Tuesday, July 8, 2008 – Day 16

Start: Hardin, Montana
End: Sheridan, Wyoming
Today's Miles: 94.28 Total Miles: 1,154.70 BRAA Total Miles: 1,071.30
Time: 5 hours 54 minute (avg 15.9 MPH)
Flat tire count today: 1 Total flat tires for the ride: 5

This morning was a cold one. I woke up at about 3 AM and I was ready to break out my third blanket. I didn’t though. I just went back to sleep because I was too tired to dig it out of my bag. When we all got up around 5 AM to start packing up, many were wearing their warm gear to get the day started. I didn’t take my jacket since I was pretty sure it would warm up quickly and I didn’t want to have to carry it all day long. As I suspected, it warmed up nicely. It was a great riding day. Just the right temperature – not too hot and not too cold.

There were two milestones we reached today. The first came about 12 miles into the ride. We have officially logged 1,000 miles! My mile count is higher due to additional miles riding around the local areas, but the official total finally made it over the 1,000 mile mark. This has only taken us 13 riding days to accomplish and we are right on schedule now that we are one third of the way through the ride.

I have been talking to several people about Montana being so against Meth. There are billboards all over the place telling people to not try it – not even once. I wanted to show everyone what one of these signs looked like. As I was heading out of Montana, I saw this one painted on the side of a building. The picture states “Meth Means Death”. This is the slogan that was used on the billboards as well.

Right before heading out of Montana, we went through the Little Bighorn Battlefield. There was a park that had some small animal monuments and a larger one of The Mystic Warrior. There were a lot of American Indian related statues and other things to look at throughout the battlefield.

Our second milestone was reaching our fourth state – Wyoming. We are finally out of Montana. Montana is a beautiful state, but we were there nine nights and that was enough for me on this trip. We will be staying three nights in Wyoming, which I am sure will go by real fast.

I did get another flat today. That makes five total for the trip. Tony stopped to make sure I had everything I needed to fix it. We then rode the rest of the day together. I am sure I slowed him down at times, but overall we seemed to do pretty well together. Especially through most of Wyoming. We were cruising pretty fast – averaging about 25 MPH for about 15 miles. Here is a cool picture of Tony riding toward what looks like a never ending journey.