were quite knowledgeable about the history and the ins-and-outs of the neighborhoods. Top stuff.

After this, I had to walk back the 40 odd streets to the hotel - and by now it was 9:30 at night. I've got one thing to say about Manhattan - at least the parts I've been in - it's remarkably safe. I felt more uneasy in parts of San Fran than I have in NYC. There is a fraction of the homeless/beggars in NYC that San Fran had. Even when I was walking around on my first night at midnight, the bars were full, there people everywhere, but I felt safe.

Monday - today.

I was intending to have a look at the Museum of Modern Art today, but took a long way to get up there. Of course, I hadn't read the small print in my guide book which says that it's open every day except - you guessed it - Monday! Arrgh! Oh well, I wandered though the Guggenheim which was close by, and also the Museum of Natural History, which is on the other side of Central Park - which I got to wander through again.

The day was looking good weather wise, even though they predicted rain. I thought I'd do the "Top of the Rock" which is the viewing area of Rockefeller building. You can buy a ticket to see it during the day, then later in the evening. I needed a break, so went back to the hotel for a quick nap. Yeah, there's time enough for sleeping when you're dead, but after four days of solid walking, I was knackered. Half an hour later and the rain comes - bugger. No point going up a tall building in the rain. I'll leave it for tomorrow.

Drink can be educational - inside a Snapple lid - "It is illegal to graffiti someones cow". OK?

Anyway, that's all I can remember for now - Cheers!

07.09.2010 Trip done - no more bets.. all done..

Pic - Wallowa Lake, just outside Joseph

Hey, whaddya know - I made it.. in one piece.. woohoo.. Mum - you can take a breath now :)

So this morning was time for another American brekky seeing as I was staying at a B&B. This time I held back and only had a banana bran muffin, fresh fruit salad, an egg Florentine, juice and coffee - barely got me through the day! This time I was dining with a couple from Denmark who were doing a mini-tour of the US as well.

The day started off cool, but was sunny so it was all looking great. I got to do Hell's Canyon and the Ukiah-Dale Scenic Byway (Blue Mountain Scenic Byway) again. A tip for anyone looking for an interesting drive/ride as opposed to a flat-out-have-to-get-there trip. Look for any of the Scenic Byways. Get an AAA roadways map and follow them - you're bound to have a great trip - terrific scenery and a challenging drive. I won't bore you with the description of the twisty roads, river gorges etc etc..

After 200 miles I thought it was time for a break. Yeah.. 200 miles. Probably not the smartest thing to do (ride 200 miles without a break) - but everything was honking along so well, I didn't feel like stopping. Just as I thought I should take a break, another series of corners popped up and I couldn't help myself. At one stage I played a game of tag with another bloke on a BMW 1200GS. The tyres on the bike weren't brand new when I picked up the bike, but I reckon about all they're good for now is keeping the rim off the ground.

When I pulled up to a servo, the guy there saw the stickers on my bike and got a good chuckle about the "Kangaroos next 120 kms". He wanted to know if I'd seen any today... I don't know if he was all there because he kept carrying on about it. He was hoping I had a spare so that he could put one on his "motor-sickle helmet". Ah well..

After 60 miles the heaven's opened up - not full on, but I had rain for about 20-30 miles, which put a bit of a dampener on things, but I still had a bit of time to dry off. Just in time for it to start raining as I pulled up to my hotel in Bend.

Sooo.. it's all done. Would I do it again - hells yes. Would I do it tomorrow - you betcha. It's gone so quickly, it's bizarre - it barely feels like 4 days let alone 14 days. Thanks to Scott and Terry from Flyrideusa.com. The bike and service was spot on and I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it to anyone thinking of doing the same thing.

Now I've got a day to wander around Bend before flying to NYC on Thursday morning. I might keep this blog up when I'm in NYC - if something interesting happens.. what are the chances of that?

Cheers...

05-06.09.2010 Two days of heaven on a bike

Pic - Wyoming, near Pinedale

The past two days have been clear days with blue skies with a bit of cloud around. The mornings have been really fresh, but by afternoon have warmed up nicely.

Saturday night in Salmon we had quite a nice lightning display. My room backed onto the Salmon River which is about 30 metres wide and flows quite quick - it's relatively shallow, but because of the rocks underneath, it looks like it's on the boil all the time. The river would've only been 10 metres from my room - you could hear it all night - it was quite soothing. On the other side of the river was pretty much nothing, until the mountain range. All this allowed a great view of all the fork lightning about - from cloud to cloud and cloud to earth. I tried to put the rain out of my mind for tomorrow.

