Nice morning. Woke up at over 7000′ in the Montana mountains. Blogs will be delayed due to lack of wifi / cell service in the wilderness. We started with some of Mike’s famous camp coffee made with filtered mountain stream water. Good and strong. Had to stop at an auto parts store in Red Lodge to fix the tail light on my Honda. Headed out of town for the Bear Tooth Pass into Yellowstone.
What a trip. I cannot believe they cut a road over these mountains.

Unbelievable. I am not embarrassed to say the level of anxiety was high. The views were just plain spectacular. The bikes preformed well but labored at the altitude. 30mph was probably average. Some of the turns in 1st gear maybe 10mph. Took us over an hour to get to the summit at 11,000′. I wanted to get a picture of us in front of the summit sign, but it was probably in the 30’s with a 20mph wind. We stopped, but I decided I would just tell you all about it.

The trip down was basically controlling speed. Over an hour there as well. Same type of turns. I am not a professional driver but some of these folks should not be on mountain. Just spectacular country. Wish I could of taken pictures. Jonathan got lots of GoPro stuff. His video should be good. My first time in that part of the country. Worth your time. Plug the pigs races into your trip. you won’t be disappointed.

So after looking at endless scenery and hanging on to the motorcycle so I wouldn’t fall off the mountain we dropped down for the run into Cooke City, MT. Once again, we crossed from WY to MT or MT to WY. I forget. You lose your sense of direction out here. Point is we again crossed the 45th parallel. I refer to day one.

We got to town and had lunch at the Beartooth cafe. The special was carne asada tacos and they were muy good. Fueled up. Headed into Yellowstone. Paid our fees. Found out our campsites that we called and reserved yesterday were 100 miles away. By this time, its 2p and my visions of an easy day began to fade.

Love the park. Could spend a week and only begin to appreciate. We stopped at only a few points of interest. Sulphur pools. Some canyon that I don’t recall the name. We had to stop while a herd of bison were crossing the road. Grazing on both sides. Mike suggested that we plow through. So we did. I confess it may not have been an approved passage. We could of waited all day. Cars were lined up, just waiting for the hundred or so bison to make up their mind. I just helped them make up their mind. I waited for the big ones to get off the road. They would stand in the road, stare at cars and wait for the younger ones to cross. At any rate we were number 2 in the line of vehicles, I pulled out, stopped when it seemed they didn’t like the idea of us invading their afternoon stroll, but then slowly driving nose to tail the bikes eased through the herd. I can only imagine the comments we generated from those in vehicles for us disrupting the last vestige of the American Bison. To alleviate any concerns, they gave us berth. A few of the young ones spooked but we left them intact. And motored on.

It took us almost 3 hours to get to the campsite here. All I can say is the campsites are designed for the masses. And they are here. Lot’s of rules. I mean lots. A young lady stands and reads them to you while waiting in line to register. Then you wait for an open window (4 or 5). Then you have to initial that you know the rules..
That being said, everything is clean and well maintained. Big shower building (you get buzzed in when you show them your camp thingy). Convenience store that sells liquor. All you need. We bought 3 boxes of firewood. Alex made a steak and pepper sandwiches with stuff bought at the store. We had the biggest fire in the campsite. I can’t remember what we talked about but there was laughing. Rain shut down the board of directors meeting 11ish. Big thunder and lighting and lots of rain through out the evening. Stayed dry

Again, Life is good