Day 46: Missoula to Lolo hot springs/lotsa lodge
I heard someone’s alarm go off at 6 but didn’t hear anyone get up. I fell back asleep until I woke up feeling hungry. Good thing there was continual breakfast. I wasn’t surprised to see Evan already there. We discussed the dynamic of the group while enjoying waffles, yogurt, biscuits and way too much hot chocolate on my part. We weren’t in a terrible rush as the adventure cycling headquarters didn’t open until 8. Last night we had debated on leaving our stuff in the motel room. We would have to bike past it again to get out of town. In the end it wasn’t worth it. The ACA takes your picture and puts it on the ‘wall of fame’ and I wanted my bike to have its gear. The headquarters was about 4 miles away. I really enjoyed biking through Missoula. It was a bike friendly city and we rode on a bike path all the up to the front door. Inside we signed the guestbook and got a tour of the building.
That was really neat. Our guide explained the history of a bunch of bikes they had hanging on the wall. They had the original bike that blazed the Trans-Am trail. It looked like it was about to fall apart. The headquarters was a lot bigger than I was expecting. There was a sale section where they sold jerseys, socks, maps, water bottles and a lot of other cycling gear. The sale section was combined with a welcomed and phone reps. Going down the hall they had the most beautiful photos hanging on the wall. I took down the name of the photographer as I want to buy some of his prints. Next to the photographs was a library. I think I could have spent all day there. Every book related to cycling was in their collection. Further down we passed some offices and then the map maker section. There was a cool ‘evolution’ of the maps panel. They had copies of the first maps and how they have evolved over the years. I was curious of what software they used to put the maps together. I suspected it had something to do with GIS. I asked the question and I had guessed correctly. I took a GIS class at UD so it was pretty interesting to see GIS software being used in the real world. I never would have guessed I would be using maps created by the program.
Further still was a section where they put together the magazine. ACA puts out a magazine nine times a year. They had paper and cutouts everywhere!
The tour ended with a walk through the courtyard. It seemed like every employee bikes to work. They told us that they could weigh our bikes to see how much we were lunging around. I didn’t want to know but Mark and Jolee weighed their tandem. It came out to 125 pounds. (That includes the bike and all their gear). I don’t know if I was expecting more or less but I knew my bike and gear had to be less than that. The headquarters also had a cyclist lounge where they let us eat ice cream and drink soda. I think we had three ice creams ice each even though it was only 11:00 in the morning. We ended up staying at the ACA headquarters for nearly three hours. I think would have spent the day there eating ice cream and browsing their cycling books.
From Missoula the route took us back through Lolo but turned right towards Idaho. On my way back I was so happy to run into the Chinese couple!! I didn’t get to say goodbye to them. We took a couple selfies together before wishing each other goodly just. Everyone stopped at Subway in Lolo but I wasn’t hungry due to all the ice cream I had eaten at ACA. I got a head start on the rest of the day. We planned to meet at Lolo hot springs lodge. It was a gradual climb up to the lodge. Then it was a short steep climb up to the boarder. A couple miles outside of town I ran into Monica! (If you remember I had met her in Wisdom a few days before). It was nice to chat with someone during the gradual climb. At the lodge we met the leader of the ACA 30 under tour. I had highly considered signing up for the tour as it is the same route. I’m really glad I didn’t after to talking to Looze (I’m not sure how to spell her name, it sounds like loose). She seemed really stressed about the group. When everyone else arrived I was surprised to find out Michelle, Marks wife, would be meeting us again for the next day. We ditched our bags again and made the climb up to the board in record time. We took pictures at the top at the Idaho boarder. Time seemed to be going really fast! Mark and Jolee let Evan and I get a head start on the downhill. We weren’t going much further. There was another campground where the ACA tour was staying. I didn’t make it a mile before Mark and Jolee caught me. This time I was trying too! I was peddling dangerously fast so that my front tire started getting speed wobbles. There’s no catching the tandem duo on a descent. At the lodge we met up with Michelle. No one had service which posed a bit of a problem for me because it was my Dads birthday. I begged use of the lodge phone who made an exception for me to make the call.
When Michelle arrived we decided to go back to Lolo hot springs as it was hot and we wanted to swim. We stacked our bikes with Ellen’s who decided to stay with the ACA tour and Monica. At Lolo hot springs we set up our tents then enjoyed a very hot pool. The water was so hot I could only put my feet in for a few minutes. There was a normal pool where Evan, Jolee and I slashed water at each other. They ended up having a noddles fight that opted out of. As it got colder the hot pool was more tolerable and felt good. It was getting late so we showered and headed back to camp. The stars would have been incredible if it wasn’t so cloudy.
