On Friday, 5-31, I left at 7 a.m. for a 67-mile ride from Circle to Jordan, Montana (pop. 343). Little did I know what troubles I would encounter that day! Thankfully, however, due entirely to the generosity and kindness of my new circle of friends in these parts, I made it through this ordeal. Let me start from the beginning of this saga.

I encountered my friend and former work colleague Frank as I headed west from Circle. He stopped when he saw me on his way to work. Frank is the General Manager of Farmers Union Oil, an agricultural cooperative. About an hour into my ride west, I also crossed paths again with Frank’s father-in-law Herb, the Curator of the McCone County Museum I met the day before, who was also driving to work, and he too stopped to say hello. Here is a photo of Frank as we chatted by the side of the road.

Around the time I met Herb on the road, I started noticing ominous signs that my rear tire was going flat. I rode on the flattening tire for about a half hour and managed to make it to the town of Brockway, MT (pop. 140), one of the very few signs of civilization on my route for today. Unfortunately, Brockway today no longer has any commercial enterprises other than the Brockway Supper Club, which was closed when I rode by. I rode around the town, which currently consists of a few houses and some long-closed businesses, but I understand at one time was a thriving trading and transportation center.

I was looking for somewhere to get out of the heavy wind and repair my flat tire, but this town looked completely deserted–that is, until I came up to a large garage (which I later learned was a former livery stable) in which a man named Wayne was welding something on the back of his truck. I asked Wayne if he would mind if I changed a flat tire in his garage, and he said I was welcome to do that and to use any of his tools I might need. Here is Wayne inside and outside his garage. Wayne was very helpful in lending a hand as I worked to swap tubes in my flat tire (I had three spare tubes with me), and he had compressed air in his shop, which was a godsend in pumping up the tire again. The flat was explained by a small piece of wire we found embedded in the tire.

Wayne used to run a business moving houses and other buildings, and at one time had moved a number of the buildings on display at the McCone County Museum, including a church, to their current home around the museum. He later worked for the road department doing maintenance.

I thanked Wayne for his help and then was on my way from Brockway. As I headed out of town, I thought I was on Highway 200, my planned route, but mistakenly took off on Highway 253, which crosses Highway 200 at Brockway. It was very windy, with gusts up to 40 mph, and also quite hilly, and I was 15-20 miles into my painstaking wayward journey on the wrong road when my Chief Navigator Trudi placed a panicked call to me saying that she thought, based on where she could see I was (using our “Find My Friends” app) that I was on the wrong road. As usual she was right.

Unfortunately, right about the time we realized I was headed in the wrong direction, my rear tire went flat again. Yipes! I was left with few good options at this point. It would have been nearly impossible to change a tire by the side of the road (which had virtually no shoulder) in those strong winds and riding 15 or so miles either back the way I came or forward to the next town on a flat tire in this hilly terrain was unfathomable. I contacted Herb, my newfound favorite museum curator, for some advice. To make a long story short, Herb put an “out running errands” sign on the museum door and drove out to come get me. We first stopped at Wayne’s garage where we thankfully found Wayne, who helped check the tube and tire. After a careful inspection, they seemed to be fine. We reinflated the tire, and after discussing my options, which would not allow for a 53-mile ride to Jordan that late in the day, I accepted an extraordinarily kind invitation from Herb and his son-in-law Frank to spend the night at their home about 25 miles from Circle. The plan was that they would drop me off in Brockway the next day at the point where I took the wrong turn, and then I could begin the trek to Jordan. Here I am back at Wayne’s, checking out my second flat of the day.

Here is a sign for Highway 200, the road I should have been on the whole time.

Here is Herb, Frank, and Frank’s son Frankie when we went out for a walk near their home after dinner that night.

Here is where Herb and his wife, and Frank and his family, live (in adjoining but separate living quarters), three miles from the nearest neighbor. Herb and Frank’s wives (Frank’s wife is Herb’s daughter) were out of town that night and wouldn’t be returning until the next day.

