Written by Dave

Day 16 – June 13 – 47 Miles, 1,150 feet climbing (Grangeville to Lowell)

Back to regular old human generated content today. Sorry, no Phil Ligget suitcases of pain. Rather than racing uphill, today we had a short riding day that included much less climbing. I tried to convince Chris that today could be called an active rest day but that fell flat when we hit the first little rise that included a 10% gradient.

We could have ridden out of Grangeville on Highway 13 but Komoot and Adventure cycling found us some nearly deserted back-paddock farm roads. The grasses and other crops were in full bloom. We think that the bright yellow fields were rapeseed but no one bothered to get out a phone and ask Google. Remember, today was supposed to be low technology, AI free. Regardless what plant it was, we enjoyed taking a lot photos as it was all very scenic.

At the end of the farm road section we routed back to the highway on a crazy steep downhill called Lambs Grade. I read -15% on my cyclo-computer the one time I dared take my eyes off the road. I can’t imagine west bound riders using our maps and riding up Lambs. Everyone let out a “phew” when they reached the bottom, our disk rotors were all pinging from the heat.

Not much later we stopped in the small berg of Stites looking for a restroom and water. We stopped at the town park after finding restrooms but no water. At the park we met another Chris, a nice young man from Vancouver BC, who is also riding across the USA. We also met the mayor of Stites, Gerry Cathey. The mayor was happy to chat with us and told us all about the town and surrounding industry. We asked him why the water tap was locked to which he said “we need to unlock that”. Everyone chuckled when we asked him if we needed to check with the mayor to get that actioned.

After our break we headed off together towards Lowell and Three Rivers campground. Somewhere along the way we lost track of Pete. The rest of us took a wrong turn adding a few extra miles and we assumed that Pete was ahead of us. The four of us thoroughly enjoyed the 22 mile ride up the Clearwater Rivers (South Fork, then Middle Fork), even though we rode hard trying to catch Pete. It turns out that Pete was behind us and we should have ridden slower, not faster. Not to worry ultimately as we all arrived at the Three Rivers Café well before the 2PM closing time. Hard as it is to believe, all 5 of us rode faster than the lightly loaded Chris from BC. Like Pete, however, he made it to Three Rivers safely. It just goes to show you, whatever your pace, at the end of the day everyone makes it to the bar in time for stories.

Camp is nice, if not a little overpriced compared to previous camps. We are filling four of the tent sites, Chris from BC has one and the other two are filled by rafters. So, location does matter. All of us, including Chris from BC hit the onsite restaurant for dinner where Nancy and I both had the spaghetti special. They had very few other choices, which is something we think we’ll see more of as we head east. Tomorrow we head further up the Clearwater River towards Lolo Pass. Chris has negotiated us tent camping on the lawn of Lochas Lodge – should be a good day.