Last night, we had a very unique dining experience at the Cattle Baron Supper Club in Babb. We weren’t sure what to expect, but it ended up being an excellent meal in a beautiful, hand built wooden lodge. There appeared to be multiple generations of the family working at the supper club, and it was nearly full by the time we were leaving. After conferring with some locals nearby and folks who are familiar with the area, it is apparently quite well known and popular. The only other establishment in Babb, the cafe across the street from our motel, was closed this morning, so we pieced together a breakfast from the general store before heading northwest on our bikes back into Glacier.
Since Columbia Falls, we’ve been following the Adventure Cycling Association’s Northern Tier route, which goes from Anacortes to Bar Harbor. Adventure Cycling does an excellent job of picking scenic routes and quiet roads where possible. The stretch of the Northern Tier from West Glacier to Cut Bank, Mont. has a few different alternatives, but the main route takes a long, curvy route up through Alberta. If you were following our GPS route today you may have noticed that for some time we were heading almost due west. Although we were a little skeptical about whether this major diversion was really worth it, the roads today proved it to be worth our energy. They were quiet, and we continued the spectacular views of the mountains for about 40 miles of up and down climbing through Glacier and Waterton Parks. Admittedly, we thought our days of hard climbing were over, but we started ascending almost straight out of Babb and did not get a break until well after the border crossing. Big differences today were that there was hardly any traffic and good shoulders. Winds were definitely out of the west, which meant some headwinds during our morning climbs but also, as the customs officer at the border had foretold, we had an excellent tailwind from Waterton Village all the way to Cardston. We stopped for lunch in Mountain View and met a few local cyclists who had been riding into the wind. They didn’t have exciting things to say about the miles we have ahead of us, but we were expecting a significant change in scenery and, after leaving Waterton, we can see that it is swiftly approaching.
I keep a bag of foreign currency at home to take with me when I travel internationally. I also seem to forget every time I go abroad to actually bring said currency with me. This time, I remembered to grab some Canadian cash before we left. However, being weight conscious, I opted only to bring paper cash. Today in Mountain View, I went to pay for our drinks and the server gawked at my 2-dollar Canadian bill. She called it a ‘relic’ and proved it had been out of circulation for some time by showing it to the teenaged fry cook who asked if it was real Canadian money. She traded it for a “two-ney”. Hopefully I was not swindled out of a valuable collector’s item.
Cardston is an interesting town. It was settled by Mormons in the 19th century and is still more than 80% Mormon. It is also a dry town, so there is no alcohol sold in any of the shops or restaurants. Apparently they voted as recently as 2014 to remain this way.
Tomorrow we will head back into Montana, hopefully staying in Shelby for the night. After that, we’ll be headed east across Montana, North Dakota, and in a few weeks into Minnesota.
(Note: I’ve added the photos from yesterday's ride that I couldn’t upload last night to that post)
By the numbers:
Distance Traveled: 96km / 60mi
Total climbing: 1040m / 3409ft
Number of summits over 1500m / 5000ft: 6
Sovereign nations traveled through: 3
National Parks Visited: 2
Plates of poutine: 1
Just over the border into Alberta.
Some of our unexpected climbing.
So the LDS people made you dry out for a night! Good for them. LOL Poutine AND fried chicken fingers are truly hard to imagine for a lunch but following them with bike riding makes me shudder! My dear Canadian friend agreed! LOL Pictures look great.
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