Trans-America Bike Trek with Ken Powley

La Push is a very quiet and small town, occupied primarily by the Quileute tribe of native Americans. The Pacific, here is numbingly cold - colder I think than the coastal waters of Maine, which I had dipped my toes in a few years earlier.

Logging trucks roll by regularly, seemingly oblivious to posted speed limits. An older man who used to drive one tells me, "Ain't nothin' no more. Usta be 500 loads a day comin' outta Forks." Forks is a very small town just south of La Push.

Still, the road is littered, for miles and miles, with shards of tree bark and chips of wood, and the sound of buzz saws oozes out of the thick woods on either side of me.

People in the area are extremely friendly, but also bitter and vocal about the government's curtailing of the logging industry about 10 years ago. Saving the spotted owl was at the center of the controversy. A local artist's work hangs on the wall of a convenience store. One piece depicts an owl hung by the neck from a tree, bearing the caption, "Support the spotted owl . . . with a rope." There are other pieces of similar nature, like the logging truck carrying a load of spotted owls, captioned, "Try building a house out of this."

On another note, I've learned that my favorite way of determing that there's a headwind (which there was most of today) is when the aroma of freshly baked pastries hits you BEFORE you pass the pastry shop.

Crescent Lake. This 12 mile long, 600 foot deep jewel was carved by glaciers about 10,000 years ago. Its long, slender shape, surrounded by immense cliffs, is reminiscent of the fjord-like features of Scandinavia.

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Olympic National Park dominates the Olympic Peninsula, featuring rain forests, glaciers and rugged coastlines.

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First day of the bike trek ends in Port Angeles, on the Straight of Juan de Fuca.

Route 101 follows the northern coast of the Olympic Peninsula, and is for the most part, a busy, industrial highway. It passes through portions of what is called the rain shadow. The mountains that squeeze Pacific moisture from the air and drop copious amounts of water on the Olympic rain forests to the south and west, are the same mountains that eclipse towns like Sequim (pronounced Skwim) to the north and east. Sequim, downwind of the Olympics, averages only 17 inches of rain each year, and is an arid desert climate. Several dozens of miles away, a hundred inches of rain falls into a thick, mossy rain forest.

Tomorrow's ride turns east toward the Cascades, leaving behind the coastal plain and the ever-present scent of salt.

Route 20 cuts north through the center of Whidbey Island in the direction of Anacortes. Separating the island from the Mainland is a chasm about 500 feet deep, and several hundred feet across. The passage was discovered by George Vancouver in 1792. Observing the rapid flow of water through the pass, he concluded he'd discovered the mouth of a major river leading inland. Soon, however, the tides changed and the flow of water reversed course. He realized he'd been deceived by the tidal flow - hence, the name, Deception Pass.

You'll see a photograph of the Deception Pass bridge on the cover of many Atlases and travel magazines.

Also today, an impressive view approaching Port Townsend, overlooking the harbor and the channel to Whidbey Island which is reached only by ferry service from the southern shore. Docked in Port Townsend today is the exact replica of the ship used by explorer John Cook to circumnavigate the globe. Also, fortunately, a friendly bike shop where my newly installed gears could be adjusted, along with some other minor maintenance.

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Day Three . . . Burlington, WA to Colonial Creek Campground, WA (10 miles east of Newhalem)

Burlington is the last "city" we will see for the day . . . for many days, likely. Several miles east of town, mountains seem to form a barrier across the entire eastern horizon. "The Cascades?" I ask, almost rhetorically. "No, those are just the foothills. The mountains begin another hundred miles east." I try not to let my legs hear this. But it is too late. They instantly feel heavy, sluggish. And the pace slows.

Route 29 is known as the Northern Cascades Highway. So far, it has been a pleasant surprise - wide shouldered, smooth surfaced, and not extremely heavily trafficked. The season for Winnebagos and mini vans ended with Labor Day and the logging rigs are noticeably absent. Tiny towns roll by, each a bit smaller than the last. We are following the Skagit River Valley, and now the "foothills" tower over us on all four sides. At their peaks, pockets of old, dirty snow resemble sand traps liberally arranged on an impossible, unplayable golf course. Last year's record snowpack has been unusually late disappearing. Still, we are sweating under an 80-plus degree heat, and a slight but relentless incline.

To our left, a real peak pokes its head above the foothills. What look like glaciers coat the southern face of Mt. Baker. I remember hearing that name on the news just a few weeks ago - set the world record for most snow in a 12 month period - 1140 inches, I think.

The Skagit carries the distinctive blue-green color that signifies glacial origins. The immense pressure of grinding ice pulverizes the rock at the glacier's base, forming a substance called loess. And this, I am told, creates the cold coloring of so many rivers in the Cascades.

Lunch is taken in Concrete, WA. the tiniest town yet, just a single block long, it sits quietly and well hidden just a few hundred yards west of the main highway. An enormous "Welcome to Concrete" sign is painted on five immense concrete silos. I guessed that I knew the town's principle industry. An innocuous looking cafe centered the town's singular strip of storefronts. Opening the door I was concrete.jpg (24244 bytes)

greeted by a beautifully designed and decorated room, knotty pine and glass surfaces everywhere. Skylights and vaulted ceilings, passages to enclosed exterior decks, gallery-style works of art on every wall, and greenery growing everywhere. It had the look and feel of a Central Park cafe done in a western motif, and the food did nothing to detract from the resemblance. Clam chowder - perfectly prepared; a garden salad that looked more like a still-life painting than something edible; and a sandwich garnished with daintily sliced strawberries, grapes and melon. I am still savoring the look and the flavor of the place, and wondering what it is doing tucked away in Concrete, Washington.

We stock up on fruit, Snicker bars and fluids. Towns ahead are scarce, and small, and possibly foodless.

The Skagit River Canyon near Newhalem. Newhalem is a town constructed by Seattle City Light Company to house employees who operate the Skagit hydropower project . . . a series of three dams and reservoirs that provide much of the electrical power to northwestern Washington. The town is reminiscent of a Pennsylvania coal town, but much cleaner, more vibrant, and plopped in the center of a postcard setting.

Route 20 now rises from the river valley and climbs to dizzying heights over the gorge. Sections of the Skagit dewatered by the project are directly below us, a jumble of boulders that for nearly 90 years now, have yearned for the chance to create again the ferocious whitewater that once was their purpose. I keep reminding myself. We are only in the foothills.

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Climbing . . . climbing . . . climbing. Up to and above the tree line, and eventually, the snow line. Washington Pass is the first great obstacle of The Cascades. The pass was formed when two glaciers in adjoining valleys gradually wore away opposite sides of the same land mass and merged. Still, the pass is over 5500 feet above sea level. Couldn't resist frolicking in the snow, in a blazing 80 degree sun. The air is definitely thinner here, and temperatures jump from 40 degrees in the shade to over 80 in the sun. Makes it hard to know what to wear when you're passing between sun and shade all day.

Last night was our first night camping. We pulled into the campsites just before dark. It was chilly, and smoky . . . all the campfire smoke hung low over the grounds, unable to lift out due to thermal inversion. It was quite cold overnight . . . so I piled on several layers of clothes and woke up sweating. Nothing beats a really good sleeping bag!

60 miles separated towns today, so it was after 4:00 PM til we had our first real meal. Up til then, just fruit and old pastries and power bars and water and Gatorade . . . by the gallons!

