Forty to Finish

It was hard to leave Virginia City, an authentic town full of history. If only the streets and buildings could talk. The comfortable bed, the crisp morning air, and the burden of an imminent 1,000-foot climb along the Gravelly Range in the Tobacco Root Mountains gave me pause. But it was time to go, so I did. Wendy wasn’t working the front when I walked out of the Fairweather Inn at 8:00 a.m. I rode by the Pioneer Bar and imagined the entertaining atmosphere inside that the girls described the night before. I thought about trudging through the snow in complete darkness to greet locals at the local watering hole. Citizens from Virginia City were isolated from the rest of civilization. Someday, I want to visit again with Kelley and the kids to experience the remnants of a once-thriving village of the 1860s. My blood circulated, and my body came to life once I started the big climb east of Virginia City. Clouds covered most of the morning sky directly above. In the distance, blue sky peeked through the overcast skies.

A thrilling and completely unexpected 2,000-foot drop over a 10-mile stretch down the back side of the Tobacco Root Mountains into the Madison Valley west of Ennis (population 852), Montana, immediately followed the big climb. I finally had the experience I hoped for several months before, when I’d descended the Vulture Mountains east of Wickenburg, Arizona, destination Tempe. The grand view of the snowcapped Rocky Mountains to the east and endless open plains on both sides of me was the most captivating view of the entire 4,200-mile ride. The scene was reminiscent of the 1976 American Western film The Missouri Breaks, starring Marlon Brando and filmed near Virginia City. Winding through the mountain road to the valley floor, I basked in the jubilant bliss that comes only from these moments in the backcountry, no matter how fleeting. God’s natural kaleidoscope of snowcapped mountains, sparkling river water, green pastures, sagebrush, and soil unfurled like a map before me, changing with each passing mile.

The landmarks and geographical formations can easily describe the back country, but it’s also a state of mind—a place where I found myself unbound and focused on making progress. Up the mountain. Down the back side. Toward a greater sense of inner self.

I felt confident I could surpass my speed records of 45.42 mph and 24.42 mph for a 10-mile segment because of the favorable conditions and the fact that Tank carried less weight, without panniers attached to the racks. I accelerated with each pedal rotation, more forceful than the one before. I wanted to reach 50 mph. Unfortunately, I could only muster the strength to reach 44 mph during a half-mile descent in this majestic, northern Rocky Mountain region. And more disappointing, I only averaged 20 mph on the 10-mile leg.

At 9:25 a.m., I reached the outskirts of Ennis and felt like I had passed through a time machine taking me back 100 years. American flags lined both sides of the broad central avenue through town, protruding from several storefronts. I imagined I was a color guard marching down the center of the city. Quickly, my nostalgia turned to unease when I looked up toward the east end of town at the mighty, snowcapped peaks of the Rocky Mountains, which gnawed on the horizon like teeth. Intimidated for the first time, I called Kelley. “I’m about to ride through the Rockies!” I told her, excited but anxious about what lay ahead.

Eleven miles south of Ennis, I stopped to talk to a female cyclist from New Zealand, who was traveling east to west on the TransAmerica Bike Trail. During our exchange, a male cyclist riding west joined our conversation. He was from Russia, and he told me he had passed Rolf the day before, adding, “I met Abdullah several days ago.” By this time, Abdullah had made such a huge impact on the racers, touring cyclists, and dot watchers that he’d become a living legend.

On this morning, the cycling conditions were optimal. Motorists passed infrequently. I approached an area devasted by an earthquake in 1959. A historical marker near Cameron, Montana, described the quake, which struck the Rocky Mountains measuring 7.5 on the Richter scale, the most devastating to hit the region in modern times. Quake Lake (Earthquake Lake) had formed after the earthquake occurred, generating an 80-million-ton landslide. The quake destroyed several homes and killed 28 people.52

Today, on the southern tip of Quake Lake, is Hebgen Lake, a man-made lake that expands about 15 miles from Quake Lake to the northern boundary of West Yellowstone, Montana. Beautiful log cabin homes were perched high, overlooking the lake, with the rugged, snowcapped mountains in the background. I often visualized leading a humble existence holed up in a log cabin, sipping coffee on the front porch during the morning calmness, waiting for the sun to rise and the birth of a new day. It was beyond my imagination on this day that three months after returning home to New Jersey in October 2019, Kelley and I would purchase a log cabin on Torch Lake, Michigan. Now, coffee on the porch is no longer just a dream.