Across the Bitterroots

Moon over my camp south of Lost Trail Pass

I didn’t feel half bad considering that I’d pedaled 100 miles the day before.

It was another shivery morning, but I was able to spare myself some suffering by warming my hands in an electric drier inside the camp bathroom. Spoiled.

I definitely felt stiff as I got back on the bike but the air was invigorating. The road followed a riparian zone of trees and farmland below the sparse, arid hills above. In a few miles, I came upon a sign marking the 45^th parallel — exactly halfway between the equator and the North Pole. It brought me back to childhood summers in Rangeley, Maine, which happens to be at the same latitude and has a colorful sign up outside of the Pine Tree Frosty to mark the invisible line.

While Rangeley was a couple thousand miles to the east of me, I was excited to pull into Salmon, Idaho, which I’d already heard stories about over the summer. Specifically, I’d heard about the Salmon River, a.k.a The River of No Return, with its hardcore whitewater. I’d join fellow raft guides around someone’s laptop and watch hours of rafts and kayaks going up against the massive waves, rocks and keeper holes, often getting stranded, flipped and generally carned-out by the river’s fury.

I counted down the mile marks to Salmon with growing anticipation. My priorities included buying some real food at a grocery store, and maybe grabbing some Internet time for myself as well.

Going back on the busy roads was a bit of a shock after having minimal traffic for over a hundred miles. Cities also tend to have steeper hills than wussy highway grades, so I found myself puffing hard to get to the supermarket, which was maybe a hundred feet of climb from the river in the center of town.

I'm always crossing the line

I loaded up way more food than I needed and set off for a quiet riverside park where I could gorge myself in peace.

I discovered that my brakes were getting worn when I went back down the hill and found that it took much longer than it should have to come to a complete stop at an intersection. It occurred to me that this might be something I’d want to look at before I went down the next mountain pass.

That was, if I could make myself stay in town that long.

Being amongst civilization again was disorienting rather than reassuring. Suddenly, I couldn’t just take a leak wherever. I had to worry about colliding with people and vehicles again. I felt self-conscious about my oddball bike rig with all the gear hanging off as well as my scraggly appearance. I sat alone at a picnic table by the river where I ate more food than most people go through in a day.

It was about 45 miles to reach the Montana border in the north. I didn’t know if I’d be able to make it over the 7,000-foot Lost Trail Pass that day, but I was already feeling restless with the time that I’d spent in town. I decided to skip the library or finding a good bike shop in town. It could wait until Missoula.

Salmon River, looking north toward the Bitterroot Mountains

I left town under a broiling sun, feeling bloated and lethargic after the picnic table food binge.

The Salmon River was a beautiful traveling companion. It wound blue and sparkling through the dry hills and canyon cliffs. I’d see fly fishermen here and there standing out in waders. One thing I didn’t see was Epic River Carnage: no massive standing waves or homicidal cataracts. The most adrenaline I could see in this section was little fast water riffles, which would barely make Class I.

Every once in a while, I’d see the familiar sight of a trailer loaded down with rafts, but none of them were in the water. The good stuff must have been somewhere else.

Landscape shot near the Salmon River

My showdown with the Bitterroot Mountains started with a gradual incline on the way to Lost Pass at the Montana border. For several miles, I kept going up steadily. I stopped at a couple historical signs to catch my breath and get water. The Lewis and Clark Expedition had been in the neighborhood when they’d crossed the Continental Divide. Being on a known map and more or less contained within civilization, I felt a bit coiffed compared to these grizzled historic forebears. No doubt, Meriwether Lewis had smelled a fair stretch worse than I did at this point in his expedition.

Camping looked like it might be an issue. The road was hemmed in by private summerhouses, which made me worry about finding find a tent site without trespassing.

The got steeper, and soon I was in low gear standing up on the pedals. The road switched back again, and again. When was I going to be in Montana?

As tired as I was, I still thought I might be able to crank it the rest of the way up the pass by nightfall. I even went past a turnoff to a national forest campground so that I could make more distance. After a couple more miles of grinding uphill struggle, I decided that Montana could wait another day. I'd done close to 80 miles.

The best place I could find that wasn’t on an impossibly steep slope or in someone’s backyard was a patch of forest in the edge of a new subdivision. I dragged my bike over a guardrail and guided it past the trees with plastic ribbons around their trunks. In another year, my tent-site might be the living room for yet another roadside mcmansion.

I started the next morning with a five-mile grind up to the 7,000-foot Lost Trail Pass into Montana. Each time I got to the top of a switchback, I expected to see the top — only to see more road winding up ahead of me.

Several drivers coming down from Montana shot me thumbs-ups and gave me inspirational honks. It was late morning by the time I reached the crest of the hill.

There was a visitor station and a small ski resort set up on the border. If I’d have wanted to bike a couple miles out of my way, I could have made it to the Continental Divide, but decided I’d rather use that time to get closer to Missoula, which was 90 miles to the north.

One important priority I took care of was checking my brakes. I adjusted the clamps so that even if they weren’t the best, they would put out enough drag so I could slow down and steer myself out of trouble. I practiced stopping a couple times, took a deep breath, and then started down the other side of the pass.

Finally!

The rhythm of the wheels turning blurred into a constant thrum and I felt my eyes tearing up in the wind. I didn’t turn a pedal, but every muscle was clenched as I flew down the curves. It was awesome.

I tried to use the brakes as little as possible. I leaned hard on the curves (though maybe not as hard as I would have if I’d been riding without gear.) Sometimes, I let myself drift over center line in order to make a turn. Every gram of my concentration was locked on the asphalt stretch in front of me, the dashes on the pavement coming at me slowly at first, than speeding up, finally rushing past in a blur of gray and yellow.

The mountain forests gave way to farmland. I’d gone through 10 miles without pedaling a whit. The next four miles were a more gradual downhill and I barely worked at all.

The road eventually flattened out to a scenic ride along the Clark Fork River. The Bitterroot Mountains towered to the west.

One thing that I wasn’t a fan of was the traffic. Vehicles coming and going from their ranches and vacation houses flew by my left side. There was precious little margin to work with and it cut into my enjoyment.

As I worked my way further north, I found bigger towns with strip malls and cars backed up with stoplights.

Fortunately, there was an intermittent bike trail that let me avoid some of the mayhem. Even so, I found a tough wind that started shoving me around. I started to slow down.

It got later and later in the afternoon, and all I could find was commercial development and nothing that was available for camping without going way off course. It'd been about 85 miles so far. I was so tired that it was turning into a colossal effort just to go another mile

Bitterroot Mountains as seen from Montana

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Finally, I took a road to a recreation area in a canyon to the west. There was no camping allowed, a sign explained. Well, screw it.

I trundled my bike up steep bluff where I hoped it would stay out of sight and set to getting my tent set up. Of course, as soon as I set to work, I saw a couple hikers coming down the other side.

I sort of shrugged my shoulders at what I was doing. They moved on. I didn’t think they were about to turn me in.

Finally, I threw my bag inside my tent and fell into the sleep of the dead. 

Camp: undisclosed location, south of Missoula