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Last of the maps - next 2 days are a repeat of the first two

What do you know, the morning is freezing and there's dark clouds everywhere. Once I was told I was mad, another time I was told that I'd "better have your dri-rider's on".. thanks for the advice guys. I saddled up and was to follow the Salmon Scenic Byway from Salmon to McCall, both in Idaho. Somehow I missed all the rain, and only had to contend with a damp, but rapidly drying road, for the first part of the morning. Most of the trip was fantastic, following the Salmon River which has carved out a gorge over the past x thousands of years. So once again, I've been forced to endure a ride along a winding and twisting river gorge that follows a fantastic river/stream, with cliffs and hills covered in pines and firs. It's a tough life. The best part of these roads is that they aren't the main highways, and are definitely not the interstates, so there's relatively few people on them. Heaven!

I got to pass through the Sawtooth Mountain range again, so from here on in, I'm retracing my route from the beginning of the ride - not a bad thing in that the roads are great, but still, I can't help thinking that it's all nearly over.

Sunday night I stayed in McCall at the same hotel that I had the previous time, nearly two weeks ago. The concierge recognised me and greeted me by name, which was a bit surprising. The next morning is another fresh one and the bike even has a bit of frost on it. At 7am, it was -1 deg C!! The hotel must have a fantastic heating system, as I didn't have a clue and slept without a blanket most of the night. I rug up for what is another great ride through more river gorges etc etc etc. Just as I exit the township of McCall I startle a few deer that are strolling across the road.

I have to go through the same area where I was pulled over two weeks ago, so take it pretty easy. Just as well, as there are cops everywhere. Just as I see a State Patrol go by, I see another car pulled over by the local Sheriff, and then about 2 miles later, I see another Sheriff that has just finished booking someone, do a 180 and chase down someone else! So, if you're ever travelling through or near Grangeville - take it easy!

At lunch I have a look at The Age on my Blackberry and see that Bill Perry from Charlton has scored himself top billing! Looks like the place is fairly well flooded - worse than I've seen before, and according to the locals, the worst in 100 years. Hell of a way to break a drought - if it has.

After lunch I get to do Rattlesnake Grade (I don't know how this will be highlighted, but if you want to see a bit about that road, click Rattlesnake Grade) again - that's the area that has 200 corners in 10 or 20 miles. I had another great time, although was held up a bit by an RV that wouldn't pull over into the slow vehicle turnouts - I guess he didn't know who was behind him :)

And so here I am in Joseph, Oregon, in the same B&B that I was two weeks ago. Next stop is Bend where I drop off the bike - after 360 miles. This time should be a bit easier as the forecast is for a mild day of mid 60's.

Last day tomorrow :(

03-04.09.2010 Taking it easy

Pic - Logan's Pass - Glacier National Park

The past two days have been relatively uneventful with some short days on the bike. The weather has been warm high 20's and low 30's which hasn't been too hard to take.

This weekend is a the labour day long weekend in the US and on Friday arvo, the roads were packed. On Friday I stayed at a B&B in Missoula, Montana. Missoula is about the same size as Ballarat. There must be a tradition around here to do something with tractor inner tubes as they were for sale at a few different places. I saw one car with about 6 uni students in it, all trying to hang on to inner tubes on, or in, their car - looked pretty funny.

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I met this old bloke in a coffee shop who rides an old beat up Harley. He introduced himself and asked a few questions about my trip. He says he like Australians as they "know how to party and don't take things too seriously like us Americans". He told me about this Aussie truck driver he met a while ago who had started his ride in Patagonia in South American and was riding up to Alaska - now that's a trip! I had a chat to him for about 10 mins - he had some interesting thoughts on life. When I wandered past the coffee shop 3 hours later - he was still there - waiting for "Simpson who's never on time"!

Today was the first weekend of college football and, as Montana doesn't have an NFL team, they get right behind their college team - every second store had a "Griz" display in their windows - there was even a "Griz" liquor store.

This morning I had my first full on American brekky. Up until now I've only had cereal, toast and coffee - not a bad effort I reckon. At the B&B I had brekky with the other guests which was interesting. There was an older couple from the UK (in Bath) and another older couple from Ohio. The brekky consisted of fruit, cereal, coffee, juice, omelettes of portobello mushrooms and cheese sauce, bacon that's pan fried in maple syrup and brown sugar, all followed by a coffee cake!! Pretty full on stuff - but the bacon did taste really good. I didn't eat lunch until 2pm - and even then it was just because I thought I'd better have a break from riding. It seems as though the Great Ocean Rd is popular with tourists as both couples had been on it, as well as the cook! They were all impressed with it.

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Tonight I'm staying in Salmon, Idaho - it's a small town of 3,500 or so, but walking through it this arvo, it was just like walking through Charlton on a Saturday when the footy is out of town - ie. it was a ghost town. The road from Missoula was a nice twisty road through the hills for a while. When I pulled into a servo in Salmon, a bloke behind me said "You must be invincible".. I said pardon and he repeated it. I asked why, and he said "overtaking on double stripes on a blind corner".. Ahh.. that bloke.. It wasn't as bad as it sounds.. honest.

