Motocaching the Counties Finale - Part 1

The time has come for the final push.  I lack just 13 counties in New Mexico from having logged at least one geocache in every county in the eleven western states.  The departure date is pinned to June 17^th because my friend Sam Charles, who rode with me last year to New Mexico and Texas is leaving for his High School reunion in Iowa on that date and he will ride with me to son Yancey’s place just north of Denver.  Sam and I were on the road at 6:30 am to begin our ride up Hwy 12 toward Lolo, MT.  It was cool and overcast looking like rain.  I was glad I had my heated liner under my jacket. 

We stopped for a cache at the Major Fenn Picnic area.  It was not paved in the picnic area and wet from recent rain.  My bike did a little slipping and sliding through a mud patch on the way in and out but we made it.  Fortunately the rain seemed to stay just ahead of us.  The highway was wet but we didn’t get into any significant rain.  After stopping for gas at Lolo we headed south on Hwy 93.  We had lunch at a Rest Area at the summit of Lost Trail Pass and I got a geocache there that required me to climb up a big sign support to reach the cache on the back of the sign. 

After lunch we turned east on Hwy 43 toward Wisdom, MT.  My planned route was to follow Hwy 43 over to Interstate 15 to our evening destination at Melrose, MT.  However, Sam suggested a different route he had once ridden that takes off of Hwy 43 north and loops back to the interstate – a bit longer but more scenic.  As it turned out this was a fantastic ride called the Pioneer Mountains Scenic Byway.  The first part of the Byway was not only scenic but twisting with rolling hills making it a motorcyclist’s delight.  One complaint I had with my Triumph Tiger XRx was that on deep leans the feelers on the bottoms of the foot pegs would sometimes drag.  I replaced them with short bolts and this road gave them a good test.  On one deep lean the outside of my boot hit pavement briefly but no metal parts.  Again we were fortunate to just beat the rain to Melrose.  We stayed in nice cabins there and had dinner at the local café.  We had traveled 432 miles stopping for just 3 caches although I picked up another one at Melrose.

The rain set in that night and was still going strong in the morning.  So we donned the rain gear and were on the road by 6:30 am.  No place for breakfast in Melrose at that hour so we stopped down in Dillon at a restaurant for some breakfast.  Meanwhile Sam was experiencing some brake problems.  His BMW has power breaks and he thought he may have inadvertently hit the brake lever during the startup procedure which caused the power brake feature to go away.  He felt he was OK on the interstate where he would have sufficient lead time to stop but he would have to significantly reduce his speed on the usual back roads we take.  Sam is an accomplished motorcycle mechanic but he needed some help on this problem which he felt was related to software.  It was a Monday and most all motor sport shops are closed on Mondays.  He had had this problem before and said that usually after a while the problem would fix itself.  So far that had not happened so he suggested that I go ahead at normal speed and he would follow along and meet me at the motel in Rock Springs.  He knows it drives me nuts to poke along.  I hated to leave Sam but since there was absolutely nothing I could do I decided I would take his suggestion and move on.After turning east off of I-15 onto Hwy 33 west of Rexburg I stopped for a cache at a roadside historical marker.  Just as I was pulling back on the highway I noticed a motorcyclist coming behind me.  Lo and behold, it was Sam who raised his arm jubilantly in the air signaling that his brakes had healed themselves.

Raining harder than it looks

Our cozy cabin in Melrose

The Big Spud

The rain had slacked up considerably and we stopped at a restaurant in Driggs, ID, for lunch.  We got into a conversation with another biker there and he informed us that we would be in snow if we took the route we had planned to take over to Jackson, WY.  With that information we changed our plans and headed south to Alpine to take another pass at a lower elevation.  It added quite a few miles to our journey and we did avoid the snow but we didn’t avoid cold driving rain.  This route did bring back memories as on the way to Hoback Junction we passed the place on the Snake River where there had been a hot springs pool and camping resort that Yancey had managed for several years. We did stop at one cache near Driggs that had one of the few remaining operational drive-in theatres.  The theatre was called “The Spud” and the cache “A TON of French Fries” was at a flat bed truck with a huge potato on it. (I don’t think it was real).  We slogged on down to Rock Springs stopping for only one more cache along the way.  We stayed at a nice motel (Quality Inn) there and I took Sam over to my favorite fast food restaurant, Dickey’s, for some great barbeque.  We traveled 472 miles that day with just 3 caches. [To be continued] M/W