We pulled into Winthrop about dusk. To my surprise it looks like Dodge City . . . wooden plank sidewalks, with every building in the wooden architecture of the wild west. Apparently, at one time, over 95% of the residents were employed by a sawmill operation that was forced to go out of business. The sawmill donated money to a trust for the town so that it could remake itself as a tourist destination, which it has done quite successfully. Can't walk around here without feeling as though you should have a horse and be wearing a cowboy hat and spurs.

Drop offs of a thousand feet or more in every direction. Snow scattered everywhere, and great trips of evergreens absent from the mountainsides, victims of prior years' avalanches. A ferocious climb to get there, but worth it.

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A Day of surprising diversity. We left Winthrop a bit reluctantly. It would've been a delightful place to spend a rainy day, picking up stories about the town's colorful past, and visiting its very unusual shops and attractions. Instead, we were on the road by 7 o'clock, bundled heavily to fight off the early morning chill. The 10 mile (downhill) ride to Twisp was, how shall we say, invigorating. I've learned to try to reach as close as possible to the base of the next day's major climb, before calling it quits in the evening. A good steep climb first thing in the morning is the best antidote for nearly freezing morning temps.

Breakfast in Twisp was at the "Antlers" restaurant. The decor was . . . varied. The Antlers anchors the one-block town, and had the look of an arcade slash tavern slash music hall slash pool room slash family dining slash bingo hall slash taxidermy shop. An enormous breakfast under our belts, we emerged to find the early morning chill replaced by a pleasantly warm sun. Several miles south of Twisp, Tom turned to the south and west, following the Methow River valley in the direction of Seattle, and I turned north and east, beginning the 12 mile climb to the top of Loup Loup Pass. Unlike Washington Pass, the tree line appeared at a much lower altitude. The green valley now behind me, I was climbing into an arid altitude that supported little growth. The sun, which had been a welcome source of warmth just a few hours earlier, now cooked everything in its shadowless sights. The long descent into the valley east of Loup Loup brought little relief from the dusty dryness of eastern Washington. Irrigation systems spread out in every direction, in support of thousands of acres of Washington's finest apple orchards. Mexican restaurants dominated the small villages that dotted Route 20; and a gathering of Mexican men practiced volleyball drills alongside a tattered net surrounded by columns of wooden boxes soon to be filled and shipped. I had noticed that logging trucks had been gradually replaced by semi's piled high with these enormous crates, and now realized what they held.

The valley here was defined by harsh brown bluffs, and I collided with my first tumbleweed just west of Okanogan. The look and feel of Wyoming's highlands persisted all the way to Tonasket, except for what seemed to be selected zones of agriculture, where apple orchards survived and flourished against all odds. Dust devils danced behind each passing truck; the full rivers of the western Cascades, where we'd earlier watched rafters and kayakers floating between lush green forests and snowcapped peaks, seemed worlds away.

I pushed a little harder to reach Tonasket before dark. This little trucking town sits at the western base of Wauconda Pass. No chilly downhill ride in the early morning hours of tomorrow. Slowly, I'm learning.

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Day Six . . . Tonasket, WA to Republic, WA

An early start was important if I was to climb Wauconda Pass and Sherman Pass on the same day. By 6:30, the climb out of Tonasket was well underway. I imagined from the color of blue overhead that the sun had broken the horizon, but mountains straight ahead of me would block it out for at least another hour or two.

"Caution - Range Area" was the warning on a sign a short distance into the ride. I'd seen the same sign miles earlier, and rode head lowered, assuming I was passing a shooting range or perhaps a military target range. But the present hilly terrain made this seem unlikely. A family of grouse flushed from the tall grass alongside me. And thoughts of the warning sign left me until, about an hour later, the road ahead appeared occupied by a dozen or so cows. Larger than cows, actually. They were huge creatures that looked to be half steer, half bison, half grizzly bear. I later learned that many of the grazing ranges here in the Okanogan Valley are the original ranges laid out in the 1840's when the area was first settled, and that many of them, even today, lack fencing or boundaries. A staring contest with the cattle produced no useful results, so I resorted to my best imitation of cow-talk. Eventually, the nasal, groany sounds I served up turned heads, evoked an audible reply, and the animals wandered off the road as a group.

Impressed with my good fortune with the cows, I tried talking to horses later in the day, but they uniformly ignored me. I've concluded that horses are smarter than cows.

My sense of being in 'cowboy country" is reinforced by the names of the places I pass . . . Ponderosa Motel, Stallion Lounge, Stampede Inn. I had earlier eaten lunch at the Western Restaurant and Lucky Spurs Lounge. A not-so-edible entree left me wondering exactly what kind of luck the Spurs Lounge offered.

The climb toward Wauconda flattened into a high plateau. Unlike the broad orchard valleys I had seen yesterday, this plain was bordered by low rolling hills, leaving it, and me, exposed to a gusty headwind that bent the tall brown grasses, and that slowed my pace to less than 5 mph on level ground. The idea of reaching Sherman Pass seemed more unlikely with each burst of wind.

The level terrain made me think I might be near the top, but eventually, the road pitched up again, pinched between taller hills that protected against the worst of the wind. Uphill, my pace quickened to a still disappointing 8 mph.

The 'village' of Wauconda offered a single cafe which after the morning's climb, seemed an irresistible stop. Inside, two older men sat, foodless, in conversation. I took a seat at the counter, close enough to hear them discussing next year's crop, the purchase of solar panels for power, John Elway's retirement, and all kinds of Y2K stuff.

One man, a boxer in his youth, and now a melon farmer, was quite large, with a rounded face and rounder belly. The other was thin, a bearded fellow with a remarkable facial resemblance to Charles Manson - but with a warm smile and a soft, sincere voice.

Before long, I had joined them, and we traded stories for over an hour. I glanced at my watch, realizing that the time I spent here ruled our Sherman Pass. It would have to wait. We had yet to cover vital territory, like the role of migrant workers in Okanogan County, and the fate of the world after December 31st, and the disaster of NAFTA to family farmers, and the gems of wisdom found in eastern religions.

The bearded one surprised me with his insights on philosophy and physics and politics and religion. To hear him speak, he was very well-read. He could never quite remember exactly where he read it, but he cited his uncertain sources for each of his points, many of which I found myself agreeing with.

Somewhere during our chat, the ex boxer wandered outside. I noticed him through the cafe window, rummaging through the back of his pickup. When he returned, he held out a cantaloupe, asking, "Like melons?"

"Love 'em," I answered. It was true, but I'm certain I'd have lied even if I hated them. "Here," he offered. I could do nothing but accept, and soon found myself searching for space in my already filled pannier bags for this most unlikely of traveling fruits. I asked the cafe owner hopefully, "how much farther to the top?"

"Just that way," she said, signaling with her hands that the peak was just up the road. I secured my edible bowling ball, thanked my lunchmates and wished them well, and headed east, forgetting that in these parts, "just up the road" can be a long long way. In this case, it was a 4 mile straight-up climb in a gear not suited for hauling cantaloupes. I was very grateful he hadn't offered me a watermelon, of which there were many in his pickup.

I called it a day by mid afternoon, in Republic, WA, spending an hour with the local barber, another with the local bike shop owner, and another with the owner of the Frontier Motel . . . all good people, full of stories, and eager to share them.

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Day Seven . . . Republic, WA. to Flodell Creek Campground (20 miles east of Colville, WA.)

For a reason I do not understand, it seemed I was focused on sounds rather than on sights, all day today. It started on the long climb up Sherman Pass - 22 miles up - to the last in a series of very high hurdles.