Tomorrow will be a bit of a sad day as I'm starting to head back over some of the roads that I started out on - so I'm starting to head home. The upside is that they're some cool roads.

02.09.2010 Pure Awesomeness!

Pic - Logan's Pass - Glacier National Park

Yep, this place is made from pure awesomeness. Yesterday I was singing a John Denver song that's chorus is "Some days are diamonds, some days are stones" due to the fact that yesterday was just a day to get through with next to fun to be had at all. However, today I was singing it for another reason.. today was a diamond. Straight from boiled lollies to choccies. Today I did a lap of the Glacier National Park.

The day started out promising with a blueish sky and no sign of any rain clouds, so I stripped out the lining from my pants and jacket and packed my winter gloves - just in case. About 30 miles in, things start to look a bit grim - there's fog and low cloud and it's starting to get a bit cool. I start to swear to myself that if this turns out like yesterday I'll be mighty pissed. Once I enter the forest proper, the area looks great - despite the overcast and grey conditions - I still can't see much beyond the short distance - no mid or long views at all. A river runs along the road which has a few small waterfalls, rapids really, which are nice to stop to look at for a while, but not what I'm here for. There's a tonne of hiking trails through here - including one that begins with built up wooden paths so that the natural undergrowth isn't destroyed or disturbed.

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Later on I catch a glimpse of some snow covered peaks, but most of them are obscured by clouds. I go with the flow and follow the traffic on the way up. The national parks are well patronised by the public and there's cars, RV's and SUV's everywhere. At one stage I was following a dual wheeled SUV up a winding road. On the left is a sheer wall coming down into the road, then the road which is barely 5 metres wide, then a small (30-60 cm) stone wall, followed by sheer cliff on the other side. At one stage, this SUV could barely fit in the lane. His front wheels would be on the right side of the road, but because of the dual wheels at the back, he was nearly always on the wrong side of the double lines. I sorta hung back from him as I'm sure people coming the other way weren't too impressed with how he was getting up there.

Suddenly, most of the weather started to clear and the views were absolutely breathtaking. I've never seen anything like it before and it's what I reckon some of the Alps and mountains of France must look like. There's snow covered peaks and glaciers everywhere. Below the snow/ice line is an incredibly green forest with some large grassed areas thrown in as well.

My photo's don't do the place any justice whatsoever, it is an incredibly beautiful place. By the time I got to the visitor's centre at the top, I was stunned. It was a bit "Brrr.." at the top, but I spent about 30-45 mins just staring at the views. The area was packed with people, buses, cars, and motorbikes. Everyone was wandering around in awe. The road up was first made in 1936 and I can't imagine how they did it - but it's a good thing they did. I read in the paper yesterday that a mining concern wants to mine a part of the park. It would be a travesty if they did. Along the way there were many waterfalls streaming straight down the cliffs, as well as a "weeping wall" where water was just seeping out of the rocks. One thing that's interesting is that they reckon the glaciers will all be gone by the year 2020. There is a series of photo's that show how the glaciers in one spot have degenerated since the late 30's to the present day, and the change was remarkable. At one stage, there is a glacier that is over 8 feet thick, and it doesn't exist at all today. It will be a shame if they all go.

On the way down, about 1 mile from the visitor's centre, there was more roadworks and the traffic was held up for 10 mins - I didn't mind at all, as I got another view of the Rockies for a while. I'd not heard of the Glacier National Park before I got the route for my motorbike ride, but I'm so glad it was included. I'd highly recommend it to anyone if you're anywhere near Montana. It's been the highlight of my trip, and I can't think how anything else is likely to top it. When I was talking to Scott (the guy I rented the bike from) on the day he delivered the bike, he asked if I had seen the Rockies before. I said "Nope, this is the first time I've been to the States". At that, he burst out laughing and said "Oh man, are you going to have a trip then". He said that a father and son had only just returned from there and he reckon they found religion! Of what type, I wasn't sure :) At the time I thought "Wow.. that's a big sell". I don't know about the religion side of things, but is one helluva sight to see.

Towards the end of the day, with some time to kill, I visited this large outdoor shopping plaza - kind of like a mall, but individual shops not under the same roof. I went into this huge sporting store to have a wander around. They sold everything from skateboards, to kayaks, to bicycles, hiking gear, camping gear etc etc. Of course, I ended up near the guns, as that side of things is still pretty bizarre to me. The place was pretty busy as a new season is about to open - bow hunting I think? Anyway, if you want a gun, this would be a good place to start. From pistols that you could hide in a pair of speedo's, through to one that would put Dirty Harry to shame - basically a hand cannon - to lever action rifles, pump action shot guns and semi-automatic assault rifles - just in case you get attacked by a mob of deer and have to take out 15-20 at a time I guess. Unbelievable stuff.

