Day 17: Malta to Glasgow, Mont

Greetings from the middle of nowhere. Typically, I’d prefer not to denigrate a small town by calling it something like that, however, it seems as though Glasgow, Montana actually has that official designation. Apparently a research team at Oxford mapped traveled distances across the globe, then the Washington Post used that data to determine what settled place in the U.S. was furthest from any city or suburb, and Glasgow took the title. You can read more here: Middle of Nowhere

Today’s riding continued the trend of our eastbound prairie riding. Again, we left early to beat the heat, turned east on 2, and pedaled for about 70 miles with tailwinds blowing us along. The scenery continued to be fields with some prairie hills. For a few miles it started to look like the Yakima Valley again, until the trees and hills faded into the distance.

The woman at the motel last night warned us that the bugs would be worse east of Malta, and it was hard to imagine how. But, she was not wrong. For the first 30 miles the bugs were not only swarming when you stopped, but chasing me at up to 15mph. It was without a doubt my least favorite 30 miles of the trip so far. A quick count at the end of the day and I can see at least 50 bug bites, though there are likely more. At one point along highway 2, I was still riding while just indiscriminately spraying bug spray on me and all around. I was determined to make it to our first town, Saco, and go inside whatever place was open just to get a break. We ended up eating a good breakfast at a great diner. The server shared that they spray the roads in Saco every morning, just so that they’re able to walk around.

After Saco, there was one more town about 12 miles down the road. We stopped there again to get an indoor break at a convenience store. The clerk there shared that we were through the worst of the bugs, that Saco was the worst place for bugs. That seemed to the be true, and for the next 30 miles, the bugs went from nightmarish to mild to normal.

We arrived in town earlier than usual, now that we are back into our more normal mileage range. We will likely have a few shorter days as we’ll turn south off of 2 after tomorrow and head toward the I-94 corridor which will take us most of the way to Minneapolis.

By the numbers:
Miles traveled: 71
Total climbing: 1138 ft
Tacos consumed: 4
Types of cheez-its purchased: 2
Ed’s average heart rate: 95
Westbound cyclists spotted: 20+

 Departing Malta this morning.

 A little break in the monochromatic scenery.

They’re serious about this designation.

Trying to map out the next few days.

More highway 2.