The road zip zagged in a way that allowed the sound of groaning trucks to reach me while they were still several miles back. The noises they made reached across the open spaces between me and the portion of hillside they still occupied. Without being fully conscious of it, I realized that I was able to distinguish the sound of a logging rig, from say, a quarry truck or a heavy equipment carrier (of which there were many).

I could hear each shift, each double clutch, sometimes as much as 10 minutes before the author of such sounds lumbered around the curve nearest to me and came into my mirror's view.

A constant companion today (perhaps other days too, though I don't recall it) was the melody of utterances from a brook that flowed within feet of my route, usually just off my right shoulder. Sometimes the brook was in plain view; more often, it was hidden by the steep drop-off from the road, or by dense underbrush up against the shoulder of the road. I gradually learned the subtle differences between the sound of water dribbling slowly over dozens of scattered rocks; the sound of water constricted into a narrower channel, dropping over a single rock-edge and plunging deep underneath itself; the sound of a vertical drop off, water free falling onto a rocky base; the dripping sound of seepage whose source was the rock cliff overshadowing the brook; and the jumbled symphony of sounds that played up from a longer stretch of rapids.

Then there was the sound of a family of songbirds, well hidden in a tree off to my left . . . the gentle t-toot from a trucker who wanted me to know he couldn't slide left . . . the rustle of a hundred blackbirds scrambling to evacuate the tall reeds off to my right . . . the metallic ping of roadside guardrails, expanding in the sudden warmth of the day's first light . . . the wind in my ears . . . the cli-clacking of thousands, millions, of grasshoppers who take flight to avoid my skinny tires . . . the rhythm of my pedal strokes and the hum of each tire on asphalt . . . the crunchy sound of sand and small pebbles underneath me . . . the gleeful honking from a van laden with bicycles, offering a thumbs-up as it whisked by me at the crest of Sherman Pass . . . and the dead, dead silence of the White Mountain forest, scorched by wildfire, and still struggling to regain life.

And now, in the silent black of the Colville National Forest, my breathing, and the electronic ping of each keystroke.

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Today's principal enjoyment was the unusual sensation of forward momentum. For the first time in many days, there were no difficult climbs. I broke camp at 6:30 this morning, and descended off the high plateau east of Colville into the Pend Oreille River Valley.

An unusual convergence of logging trucks surrounded me coming off the eastern side of the Pend Oreille River timber.jpg (35406 bytes)

bridge. They approached from the east and west, as well as from the north and south. I recall thinking that they seemed to be swarming now like a hive of honeybees (only a bit larger and more dangerous). Several miles later, I discovered the hive itself . . . a Boise Cascade Wood Products Division facility . . . where the heavy laden rigs lined up to deposit their cargo, while others left empty to retrieve more product.

The remainder of the day offered a pleasant (no hills) cruise alongside the river. Near Newport, I crossed into Idaho, and lingered a while at the border, savoring the psychological victory of having reached another state. My odometer read 580 at the crossing.

Runners-up: Eagle's nest perched atop a flat platform installed on the top of a telephone pole; and a family of wild turkeys who strutted single file across the road in front of me, the last in line barely missing the spokes of my front tire.

Much of the day included sections of the Kalispel Indian Reservation. Now, in Sandpoint, Montana is within half a day's reach.

Have decided to push a little harder while the weather is clear, and the terrain rather flat. I'm getting excited about Glacier National Park. It's 3 days east. Everything I read about it tells me it will be a highlight of this trip.

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I recall earlier thinking that Montana might be disappointing, anti-climactic, after the eye-popping vistas of the northern Cascades. I couldn't have been more wrong.

Sandpoint Idaho was a bit disappointing . . . a little too touristy, too developed, too pretentious. The lake itself (Pend Oreille Lake) which is the major attraction of the Sandpoint area, is attractive, and the 20+ mile ride around its perimeter gave some splendid views. Among the most interesting was the eastern extremity of the lake, marshy, teeming with wildlife. Hundreds of ducks and geese take flight as I roll past.

Leaving Idaho, there is no "Welcome" to Montana. There is, however, a noticeable change. The valleys broaden out, the surrounding mountains grow in stature, and the ride along Rt 56, beside Bull River, is especially satisfying, but in a different way.

In the Cascades, views were spectacular, but in a way that reminded you that you were a visitor, an outsider. Surroundings were often harsh, stark, steep and rocky.

Here, in the high valleys of western Montana, the scenery simply absorbs you . . . makes you melt into it and feel a part of it. It is warm and comfortable, visually and other wise.

A motorist stopped to ask my destination. She and her husband had earlier graduated from UC Berkley, and moved here 25 years ago . . . and would never leave. I can see why. Like a painting perfectly framed, the Bull River is bordered by vast meadows and forests; and they in turn, by mountain ranges that are picturesque but (like the perfect picture frame) not so dominating as to detract from the subject.

MOST IMPRESSIVE VIEW: The rapids of the Kootenai River, near Libby, MT. This area was originally occupied by Kootenai Indians, a peaceful tribe who suffered terribly at the hands of their principal enemy, the Blackfeet, who'd cross the Continental Divide to periodically wreak havoc, steal horses and take scalps.

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The sky's not the only thing big in Big Sky country. They seem to grow everything here big . . . even the buzzards. I startled a cluster of the scavengers who take flight just in front of me. I half expect them to carry off the carcass they're methodically dismantling. Their wingspans are enormous, easily wider than my outstretched arms. They circle in a way that reminds me of Jurrasic Park, and for several miles, I keep an eye on the woods on either side of me just in case other prehistoric relics make their home here. My imagination is dashed when a white husky darts from a hay barn and gives chase.

I realize how very little (mammalian) wildlife I've seen. A few deer, and a little black squirrel-sized thing that looked as if its hair were electrified. Presumably, I've just pedaled through an area inhabited by big horn sheep, mountain goats, mule deer, black bears and 15 grizzlies. (Wonder who does the census work on this.) They all must avoid Route 2.

Either that, or they're holed up in a casino somewhere. Virtually every restaurant, gas station and mini-mart includes a gambling room. In Washington, gambling is permitted only on Indian reservations. Here, every business can offer it, and it shows up on every block of every street of even the tiniest towns.

MOST IMPRESSIVE VIEW: Loon Lake, one of dozens that dot the landscape between Libby and Kalispel.

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A broad flat basin ringed by high peaks surrounds Kalispel and Columbia Falls, 15 miles to the north and east. Just north of Columbia Falls, Rt 486 nuzzles up against the mountains and provides some welcome relief from the still strong headwinds. Back on Route 2 again, there are hints of something important ahead . . . a string of elaborate log cabin gift shops, a heliport offering tours, several whitewater rafting outfits, and the first views of the rivers of ice that still grace the peaks of Glacier National Park. glacierpk.bmp (299430 bytes)

It is claimed that the glaciers continue to recede at a rate that will leave them extinguished in about a thousand years. In their wake, they have already carved out impressive gorges and left terminal moraines capable of trapping enormous finger-shaped lakes. This section of highway, I am told, usually closes around the middle of September, and on rare occasions, as late as early October. But there is no hint of winter yet. And the Winnebagos continue to roll into and out of the park in sometimes endless streams.

I decide to make it a shorter cycling day, partly blaming it on the wind, but secretly, just wanting to linger here and soak up the place. Camping at Avalanche Pass looks appealing. I'll settle in there and look forward to an early morning climb to Logan Pass.

