Wednesday, August 4th

Outside of Condon, MT we left our motel to get back on the trail for an easy day of riding. The objective was to eat lunch at the Holland Lake Lodge, which we did. We also wanted to be fresh for a hard climb up Mount Richmond. I wanted to catch up on the blog, so I wrote the last one at Holland Lodge and then rode 4 miles back to the highway to get enough cell coverage to send the file. Seems like the parts of Montana we are traveling really aren't focused on entering the digital age with widely available Internet access or cell phone coverage. Mike and John waited (a little impatiently I might add) for me to get back. While waiting in a camping area they saw their first grizzly dart across a road, as a kid was swimming in the stream not far away. I got back and we started our climb up to Clearwater Lake, an absolutely beautiful high mountain lake that looked untouched by man (except for our campsite). After setting up our tents, and Mike and John going for a swim, two old-timers showed up having no luck fishing the lake, we had heard their dog barking when got there. They proceeded to scare the hell out of us talking about grizzlies turning over logs, etc. Needless to say we all went to bed with our pepper spray ready for a visit. It occurred to me during the night that is not likely to happen. Mike snores so loud, for so long that either the bears like it or don't and given no visits they are like me, they don't really care for the snoring. Seems like it is a good deterrent to unwanted bear interaction. One other thing kept me awake, at first it sounded like a wolf or coyote howling, but after a while I figured it was the haunting calls of a loon on Clearwater Lake.