Wednesday, June 30, 2010

June 30, 2010. Libby to Eureka, MT. 68 miles.

We had a great dinner last night--Salmon cooked on the charcoal grill in the park, pesto pasta, broccoli slaw, pound cake with fresh berries, and free margaritas! After dinner Dianne and I played just 2 games of Scrabble in our room then shut off the lights and hit the sack at 9 PM. It was a cool evening and we had windows that opened, so I slept better than the night before with the roaring AC....


Then at 4:45 AM I woke up to Dianne pawing through her stuff saying "Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God". I asked her what she was doing and she explained that she did not remember getting her credit card back from the ATM in Sandpoint, ID on Monday! She looked through all her stuff, and indeed did not have it.


She called her sister, who must have been on her morning walk (5 AM in Montana is 7 AM in Florida) because within 30 seconds she was at Dianne's house and Dianne was yelling into her phone telling her what happened and where to find the file for her credit card. Jan yelled back the credit card number and the phone number for her credit union, and told her that in order to NOT be charged for unauthorized use of your card that you have to report it within 24 hours of the loss. It had then been almost 2 days.



Dianne called information for Sandpoint , ID, and called that CU. Of course they were not open at 4 AM. She called the 800 number for her
CU and wrote down a the 800 number she heard on the recording (for reporting a lost or stolen card). When she called that number, she said it was too hard to hear the recording, and hung up.... So I called the number and it was a "phone companionship service"! Yikes! So I called the original 800 number, got the right number for reporting a lost card, called it and pushed buttons until I got a live person and handed Dianne the phone. Good grief! Maybe now she'll get a hearing aid!

All's well that ends well--someone found her card in the ATM, turned it into that CU, and the card has been blocked from use. But if you want phone companionship, I can give you a number...

We packed up our stuff and went outside to the truck for breakfast, and I found I had a flat rear tire... I had picked up a wire on the side of the highway yesterday. Funny, CJ and I heard something but ignored it because we were so close to the hotel.... I guess that must have been the wire before it broke off. I changed the tire when I should have been eating, and ate when I should have been leaving... Today all riders rode out of the hotel, unlike yesterday when 2 people did not ride at all and 8 people took a bump up to the 40 mile point to start their ride.

We had a spectacular day today! After taking a few turns though Libby we got on SR 37 North, and stayed on that road all day, until arriving at Eureka. (I will try to specify the route most days for you google-earth folks who requested it). This horse farm (above) was close to Libby, along the Kootenai River, which we followed for the first 15 miles.

We reached the Libby dam at 17 miles into the ride. We stopped for some photos--this one is for you Anne: Jennifer, me, Patty, Kathy L and Amy. After the dam, we rode alongside Lake Koocanusa for most of the day. It was a beautiful ride--I was looking from side to side, from the Lake on the left to the towering rocks on the right.... I saw rock climbers at one point, which was very cool. We had a lot of long gradual climbs, and lovely descents afterward, a gently rolling terrain.
We could see the Purcell mountains to our left and the Whitefish range in front of us (I picked up a free Montana map today, so now I can tell you which mountains we are riding through--yesterday's were the Cabinet Mountains to the east and the Purcells to the west). When we got close to Eureka, the beautiful wide shoulder we had been riding on all day disappeared, so it became a bit harrowing riding to this place. All of a sudden there was a lot of traffic when we had had none all day... and we're still in the middle of nowhere!
We are staying at the Ksanka Subway, Motel and Mini Mart, Gas station and Bakery.... apparently it's the only game in town! Below are some of our support staff: chef Patty, sag driver Carol, and tour leader Denise.

1 comment:

The Husband said...

Are we having to much fun out there?????????
Bill