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I remember the last time I watched a documentary about climbing Mt. Everest, when they reached the top, everyone said they felt as if they were sitting on top of the world. I had a little of that feeling today. Of course, they had it at 20-some thousand feet above sea level; I had it at a mere 6500 feet. Still, I'm left in awe of this very special place. I'm sitting with my back against a rock cliff, my left leg west of the continental divide, my right leg east of it. Presumably, if I were to turn into water, my right side would end up in the Atlantic, while my left side would find itself in the Pacific.

The climb to this spot was spectacular. The first 10 miles of the climb are easy. They follow McDonald Creek, which is the glacial outflow forming McDonald Lake, one of the largest in the park.

Eventually, the narrow park road leaves the creek and heads seriously higher, at a 6% grade for 12 miles. There are no shoulders here, and I'm thankful that it's the opposing traffic that edges up against a several thousand foot drop-off.

The climb is sun drenched, hot and very dry. Fortunately, trucks and RV's over 21 feet are banned, the posted speed limit is just 25, and motorists are extremely courteous, seeming to be in no particular hurry to pass.

Periodically, there is a small pullover, constructed over what appears to be nothing but air. I'm not surprised to learn that this roadway, completed in 1932, is listed in the US registry of outstanding engineering achievements.

Still climbing, the series of blind S-turns makes a dramatic "U" and suddenly, I find myself on the side that drops off into oblivion. Never fond of heights, it is difficult to look at the views without having the sense that a parachute ought to have been packed. I hug the center line, at the same time watching for oncoming traffic from behind, opposing traffic, and stealing glimpses of the miniaturized valley that is now hundreds of feet down. Looking ahead, I can faintly distinguish the twisting road, etched across the face of a vast rocky range, climbing ever higher as far as the eye can see. The air grows thinner, cooler. I'm oblivious to the effort of climbing. Every turn is a photographer's dream. I realize that I'm now looking down onto pockets of snow on the facing mountains off to my right. A "hanging valley" spills water 400 feet into the main glacial cavity. Countless brooks tumble off the ledges on my left, spattering on the road and sometimes sending up enough spray to be refreshing. Still climbing. And in the late afternoon, the sun begins to disappear behind the higher peaks to the west. The roadway turns briefly toward the west, and I decide to snap a picture with the sun just barely hidden behind the rock structure that must be half a mile or more in front of me. I stop at precisely the shadow line, and reach for my camera. But in the 10 seconds it takes me to get ready, the shadow line has moved . . . I back up, trying to regain it, but it's no use. It migrates down the hill faster than I can backwalk.

A downhill motorist in a distinctly British accent happily announces that I'm nearly at the top. Oddly, I'm not jubilant at the news. After 3 and a half hours of the most heavenly vistas, I'm not eager for this to end. And so I sit here, taking one last look west, knowing that these mountains will give way to endless prairies as soon as I leave here. There is around me a mood of celebration and reverence and awe. I'm glad for my slow ascent; for the chance to see this all in slow motion; to be able to recall the subtle changes that surprised me on the way up; and to be able to replay them in my mind.

I glance at the mountain range half a mile off to my right, and see in it the same strata coloration's that show up in the range a mile or more off to my left, and I realize that after all this, I am looking at an ancient ocean floor.

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IMPRESSIONS: Abrupt changes.

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Today was a day of the most dramatic and abrupt variations yet. I had decided to try an alternate route to Cut Bank, heading south on Rt 89 at dawn. I knew there'd be a climb or two, but figured it'd be nothing compared to yesterday. An hour later, I'd made 5 miles progress up what turned out to be a rather massive ridge east of Glacier Park. I rested, climbed some more, and at the 6 mile mark, reached a summit that now looked east at nothing but space. This was the spot I'd heard about, where prairie meets mountains. It seemed as if I could see to the Atlantic. There was no distinguishable horizon. The sky and land met in some fuzzy fashion at a place you couldn't quite pinpoint.

The eastward descent was gradual, and long, traversing a jumbled landscape of rolling hills and plateaus. The rocky landscape turned suddenly forested with an eclectic mix of leafy trees and firs. The look of autumn added just a hint of yellow and red to the mainly green surroundings.

I kept checking behind me to get parting glimpses of the mountains, which at one point, slipped completely from view as I dropped into the trough of a creek valley several miles farther east. I was relieved to be able to see them again as the road climbed to the next, slightly lower plateau.

I stopped at a country store for drink and sardines. The owner indoctrinated me about the federal government's mismanagement of Native American affairs. He spoke proudly of the tough weather in western Montana, and of the fact that his county holds the record for greatest temperature variation in a 24 hour period. Chinook winds blowing east of the mountains can produce dramatic warming, as in the cae when, as he tells it, "We went to sleep at 50 below, and woke up at 50 above."

I asked him if I was now out of "grizzly country" and he assured me I wasn't. And that, in fact, the grizzlies are lowland creatures who only took to the mountains because of humans' encroachment at lower elevations . . . and that when Lewis & Clark first explored the region, they encountered most grizzlies along the rivers and creeks as far east as Cut Bank.

Heading farther east, the green forest quickly gives way to a treeless prairie, and the jumble of sharper valleys and plateaus moderates into a landscape of more gently rolling hills.

Soil, vegetation, buildings, livestock . . . everything is brown. A million shades and variations, but always, everything, brown.

I'm enjoying the downhill bias, and soon find myself in the first little town east of the mountains, named, not surprisingly, Browning, MT. The map says I'm in the center of the Blackfeet Indian Reservation. But there are plenty other clues that this is an area populated primarily by Native Americans. I pass the Warbonnet Lodge and the Sleeping Wolf Campground. There is Blackfeet Bingo and Blackfeet National Bank and Blackfeet Liquor and Blackfeet Opportunities, Inc. There's the Teepee Cafe and the Dusty Bull Job Training Center. And as I'm leaving Browning, the inevitable "Federal Center, Bureau of Indian Affairs."

I'm now headed for Cut Bank. Still checking over my shoulder, watching the mountains shrink, missing them already.

Looking Ahead East (left)

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And Looking Back (right)

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I am awed by the sheer distance that surrounds me now in every direction. The guide maps suggest this part of the trip may be boring, but the land reminds me in every way of a seascape . . . rolling waves, infinite horizons, light shimmering off crests and troughs of land, even a wavy rippling effect of the breeze working its way through the endless acreage of fall wheat.

I have the distinct sensation of sailing. It is a pleasure cutting through the landscape with relative ease, playing the winds, watching the sun and surface interact, and remembering how just 24 hours earlier, dizzying heights had me clinging to my handlebars.

The Continental Divide may be the significant line of demarcation on the map, but the real feeling of a divide happens at the base of the mountains, where everything changes.

I make it to Galata, MT just at dusk, and pull up to the Galata Motel. A phone call brings the owner from her house, some distance away. She tells me about the reservoir nearby; about the drought of the past two years; about life in Montana and about teaching in Chester. I'm thankful the place is open, and I settle in for the night, watching for the northern lights, and planning tomorrow's trek.

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I awoke earlier than normal today, still feeling like a sailor, and eager to get a quick start. I cleaned the galley, raised anchor, and set sail about 15 minutes before sunrise. In the back of my mind, I heard "red in the morning, sailors take warning . . . " There was none, and I took that as a good sign.

If yesterday's landscape resembled gently rolling ocean swells, today's looked more like a dead calm sea. Nothing interrupted the flat surface that extended to the horizon in every direction . . . not a tree, not a building, not a fence post. A dozen dark dots several miles off of the port side are probably cattle grazing, but in my present state of mind, they could just as easily be dolphins at play.