I next went into a Walmart. It was about the size of Bunnings in Ballarat. Grocery store, department store, gun shop (much smaller than the other one)- it even had a Subway in the store. The had more TV's on display than JB's do. Anyway, I found a Mars bar.. I didn't think the US had them, but it's not like our Mars. It's more likely our Mars Almond.

Anyway, that's enough for now.. a day full of awesome! :) Tomorrow is supposed to be a nice day as well, so with any luck I've seen the last the rain.

01.09.2010 I can't stand the rain...

Pic - Coz there's nothing worse than a stale remote

Started the day off with some hope of avoiding the rain. It started off quite warm, but after about an hour I hit the wet stuff and it stayed that way for most of the day. At one stage when it was belting down and fairly cold, I had to make a turn towards the town (district?) of Glacier. Now that's not something that you want to see when it's already freezing and you start to think of great chunks of ice!

I also passed Lake Placed and immediately started to think of giant alligators. I'm pretty sure the movie Lake Placed had an alligator in it?? I then passed Swan Lake, but it must've been too damp for the ballerina's as I didn't see any. Yeah, that's pretty lame, but that's what you think of after riding in the rain for an hour or so. Some of the views would've been great to see.... as it was, the 'short' views were still very nice. I had two deer jump out in front of me, but thankfully they were about 150m away so I had plenty of time to slow down. After all this it really started to rain. The kind of rain that makes you deaf with the hammering of it on my helmet - and that's with ear plugs in. Thankfully it stopped raining long enough for my gear to pretty much dry out before the end of the trip.

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Got some new rear brake pads about 15 miles from the end of my ride. After borrowing a socket, I got them changed and, voila! I feel about 200% more comfortable now that I have a rear brake.

I'm in the town of Whitefish for two nights and the weather is looking very promising with a forecast in the mid 70's (mid 20's degC) so that'll make a nice change. I also stay in the same place for two nights, so I get to do a loop of the Glacier National Park without my luggage AND a nice day.. woohoo for me!

I rode the bike back into Kalispell (about 15 miles away) to catch a movie (saw The American with George Clooney - wasn't bad, but not what I thought it would be). The weather was clear when I left, but after getting out it was dark and raining. The dark was a problem because I still had my dark visor on - which is like driving at night with your sunnies on - not real smart. So I had an interesting ride back to Whitefish - either not really see the road ahead, or have a 60 mph rain face massage. I thought it was a good idea to see the road.

Looking forward to tomorrow being a better day.... Cheers.

31.08.2010 Transport

Pic - Part of the Beartooth - descent into Red Lodge

Today was a pretty uneventful day. It was pretty much a transport day to get from Beartooth to the start of the Rockies. Somehow I managed to miss the showers that were about. Yet another day where I didn't get lost - this might become a habit!

The day started off pretty cool, but not as cold as yesterday. The first 50 miles were through very undulating hills with some great sweepers. I was out of the mountains and travelling through farmland now. Although not as spectacular as the previous few days, it was quite relaxing. After this I hit the interstate for the next 100 miles which is like driving up the Hume - boring as. At least the speed limit here is 75 mph (120 kmh), but the traffic was doing 80, so who am I to argue. I was rudely awoken from a bit of a daze by a Dodge Ram that passed me like I was standing still. I'm still not used to faster traffic passing me on the left side, so I didn't expect it. One interesting sight was an RV towing an SUV with an ATV on it. How's that for some acronyms. Back home I'm used to seeing some touring buses towing something like a Suzuki Vitara, or something similar. But over here, these huge Winnebago's are towing full sized SUV's - things the size of Territory's or Prado's. No point doing things by halves I suppose.

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I dropped in to see the Museum of the Rockies which is part of the University of Montana at Bozeman. Montana has one of the largest deposits of dinosaur fossils and have a pretty good display of them.

When I left the museum, I didn't put my earplugs back in because I wanted to grab some lunch just down the road. That's when I started to hear a noise whenever I used the back brakes, and it's a noise I'm used to hearing/feeling, but mainly on the dirt bike. That's the sound of metal on metal. Somehow I had no rear brake pads left. I dropped into the local Yamaha dealer, but they had no pads in stock, so I rode 70 miles to Helena (where I am now), but they too had none in stock. Tomorrow I'll check with another dealer about 150 miles away in Missoula to see if they've got any. Otherwise the guys from the rental company will FedEx some to me at the next place I'm staying at - 244 miles away at Whitefish - where I'm staying for two nights. Travelling on the highway without rear brakes is not too much of an issue - I've just got to remember not to use them as it will start to destroy the rear rotor. However, when travelling through the twisties, it's much nicer to be able to use the rear. I really hope I can get some tomorrow as I'm about to head into the Rockies tomorrow and don't want to be stressed about the bike.

I'll leave things off here for now... Cheers.