Day 25. Circle to Medora, ND, 65 miles

I slept poorly and woke up for good at 3:30; I would have headed out soon after 4, but I wanted to wait for there to be some light in the sky before hitting the interstate. You heard me right. The route runs on I-94 for a good stretch in western ND; though it sometimes jumps off onto frontage roads, the general cyclists’ wisdom is that it’s better to stay on the interstate for reasons of hills. It’s not as bad as you’d think! The shoulder is 10-15 feet and clean of debris. And at 5 a.m. on the Sunday of July 4 weekend there is not a lot of traffic happening. And I am in badlands, and it was beautiful.

It was cloudy and grey and still for the first hour, which was great because I climbed and climbed, but by 6:30 the wind was up. I was aiming for a first rest stop 25 miles out at Wibaux, or to Beach at 35 miles if I could manage it. By the time it started raining 15 miles in, I was renegotiating the day in my head and thinking about a shorter day to Beach and no full rest day.

Then a magical thing happened: the wind let up. Something with the rain and the storm and I don’t know, but the wind just calmed. I thanked out loud (repeatedly, like some kind of dizzy fool) the skies and the grasses that were no longer whipping in my face and put pedal to the metal, so to speak.

I flew past Wibaux not wanting to lose my lull, pausing once to record my departure from Montana after 13 days (!!) and my entry into North Dakota (“Be legendary”).

I stopped briefly in Beach to use the bathroom. I would have liked to hang for a bit at the dazzling, interstate-level Flying J that had been such an oasis for me and Joyce after a rough ride south through oil country and the Little Missouri Grasslands, replete with mishaps I won’t rehash here. I would have at least liked to text Joyce a picture—“greetings from Beach!” But the wind was down, and the weather forecast had it rising again as the morning progressed and getting bad by noon. So I hit the road again. And it held. It held all the way to Medora, even as the sun came out and it got hot. I didn’t stop again for 30 miles and arrived in town at 11:30, having completed a full day’s ride, short the state park campground a couple of miles outside town.

My first stop was at the Dakota Cyclery, the bike shop that had saved Joyce’s and my butts in 2013. I wanted to say thank you again and ask them to give my noble steed a quick once-over. The place was hopping, so I headed to a bar & grill for a tall Wibaux Gold, a local lager, and a salad with a side of fries. Medora is pure tourist town, so options were plentiful (for North Dakota). No grocery stores, but a place called Chateau Nuts.

After lunch I went back to the shop and hung out while they looked over my bike, tightened the brakes, put some air in the tires, etc. The owner remembered rescuing me and Joyce and also remembered sending a couple of Dakota Cyclery stickers my way (Andrew, you made this happen, yes??) after I had to retire my previous panniers. I got a new sticker and a t-shirt because they last longer. Then I picked up provisions and climbed some badlands to my campground, Sully Creek State Park.

A wonderful couple from Maine, Bob and Cheryl, stopped by my campsite to chat bike trips. He’s done 500 miles of the Northern Tier west to east and will be restarting it this week with newly-retired Cheryl as sag wagon and companion. They brought me a beer, and we had a lovely time. Later, when the ranger stopped by to let folks know about serious thunderstorms and potential hail later, they told me their truck was unlocked and I was welcome to take shelter in it if the storm got bad. ❤️ We exchanged numbers, and I hope to see them in Maine if they get back in early August as planned.

Around 8 it got clear the storm was serious about happening, as the skies darkened rapidly and we started seeing lightning in the distance, first a little and then huge pink and yellow flashes that lit up the whole sky. We all battened down our various hatches, and I retired to the tent to watch the lightning until the rain began to patter on my tent and I had to close the fly. I was exhausted and fell asleep cozy in my sleeping bag to the sound of rain lashing the tent.