Freezing rain

June 10, 2006
Missoula to Sheridan, WY. 471 mi

Wake up and look out the window, puddles of water in the parking lot with hundreds of raindrop ripples on their surfaces. I play with of the ides of staying dry and warm for a day but pack up and go anyway. After the first one hundred and nineteen miles I am chilled to the bone and my fingers are starting to get stiff. I pull out my heated gloves and jacket. I have never used them before and I feel like they are like cheating if I’m on the motorcycle. I plug them into the bike and within 20 miles I am toasty warm and have lost any guilt on using them, they are great. It stops raining by Bozeman and I dry out by Billings, MT. I stop at a rest stop on the Wyoming boarder and get of the bike this Schnauzer dog goes crazy and starts barking at me. This elderly couple comes over with the barking dog to say hello. It turns out that their kid has the same bike as me and the dog loves him, so every time he hears my type of bike he goes crazy because he thinks its his buddy. It is strange how much bikers are accepted now. I remember 20 years ago when I started ridding that no elderly couple would come near me if I was on a black bike with black leather on. Now they will come over and spend 20 minutes talking with you and offer you food and sodas. To finish the day I ride down to Sheridan, WY. and stay the night. I stop at the Visitor Info Center and pick up maps. On the grass next to the front door I see 3 baby bunnies just sitting there and looking cute and fuzzy. I check the weather on the computer and find out there is a hail-sleet storm up ahead on the highway that is so bad that it has stopped traffic, I hope it clears by tomorrow. Find a hotel and walk downtown to stretch my legs and get dinner at Pablo’s. The waitress sees me reading the book Lake Woebegone, a story of a small town in Minnesota. She loves the book and has read it several times. Her daughter even went to a book signing and had the author sign a poster for her. She loves the book because it reminds her of the town she came from. For me it would be a prison that I would have to escape from. As I walk back from dinner I see more bunnies on the grass lawns and wonder why this town has so many of them.