I set a healthy pace, and the wind is heavy in my face. It tugs at my loose fitting windbreaker. The extra material makes a flapping sound - exactly the sound of a hoisted sail in a stiff sea breeze.

An hour passes, then two. I can make no determination of forward progress. My surroundings are unchanged. I glance at the sun, check my bearings, and make sure I'm on course.

Around noon, a tiny spec appears on the horizon. An hour later, it is larger, occupies a nearly 30 degree arc off to my right, and begins to present a mountainish profile against a backdrop of blue. Another hour, and an extended range of mountains now interrupts the otherwise flat surface I've become accustomed to. They remain at a great distance, but I can easily imagine them surrounded by white beaches and the salty scent of ocean breakers.

A roadside sign announces that these are, in fact, the Bear Paw Mountains (not the Bahamas, as I'd hoped). They seem completely out of place, and I wonder about the name until later, when I see them displayed on a relief map. If you imagine a bear pawing at the soil, so that he rakes some loose material from every direction to make a mound in the middle, that's the exact shape of these mountains. Still, they don't seem volcanic. And the only explanation I can conjure up for them being here is that whoever made the Cascades and northern rockies had a little material left over, and dumped it here thinking no one would ever notice (kinda like those little clumps of leftover asphalt that show up in the unlikeliest places).

I notice that the shadow of myself, which at dawn had extended behind me such a great distance, now hovers alongside, pacing me. Gradually, it overtakes me, soon leading by a nose, then by the length of the bike, then by several lengths.

And as the brightness of day turns to dusk, the shadow takes a commanding lead, stretching out as it had at dawn, only now, in front of me. Stretching out. And at the same time fading. And gone.

I look around and think for a moment that I've completed a large circle. The 'sea' is still flat calm. The 'island' has disappeared. And the stars are reasserting themselves.

"Red at night, sailor's delight" I hear in my head. Again, there is none. Oh well. I drop anchor and wait for another day.

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OK. So it's not an ocean, and I'm not really sailing across it. But it was fun to pretend for a couple of days.

If I were still in my sailing motif (and I'm NOT!) today was a day for tacking into the headwind. Unfortunately, there's no tacking on Rt 2. It points east like an arrow, making this a grind-it-out day. I stopped early and often for liquids. And when the east wind whipped across the top of my uncapped water bottle, it evoked a tone that sounded (dare I say it) like a far away fog horn.

Today looks so much like yesterday, I find myself recalling the events of the last several days, like the first time I spotted a Burlington Northern train on the wide open prairie, west of Cut Bank. It resembled the HO scale trains found in Christmas gardens (only smaller) and at such a distance, the train's motion was undetectable. Something about the train seemed odd, but I couldn't quite tell what it was.

In time, the train approached and passed under the roadway, so that I found myself looking down directly into the endless stream of cars filled with Montana coal, headed for the power plants of the Pacific northwest.

For 600 miles, the Burlington Northern would parallel Rt 2, sometimes off at a distance, sometimes so close that a passing train cast a shadow over the highway. It was easy to imagine the time when the railroad was the only evidence of civilization here.

Built by James Hill in the 19th century, the railroad reached as far west as Puget Sound by 1893. Once built, Hill orchestrated a massive publicity campaign to encourage settlements along the tracks, selling land for as little as $2.50 an acre - land that the government had deeded to Hill as incentive to build the railroad.

I noticed that State Highway 2, which might be expected to link the small towns that dot northern Montana, doesn't. Instead, these "towns" - like Joplin and Rudyard and Hingham and Gildford and Kremlin - sit about a half mile off the roadway, but immediately adjacent to the railway, where they first sunk their roots more than a century ago.

The dominant feature of each "town" is the cluster of grain elevators overshadowing the rails. When first constructed, these were towns of strict utility: one grain tower, a street, a school, a church, the depot and the bank. One hundred years later, little has changed, except that larger metallic grain elevators now stand alongside their original wooden counterparts, which are long since retired and left to collapse under the weight of wicked Montana winds.

It finally occurred to me what was unusual about my view of the train. It was the fact that the entire train was visible at once . . . all 120+ engines and cars, strung out like an enormous snake on a vacant parking lot. I was accustomed to seeing trains in bits and pieces, at road crossings, or winding around hills or between sections of forest. There was something inspiring about seeing the great creatures in their entirety. I'd watch the things appear quietly like a pinpoint on the horizon, grow longer as they approached, then disappear. I enjoyed their company, the acknowledgment of their engineers, and the fact that all those truckloads of product were shipping by rail, and not by Route 2!

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Day Sixteen . ..

Wolfpoint, Mt to Williston, ND

It's been nearly 5 days now that I've been immersed in Native American towns, Native American culture and Native American tribes. Reservations dot the landscape across Montana and North Dakota, but even off the reservations, the Native American influence is everywhere.

Rt 2 is a reasonable cycling route, but definitely not a tourist route, so Native American gift shops and tourist traps are scarce.

I stop at a small post office to mail postcards and a package, and as I'm locking my bike, and elderly man taps me on the shoulder, and asks the usual questions . . . Where are you going, how far've you come, and why're you doing this. I give the usual answers, as he follows me, a bit wobbly, into the post office. "Just back from Korea," he announces. I feign belief, and ask why he was there. "Stationed there," he explains matter of factly, "since '52."

"Missing a few decades," I think to myself, but don't say. His present age would have made him, by my guess, of military age in the 50's. How very sad, I thought, that the most treasured memories . . . the ones he chooses to keep closest . . . are of a war thousands of miles from home. It spoke volumes about his life here, on the reservation. It suggested to me that for him, this was not home at all. For him, or for the thousands of Native Americans living here.

There are constant reminders here of a history these tribes would rather forget. Historical road markers erected for the few tourists who travel this way, describe in sometimes too gleeful language, the major defeats of the "Indians" at the hands of westward marching settlers and soldiers. Even the names of present day towns and reservations, so many of which begin with the word "Fort," are reminders of the combative history, and the uneasy truce, that characterize this region.

I leave Fort Peck Indian Reservation without regret. Soon, I'm at the North Dakota border, and Williston is doable by dark.

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Today it happened. The string of 16 beautiful, clear, warm days ended. And as I suspected, it wasn't the cold or the rain that sidelined me after 70 miles . . . it was the stubbornly strong headwinds

Minot was my target for the day, but New Town is where I'll wait for things to improve.

I got a taste of what they call the "Bad Lands" today. They are more prevalent in South Dakota, but extend north to an area just east and south of Williston, ND. The flat plains that have persisted since the foothills and mountains of Western Montana, are here cut by ribbons of erosion, leaving a landscape that looks like a miniaturized version of the Grand Canyon. Dozens and dozens of deep cuts leave dramatic evidence of the movement of water across this land, over tens of thousands of years.

For the past two days, everyone I've met and spoken with has warned me about the (weather) change coming. I sense that talking about the weather in these parts is not a social nicety used to fill awkward silences. It is a dominant issue in peoples' lives.

More than anything else, it determines the vitality of local economies which are almost exclusively agrarian. It also shapes the personalities of resident here who often have about them a sense of survivorship. They speak proudly about the harsh extremes that are endured, saying simply, "That's Montana," or "That's North Dakota."

I rolled into a small town yesterday, looking for the local post office, and asked directions of a woman resting on a wooden bench outside a small cafe. I noticed she was getting extra oxygen from a small plastic tube connected to a cylinder at her side.