In addition to a few dogs and a cat named Bob, there is some livestock who also reside there. Here are the egg-laying chickens and a rooster.

And a turkey.

And two hogs of a breed known for an exceptionally prized kind of pork, which Frankie plans to show at a fair later this summer. He is active in a 4-H Club (the four H’s are head-heart-hands-health). The pigs have doubled in size over the last month.

Here are some of the beautiful surroundings we encountered on our evening walk in their neighborhood.

Here we are enjoying the setting sun.

This truly is “Big Sky Country,” where you can see many miles in every direction.

Here I am with Frank. I am deeply grateful for his, and Herb’s, kindness in rescuing me and inviting me into their home Friday night.

Frank dropped me off in Brockway the next morning and I was on my way for what I hoped would be an uneventful ride to Jordan. For the first eight miles or so, I enjoyed the wide-open vistas in this part of the country. Remember the line “where the deer and the antelope play” from the classic cowboy song, Home on the Range? Well, I saw both of them along the way. Here is an antelope.

Unfortunately, about eight miles into my ride to Jordan, I again experienced a flat tire. My best option at this point was to ride on the flat tire for another eight miles, when I would come to a rest stop (the only amenity along my route to Jordan today) and try to change the tire–again! Here is the rest stop, where I was to spend the next two hours changing the tire.

I found it impossible to get my tire off the rim using the plastic tire levers I had brought, and needed a thinner, sturdier tool. I no longer had access to Wayne’s tools as I had yesterday. What to do? I found a new friend in Ruth, who was mowing the lawn at the rest stop. She lent me a screwdriver, which worked perfectly. When I tried to return it when I was done, she said I could keep it if I might need it down the road.

Ruth works as an independent contractor maintaining the grounds of a couple of rest stops in the area. Like many folks in this part of Montana, she has other jobs too. Her principal other employment, where she is actually an employee rather than an independent contractor, is working as a Patient Omsbudsman in several long-term care facilities. She explained that these independent ombudsmen are required under the Older Americans Act of 1965, to make sure that long-term care facilities are serving the needs of their patients and not cutting corners along the way.

There are two signs at the rest stop which help tell the story of the area, including its unique site of many dinosaur fossils. Over half of the 30 tyrannosaurus rex skeletons in the world were found in this region.

A second sign describes the history of the Fort Peck dam nearby, the largest hydraulically filled earthen dam in the United States. The dam was built by upwards of 10,000 workers during the Great Depression, who lived in 18 shanty towns in the area. One of these workers wrote: “Here we are out where there is nothing but thistles, black widow spiders, ticks, rattlesnakes, and heat. We’re living in pasteboard boxes and eatin’ dirt, with nothing to do when we’re not working but guzzle beer and wake up with a headache.” It’s been frustrating to be experiencing my third flat tire in two days, but I guess life could be a lot worse.

I am thankful to report that my replaced tube did the trick, and my remaining very hilly 38-mile ride to Jordan was a success, though winds picked up during the afternoon and it was 7 p.m. before I arrived at the Sportsmen Motel in Jordan. Here are a few scenes with some of what I saw along the way.

Remember the creeks I showed in a past post that had names but were completely dry? Curiously, I encountered Little Dry Creek on this day’s ride, which did not live up to its name.

As you can see, there is lots of water in Little Dry Creek.

I am not making this up, but about an hour later, I came across Big Dry Creek, which also was not dry.

But Big Dry Creek turned out not to have much in the way of water in it. Go figure.

You pass a lot of cattle alongside the road in this part of the country. They are invariably quite curious and will almost in unison raise their heads to stare at me as I ride by.

As I write this, on Sunday, June 2, I am quite thankful for a day to rest up. I am also a bit apprehensive about tomorrow’s 78-mile ride to Winnett, MT (pop. 182), given the challenging hills and wind conditions around here. Now that I am down to only one spare innertube, I am also very thankful that, for now, my rear tire continues to be fully inflated.