Salish Sea to the Potomac : Day 15: Shelby to Havre, Mont.

Last night after dinner, we walked into town and ended up at the Tap Room in Shelby, “where the beer is as cold as your ex-wife’s heart.” One review I read of the bar called it “classic old man bar” and I think that may have been fairly accurate. Everyone in the bar heard about our trip and had their own varying reactions. We did get some helpful tips from some of the patrons about where to stay and what’s on the road ahead, and learned a little bit of history from the owner, who is “Shelby-born, and Shelby buried there.” Definitely an interesting experience. And the beer was cold.

Today was a record setting day on several accounts. It was our longest mileage of the trip, our fastest pace, our hottest temperatures, and our furthest distance without any turns. We started early, as there was both high heat and afternoon storms forecast. From our motel in Shelby, we turned left onto highway 2. 103 miles later, we turned into our hotel off of highway 2.

We were worried a bit about what the road would be like, but the first 50 miles or so were excellent riding: good shoulders and/or no traffic for virtually the whole morning. Leaving Shelby, there was a warning for motorcyclists to take a different route because of road work for 9 miles. The road work ended up working in our favor. They were re-paving a stretch of road, but had already completed all but about a mile of it. And, it being Saturday, they weren’t working on the road. So, for just a mile of rough road, we had virtually no traffic for a very long stretch on highway 2.

Stopped for a second breakfast in Chester, and as we left, we could see dark clouds to our back. We kicked it into high pace. Partly to avoid the storm, but partly because winds from he storm were pushing us east. In the end, the clouds helped to cool us down, and never actually opened up on us while we were biking. We were a little bit sad when they turned north and the sun came back out over our right. From about mile 60, it really started to heat up. Thankfully there were still strong tailwinds. At mile 75, we sat underneath a town sign, in what sliver of shade it provided, and ate our snack. From there, it was hot, but we kept a good pace and only stopped once more before arriving in Havre.

Tomorrow we’ll likely take advantage of the tailwinds and push on for another long day to Malta. The towns we’ll pass through in eastern Montana definitely have an interesting theme: Inverness, Glasgow, Dunkirk. Perhaps we’ll learn more about how these names came to be.

By the numbers:
Miles traveled: 102
Average pace: 16mph
High temperature: 104F
Low temp: 55F
Slices of buttered sourdough consumed: 8
1998 6-man football champ towns passed: 1
Miles of seemingly erroneously placed rumble strips ridden through: 30?