She jumped at the opportunity to help me, giving long and detailed instructions for getting to the post office, which, it turned out, was only a block and a half away. I did my business there, then settled in for lunch at the Golden Harvest Cafe, the only eatery in town. The woman with the oxygen was seated at a table. Anther woman, who I took to be the owner's daughter, sat a booth eating lunch with the cook, while her 8 year old son used the other booths as a set of high hurdles, climbing over a seat, then under the table, then over the next seat, and so on. She begged him half-heartedly to stop, but he knew she didn't mean it. A turn at the counter stools left them all spinning; then it was back to the high hurdles.

There was too much smoke to eat enjoyably, and the owner, a woman in her 60's, refused to smile despite my best efforts. There was a harshness all around, and I guessed it to be a reflection of the weather that was about to descend on these people like an attacking army.

I paid my bill and the lady with the oxygen recognized me, and warned me about "the change" that was coming. She talked about the hard winters they'd survived, and about when she was young, and schools were canceled in winter, and opened in June and July, because the snow was too deep for the horses to pull the sleighs. It was a time of farmhouse schools, when the teachers and the parents and the principal (if there was one) could make those kinds of decisions based on something as simple as common sense. It was prior to public schools; prior to teachers unions; and prior to state-mandated curricula and attendance requirements.

I didn't stay long, but long enough to catch a very clear glimpse of the fierce independence and self sufficiency that still live here in the high plains of the upper mid-west.

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The "change" that Montanans have been warning me about is firmly entrenched. Brisk north winds usher in clouds, showers and much colder temps. I'm fortunate that I just missed (by several hundred miles) today's 80 mph winds in Western Montana and Idaho. RV's were literally blown off the highway by the Chinook winds I'd been told about repeatedly.

Along the way, there have been signs of every size and shape, from homemade cardboard to high tech billboards. One of my favorites was just east of Sandpoint, ID. I'd just pedaled through a tiny hamlet called Hope; then a mile or so later, the even tinier town of East Hope. Just beyond the two little towns, there was a driveway off to my right leading to a bed & breakfast that was hidden in the woods. A sign advertised the "Beyond Hope Bed & Breakfast." It was clever; I wondered if it was effective.

Across central Montana, signs typically announced the existence of each of the whistle stop towns situated off the main route, and alongside the railroad tracks perhaps a half mile to the north or to the south of Route 2. Routinely, the signs would extol the friendly nature of the place, and extend a hearty invitation to visitors and investments alike. My favorite was the billboard announcing in giant lettering that a particular town (I can't recall the name) had a population of 597 . . . "596 really nice people, and one old sourpuss sorehead."

I chuckled out loud each time I thought of it, wondering if the old sourpuss knew who he was; or if, perhaps, it was an honor rotated among the residents from year to year, either by appointment, or by popular vote; or if possibly no one ever knew, but everyone put extra effort into avoiding the appearance of being the sourpuss. Very clever, I thought.

I wanted to find out more. Kurault would've gotten to the intriguing bottom of it. but the tyranny of the miles tugged at me, and in the deepening dusk, I accepted not knowing, and pressed on.

The ride from Williston to New Town (yesterday) and from New Town to Minot (today) were among the most remote, uninhabited parts of the trip so far. Much of this part of North Dakota is included in the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation. A real feeling of isolation creeps in, when the sky blackens, the rain turns heavier and colder, a headwind slows your level-ground speed to under 7 mph, and you're 40 miles away from the nearest town. The chill was getting to me, so I stopped and huddled behind the only structure I'd seen all day . . . a 6 by 8 foot metal box situated alongside a railroad crossing. It broke the wind long enough for me to add one more layer of clothing (my last) and eat the Snickers bar that was my emergency energy ration. I washed it down with a guzzle or two from my water bottle, noticing that the water I'd found distastefully warm days earlier, was plenty cold today. How ironic. This was beginning to feel a little too much like a cold lunch stop in March on the lower gorge of the Lehigh.

I packed up quickly, stepped out from the wind shadow, and fought my way up Rt 23 as best I could.

When, to my surprise, there appeared before me the most beautiful sight: CENEX! It's the chain of gas station/mini marts that's been a feature of almost every town for the last week or so. It looked like an oasis to me and I raced to the front door. A couple of hours later, on a full tank of hot chocolate, chicken fingers, mozzarella sticks, Hershey's chocolate, Little Debbie's Nuttie Buddies, a hot chicken club deluxe, and a fruit punch Gatorade, I forced myself back outside. Minot didn't seem quite so far away anymore.

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I noticed as I moved through the western part of North Dakota, that gradually, the fields here supported a taller, fuller, thicker, lusher sort of brown stuff than I'd seen in most of Montana. Still brown, yes. But looking more harvestable. Almost useful.

I also noticed another pattern. Across Montana and western North Dakota, the whistle stop towns were spaced almost evenly along the railway, without regard to terrain. But towns of any significance . . . real towns like Cut Bank and Havre and Williston . . . all seemed to have sprung up in little (or sometimes not so little) bowl shaped depressions in the land. I noticed this because as I entered the larger towns, I always enjoyed a downhill coast into the center of town. But leaving town was far more difficult.

I wondered if the early settlers had had the same experience, and so, decided it was easier to settle in than to climb out of these places. Or perhaps, these low places were also the places where water gravitated, and from what I've seen, water is more precious than gold in the arid high plains. Or maybe these depressions provided a measure of protection against wind or against attack.

Moving east through North Dakota, there are clear signs that I'm leaving an arid climate behind, and approaching the more moist and fertile area known as the corn belt. Soil is darker, there are touches of green here and there, and even trees . . . something I've rarely seen for over a week.

I land in Minnewauken near dark, one of a number of small and shrinking towns here in farm country. The lone restaurant closed for good last month, the grocery is sparsely stocked, and the only sign of life is found in a tiny tavern at the town's edge.

There's an excitement inside, because tonight is the first night of billiards league . . . an annual ritual that helps pass the very long winter season. A group from Devil's Lake has made the trek here to play the best that Minnewaukan has to offer. No one pays much attention to the matches. Most commiserate about the low prices fetched by this year's wheat crop, and one farmer admits to me that for many, a failed harvest would be the best possible result. An early snow or prolonged wet spell would trigger benefit payments from crop insurance, which would almost surely surpass the crop's value at market.

I ask one player what North Dakotans do during the winter. She shrugs her shoulders, rolls her eyes, and says "eat, sleep, and try to stay warm." Ice fishing and snowmobiling are the past times of preference for those who venture out; and for some, winter in Arizona has great appeal.

The billiards contest ends, the free popcorn bowl runs empty, and the tavern turns quiet and unoccupied. I retire to my tent, at a public park on the banks of Devil's Lake.

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What irony. Today's landscape is dominated by flooded roads, abandoned homes, and thousands of acres of inundated farmlands across the hundred or so miles I ride. These are floods not caused by rain (there's been no overabundance of rain or snow here) but by a water table that seems to be rising for no apparent reason.

Devil's Lake is a land-locked lake with no outflow, similar to the Great Salt Lake in Utah. Inexplicably, it began rising noticeably over 10 years ago, and has added 20 feet of depth over that period. In a region of relatively flat terrain, this means that the lake has captured miles and miles of real estate.

Minnewaukan, for instance, was situated 5 miles from the lake in 1990. Now, the lake laps at its doorstep and has claimed several of its homes.

