Bicycling the Lewis & Clark Trail
Missoula to Lincoln, MT

Tuesday, July 27, 2004
Distance Cycled: 79 miles
Vertically Climbed: 2,635 feet
Average Speed: 12.7 mph

We ate breakfast with George and Jane in the hotel lobby and then we started ridding down Broadway around 6:45 AM, the temperature was a cool 56 degrees. About 10 miles out of town we stopped to take a break and Jan and Ken showed up. They had started from Janet's house, but it didn't take long for them to catch up. Today we followed Highway 200 Mt all the way to Lincoln. For most of the 79 miles today the road was an easy grade uphill or rolling hills. The wind was constantly changing, sometimes behind, sometimes a head wind. Today was a hard day for some of us. George and Jane's bodies were giving them the runs, and on our bicycle our drag break was not working. Jim was able to fix it when we arrived at our destination. Today we again saw several dead deer along the side of the road and 4 Elk across the road.

Today was the first day we traveled without having reservations before we started. Jan and Ken arrived in town first, and found that the first motel was booked up so they found rooms for us at the Leeper's motel; the bad news was they were replacing the hot water heater in our cabin, so we did not have hot water until after 5:00.

At 5:30 we all walked down a couple of blocks to a restaurant for dinner, the restaurant did not open until 5:30 as everyone in the restaurant was busy making 35 dinners for the firefighters. There is a forest fire somewhere near here. One of the disadvantages of traveling via a bicycle, you never get to hear the news. We all had a great supper including Jim who ordered 2 orders of ribs, then we all returned to our motel rooms to get ready for the ride tomorrow over Roger's Pass.