Friends on the Road

It is absolutely amazing the number of young and older people like ourselves that are traveling across the United States on bikes.  We met Jess who is riding alone from Oregon to Rhode Island and pulling her trailer with tent and supplies.  Jessica is 38 and fundraising for childhood obesity.  We actually have spent quite a bit of time and meals with Jess and she is quickly becoming another adopted family member.  Mike from Wisconsin is traveling from Oregon to Maine on some of our same route and he also is traveling alone with all his gear on his bike.  He has a great setup and has an all carbon bike like Ray's but Tulle makes a rack that works awesome on the all carbon bikes.  I have photos of his equipment because this is definitely a future purchase for Ray.  I can see lots more biking of this type in our future.  Then there was Eric and Bob traveling from Oregon to Boston fundraising for cancer research and The Dana Farber Institute.  Eric's wife is driving their SAG vehicle although she is not fond of the name SAG so she has named what she is doing as something else.  Of course, I can't remember.  There was also Jim, again riding on his own.  He just retired from teaching in the Bay Area and wanted an adventure.  All of us were staying at the fabulous Lochsa Lodge in Powell Idaho.  Thirteen miles from the Montana border.  Some chose to stay in the cute little bungalow's and others of us stayed in the free camping behind the store.  We were not skimping on the food....it was awesome.  Ray and Mike even got in a game of horseshoes and pool.  This is a definite stopping place for future travelers.  I almost forgot, later in the night we had another great young couple join in our camping.  They were Kate and Tyler.  Also traveling from Oregon to the East Coast for Kate's brothers wedding. They are taking it a day at a time and while Tyler drinks beer at the resting place for the night Kate puts up the tent and organizes the next days route.  Something amiss here......we will work on Tyler further on down the road.  Yesterdays journey brought us together with three young college students from Tennesee.  Israel, Jordan and ???? (female of the bunch).  Saw them again today having breakfast while we were making a driving/bike change before going over the Lost Trails Pass.  They decided on this adventure only a month or so ago.  They all had the time off and so off they did go.

Not bad for free tenting!  

Horseshoes anyone?

The Not SAG Wagon

Ray, Mike and Mike

Margie at her camping quarters