But beyond just the lake, there are ponds of water springing up everywhere - in each little cup of land, in the middle of grazing pastures, in the middle of crop fields, even in the middle of towns and villages. Roads throughout the region are being reconstructed to raise them, at their low points, by 10 feet or more. In many places, telephone poles alongside the roadways are more than half submerged.

And eerily, this is not rain induced, and isn't going away. Water levels everywhere continue to rise forcing some farms, and even some villages, to be abandoned.

It reminds me of the insidious underground coal fires that eventually forced the evacuation of towns like Centralia, PA.

In between the puddles, ponds and lakes, the dominant crop along the route today was . . . sunflowers! Thousands of acres of sunflowers. A farmer tells me there are two varieties, though they all look the same to me. One version is ground to produce sunflower oil; the other is sold in seed form.

The forecast is for snow by the weekend in parts of the Dakotas. My route turns south toward Fargo, just in time.

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Day Twenty One . . .

Cooperstown, ND to Hawley, ND minnesota.jpg (15845 bytes)

It occurs to me today that I was firmly entrenched in farm country, and that a subtle transition from ranches to farms must've been taking place over the last several days without my realizing it.

In many respects, the terrain is unchanged . . . flat to gently rolling hills . . . so I tried to pinpoint what exactly made me think these were now farms, and not ranches. My observation is that: Ranches are more brown than green; farms are more green than brown.

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Ranches have lots of rectangular buildings with pointy roofs; Farms have lots of round buildings with rounded roofs.

The paved roads near ranches are littered with sagebrush and hay clippings; the paved roads near farms are littered with dried-on clumps of mud and cow manure.

Ranches grow crops intended for livestock; farms grow crops intended for people.

Cows confess a certain bias for living on farms. Maybe it's because ranches are surrounded by billboards saying "Eat beef," while farms are surrounded by billboards saying "Drink milk."

And my most stunning observation: Ranches have ranch houses; while farms have farmhouses. Huh?

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First place winner in the "Most dilapidated yet 'still standing' barns" contest - Minnesota.

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It's a valley you can't really see. The river itself begins with the merging of the Boise de Sioux and the Ottertail Rivers, and flows north along Minnesota's western border toward Canada's Hudson Bay. Riding through the valley, I can't detect even the slightest slope; the horizon remains so perfectly flat it seems man-made. Apparently, this flattish valley was left by retreating glaciers and became the basin of a huge inland sea. What was once the silty lake bottom is now considered the world's richest and blackest soil.

Farms here (called bonanza farms) are unusually large, measured not in acres, but in square miles. The Bagg Bonanza Farm is the only farm of its type still intact.

When the Red River floods, which occurs not infrequently, it captures miles and miles of level fields. But each flooding restores greater fertility to an already productive landscape.

The Red River isn't red, and there is some dispute about the origins of its name. The common belief is that it comes from a Sioux word for "bloody" - a reference to the many battles fought here.

Heading deeper into Minnesota from Hawley, I leave the Red River behind, slip almost unnoticeably into the Mississippi Valley, and feel an unmistakable tug eastward.

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The Chippewa Indians called it the Mee-zee-see-bee River, meaning "Father of Waters."

The same glacier that left behind the Red River "Valley" also constructed the area that is now the headwaters of the Mississippi. In the same way that these "valleys" are difficult to see with the naked eye, so to the headwaters of the Mississippi eluded explorers for hundreds of years.

Zebulon Pike (of Pike's Peak) led a team of 20 from St. Louis northward, in 1805. Winter set in, and a smaller contingent continued with an Indian guide to Red Cedar Lake (now called Cass Lake). The native guide convinced Pike that this was the Mississippi's source, and he carried this incorrect information back to St. Louis after the Spring thaw in 1806. (Interestingly, Pike also never reach the peak in Colorado that bears his name.)

About 25 years later, the river's true source was found by a team led by naturalist Henry Schoolcraft. The exact spot rests 1475 feet above sea level and 2550 miles from the river's mouth in the Gulf of Mexico; it later became the focal point of Minnesota's first state park.

The route south from Long Prairie is marked by thickening clouds and the threat of snow. As I settle in for the evening, I find that 4 to 6 inches has fallen just a hundred miles west. Winter continues to follow me, gaining a little ground each day.

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I woke early hoping to get a quick start. Minneapolis was within reach, and friends and family would be there at day's end.

I poked my head outside to sample the early morning temperature. Off to the east, 5 black birds flew in formation. Bigger than sparrows but smaller than crows, they shadowed one another, flying in near perfect unison. I thought of the Blue Angels as they dove together, circled, soared and dove again. They worked their way south, chirping all the while, until they were soon out of sight.

I sampled the air and decided it was cold enough to pile on the extra layer of stuff I wear most mornings. It was still too early to tell if this would be a kind-wind day.

Before I could turn to go back inside, the squadron of birds surprised me by returning, but missing one of its members. "Crashed and burned," I thought. The foursome continued what seemed to be purely playful maneuvers, while the missing member approached from a different direction. A sixth flyer had joined him. The formation of six ran through the same sequence of soar-circle-dive-soar again, and as I stepped inside, I noticed a seventh joining in.

It seemed to me curious behavior for so early in the pre-dawn day. I dressed, re-packed my panniers, and rolled my Trek outside. What had earlier been the chirping of several individual birds had become, in the span of about 10 minutes, a chorus of bird sounds in which individual voices could not be distinguished. I glanced behind me, and on the triple wire connecting a string of about 6 telephone poles, there sat at perfect attention what must've been about 1500 of the birds. Not a single one in flight, all facing east as the sun prepared to make its appearance.

I wondered about the whole ritual as I headed out for the day, feeling just a little bit like an unsuspecting participant in a Hitchcock classic.

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Today's route leads south through the St. Croix River valley. The St. Croix is one of the first major tributaries of the great Mississippi as it builds size and momentum near its headwaters in Minnesota.

Indians called this the "Hogan-wauke-kin," meaning the "river of the grave." The French were the earliest European settlers in this valley, and renamed it the St. Croix River, (translated "sacred cross").

Relations with the native Sioux and Chippewa were peaceful until the late 1700's when agreements governing fur trading began to break down. by the 1830's, the area was attracting waves of settlers and the St. Croix floated millions of logs to sawmills in Stillwater for the next 50 years.

Today, Stillwater is a bustling tourist center, and the St. Croix is a beautiful boating resource.

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Last night, entering Red Wing, I crossed the Mississippi for the second time . . . this time going from east to west. What made this crossing different was that . . . I noticed it. I'm embarrassed to admit that three days earlier, in north central Minnesota, I had crossed the headwaters of the Great River as it's called here, without noticing. It was a few miles east of Bowlus, I'd just feasted on pancakes and eggs, and the creek looked like a dozen others I'd crossed in recent days. It wasn't til I checked the maps more closely that night, that I spotted the crossing.

Now, just a day later, the little creek had mushroomed into a broad swath of water meandering between hundred foot sandstone and limestone bluffs. My route today runs along the western shore of the river. After several weeks in the open plains, this feels a bit like being in a tunnel . . . steep cliffs hemming in both sides of the river.

Most of this part of the Mississippi is designated as the Upper Mississippi River National Wildlife Refuge. And much of it resembles a wetland or swamp more than a river. The river meanders through broad flats of lilly pads, reeds and stumps that obscure most of its surface. At one point the Mississippi winds for 150 miles, making only 50 miles of straight line progress.

I'm in what's called the "Driftless Area," a zone that was bypassed by all four of the major glacial advances during the Ice Age. Ancient faults and exposed bedrock are found here in a way unique to the midwest.

