Day 23 – Twin Bridges, Montana to Ennis, Montana

The Sheriff is in Town

Yesterday morning after breakfast I got back to the cycling camp in the Twin Bridges park.  The couple staying there from the night before, Brent and Jen, had already packed up and left.  That left me, Anja and Ede.  Ede, who had been averaging over 80 miles a day, suggested riding with us mere mortals for the trip to Ennis so by 10:30 the three of us were on the road. After the chill of the early morning there was no wind and it was very comfortable.

There were several cyclists without gear who passed us by during the morning.  It was unusual to see so many in this rural area. About ten miles into the day an SUV approached from the opposite direction.  It slowed and the window rolled down.  The next thing you heard was a bark-like  “Ride in single file!” It was the local sheriff. Certainly not the nicest approach, and a bit unusual since the three of us were well inside the shoulder of the road and we were riding one behind the other.

We kept going and about ten minutes later we heard a blare of a siren. It was the same sheriff who had  done a loop and  was now behind us. We stopped. He gets out and looks like someone who had just gotten out of the professional wrestling business. Probably about 6’5″ and 260 pounds.  His general comment was, again, to ride in single file and then asking us why we weren’t doing that. Here’s where you’re thinking what good is it going to do to tell this person that how we were riding was single file.  Perhaps not with exact military precision, but nearly everyone would consider it as single file.

In any case, after his rant he softened up a bit and said “Look, I’m a cyclist too and we have a lot of bikers coming through here.  I’m just trying to keep people safe.”  Fair enough and we were then on our way.

As we were riding away I remembered the conversation I had the other day with Colin, a cyclist heading west. He told me a story about an encounter another cyclist had had with an outspoken sheriff just days before.  It then hit me that this must have been the same guy.

A bit later, Paul, Al and Tim, the biking trio who I’ve been crossing paths with for weeks passed us by. “Watch out Paul, the sheriff is on the lookout. We got pulled over.” “I know. I heard back up the road,” he said.  News travels fast around here.

By now the weather was near perfect.  We stopped roadside in a vacant area of a small town to have lunch and then continued to the old gold mining towns of Nevada City and Virginia City. These two towns, which are a mile apart from each other, used to have a population of 30,000 in the 1860s. Now it’s around 200.

They have turned them into a tourist area complete with rebuilding Nevada City to exactly how it looked back then, and it’s very well done. We saw that they had a small train that you can ride the mile up to Virginia City and back, so we stopped for several hours to see the area and take the train ride. They even have live theater here and a highlight was a room with a collection of player pianos from the time period, which still play.

Leaving town, however, the fun came to an abrupt end as the long five mile climb that we knew was coming finally appeared. We were given stick on sheriff’s badges in Nevada Ciy so we felt like we had some clout if we were to be pulled over again. I can’t say the climb was fun, but I’m getting a bit better at it. The seven miles of downhill that followed into the Madison Valley and then to the town of Ennis was the best of the trip so far.

A good day of cycling company mixed in with some excitement.