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At first you see low rises on the landscape. Soon, you find yourself noticing regular patterns in the hills. Then finally, the "hills" turn into familiar shapes . . . many of them animal forms rising out of the ground.

Built more than a thousand years ago, these are the burial mounds of what are called the Woodland peoples who inhabited this region around 650 A.D. Prehistoric peoples built burial mounds across much of the Americas, but only in a narrow swath across Iowa and several neighboring states are these "effigy" mounds found. A number of different animals are represented, but most common are bears, birds, turtles, lizards and bison.

Nowhere are these mounds more prevalent than along today's route, in the Effigy Mounds National Monument near Harper's Ferry, Iowa.

These constructed mounds hint of the much larger, natural ones that cross today's route. Any notion I harbored about Iowa being a flat state was dashed today.

Before Day 1, I had replaced my gear cluster so I'd have an extra low climbing ("granny") gear. It seemed the right move at the time, given the heavy load on board and the hundreds of miles of mountains that filled most of the first 8 or 9 days. I was surprised that I'd gotten all the way into the plains states without ever feeling the need to use that granny gear. But today, on hills far steeper than the Cascades, it was only silly stubbornness that held "granny" in reserve.

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More of the same. Extreme hills - more up than down (how can that be?) - coupled with a straight-on head wind of 25 to 35. By mid-afternoon, I came to the conclusion that the winds were only getting worse, and that controlling the bike around trucks and tractors was getting a little too dicey. Truth be told, I was pooped. Working hard and getting almost nowhere is frustrating as well as tiring.

I settled into Dyersville, and discovered quickly that this was the home of the Field of Dreams . . . the preserved baseball diamond, built in a cornfield for the 1989 Kevin Kostner movie of the same name.

The house, bleachers, backstop, benches and playing field are exactly as originally built, except that left field, which crossed over into a neighbor's property, has been replanted with corn. Also, several souvenir stands erected by the field diminish somewhat the purity of the place.

Still, it is hard not to feel a little nostalgic here. Hard not to remember the value of having dreams, and following them.

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One of the nice things about crossing the farm belt in October is watching the furious pace of the fall harvest. Every field supports an army of equipment that cuts and sorts and bales and transfers and transports and tills.

On these back roads, I am passed as often by combines (they move a lot faster than you'd think) as by cars. My favorites though are the grain wagons. They are metal boxes on wheels that look like shrunken railroad coal cars, in red. They remind you a little of toy train cars, hooked together in single file, piled high in the fields with grain, and pulled by tractors or pickups to the nearest grain elevator. And they are EVERYWHERE. Dozens of them. Hundreds of them.

About half the fields I pass have already been cut. A few are tilled under and ready for the next planting. And the talk everywhere is about the harvest.

And in the background is the realization that it soon will be over. Every church posts the date of the "harvest dinner." Every cafe bulletin board holds invitations to the local town's harvest dance or the harvest social. The plant-grow-harvest cycle is nearly complete, and the energy of it all is in the air, everywhere.

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For some reason, the Mississippi had always seemed the dividing line between the first half of the trip and the second. But with my odometer sitting at 2700 miles, I'm reminded that there's a lot more country west of the river than east of it. Still, psychology is at work here, and it feels like I'm now within reach of something resembling home.

It's a steeper climb up from the river than I'd expected, but the broad, flat croplands of Illinois look very inviting.

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I've been asked several times for a mileage summary of the trip so far. Here is the first 3000 miles' worth, in sequence . . .

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It was nearly dusk. Terry was on his riding mower as I sailed by. "Anything you need," he hollered. "Water?"

Ironically, it was one of the few times I'd run out of water since the trip started. So I made a quick U-turn and took him up on his offer.

"Anywhere to get a room or pitch a tent for the night?" I asked, almost certain that there wasn't.

Without hesitating an instant, he insisted, "Right here. Take the bed in the extra room. Dinner's in about half an hour."

So I did. I asked all the questions that had accumulated the past couple days. Questions about farming mainly. How the combines work; and when the harvest started; and where the crops end up; and how the elevators work.

Both Terry and his wife work at the local grain elevator, and after dinner, I was invited to tour the place. As we drove up to, and into the cluster of towering cylindrical structures, lit by spot lights and Terry's hand-held flood light, I was reminded of images I'd seen of the Kennedy Space Center's launch pad . . . a maze of interconnecting towers and cables and pipes with what looked like half a dozen rockets primed for lift off.

I learned about the "legs" - hollow structures with a series of buckets inside that lift the corn and soy beans 160 feet into the air; and the distributor wheel that directs the grain to one of the six storage buildings; and the augers that extract the grain from the bottom of the building for shipment to the terminals along the Mississippi; and the open air pits, circa 1963, that predated the more modern elevator complexes; and the probes that draw samples of grain from the center of each incoming trailer load; and the analyzer that measures moisture content (15% moisture is ideal for corn, 12% for soybeans . . . anything more and the per-bushel price goes down); and the drying tower takes too-wet grain and scrubs it till it's storable; and the Board of Trade pricing list that comes out each morning; and on and on.

I got a much better feel this evening for farming, and it's helped make a little more sense out of the flurry of activity that's surrounded me these past two weeks.

1,300 miles of soybeans!

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The day started serenely enough. A light fog lifted early, and except for a persistent headwind (it was forecast to shift from the west by afternoon) it looked like another perfect day.

My target for the day was Rensselaer, Indiana. It was about a hundred miles east, appeared to have decent overnight accommodations, and more importantly, was large enough to support a bicycle shop - the first on my route for more than a week. I had several days earlier developed an unrepairable leak in a valve stem (very rare) so now I had no spare tube. No big problem, I thought, since I'd had so few flats, and besides, they are easy enough to fix.

Around one o'clock, the day headed south. The paved route turned to gravel for half a mile, so I decided to add a little air to each tire to insure against flats. As soon as I started, though, a second valve stem leak erupted. Unfixable. I considered my options, pulled out my cell phone, and made a series of calls to try to locate the nearest source for my size tire tubes.

In the middle of my fifth call, the "low battery" indicator beeped. By the middle of the next call, it was dead. My options had narrowed.

There had been a few farms widely separated a few miles behind me. And I found that if I put as much air into the leaking tube as it would hold, I could pedal about half a mile before it flattened again.

So I repeated this cycle 4 or 5 times until I reached a pair of farmhouses, knocked on the doors, and found on one at home. When I tried to fill the tire one more time, the pump jammed and refused to eject any air at all. My options had narrowed again.

In a cornfield, 2 bad tubes, one bad pump and a useless phone. It was time to walk, and to take comfort in the fact that this was not the one-house-every-twenty-miles part of Montana, or that miserably cold and rainy day in North Dakota.

Eventually, I found someone home, got through to the bike shop I had hoped to reach by day's end, and persuaded someone there to drive the tubes (and a new pump) to Pittwood, where I was stranded. Ironically, my hero from the Indiana shop had several years earlier worked at the very shop I had stopped at for repairs 4 weeks earlier, in Port Townsend, Washington.

During the hour-and-a-half wait, the entire youth population of Pittwood (4) found me and quizzed me relentlessly about my trip, my eating and lodging arrangements, and the general geography of those parts of the country I've seen so far.

It wasn't the day I'd planned, but as it turned out, it wasn't that bad, either. Lesson for the day was . . . stuff happens in clusters, so take more tubes than you ever think you'll need.