August 21, 2017
CUSTER NATIONAL FOREST: One Hundred Fifty Miles From the Arc of Ecliptic Totality
Even if one were to give the ugly city park a pass, Baker is still not a very attractive town. It is the grimy oil town that I thought Williston would be, only a lot smaller. The north side of Baker--the side I came in on yesterday--seemed to be nothing but metal scrap yards, oil drilling services, and messy dealerships for agricultural pipes, equipment and machinery. The downtown had lots of bars, that's for sure, but not much else. And there were hardly any human beings to be seen. I'll be generous and chalk that up to it being Sunday.
The worst part of Baker, though, was Lake Baker, which had the appearance of once being a source of community pride. It is now an almost completely dried-up basin of cracked mud. The whole time I was in Baker I felt the aura of a town that just gave up after it had been beaten down by the sun and the wind and the declining oil prices.
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Yes, it's dry here in eastern Montana. Today, as well as yesterday, I crossed several bridges that spanned creeks that were just as dry as Lake Baker.
On a happier note, I got to ride my bike in the Great Plains and Big Sky Country again today. I'm still on Highway 7 South and it still consists of constant uphills followed by downhills. However, those hills are more fun today because the wind shifted again and now I have a tailwind. HIP, HIP, HOORAY!
I hope I didn't get too carried away with that "hip, hip, hooray" thing. It's my first tailwind in a week and I like it. And Baker-ites might hate me for this, but I also like that it hasn't rained all week either.
The tailwind got me to remembering a song from long, long ago. I sang it with my best King Crimson impersonation over and over for most of the morning.
"I talk to the wind,
My words all get carried away."
There is a verse in that same song that goes something like this:
"Said the straight man,
To the late man,
'Where have you been?'
'I've been here and,
I've been there and,
I've been in between.'"
I can relate. I, too, have been here, and I've been there, and now I've been to the amazing Medicine Rocks State Park. I had been seeing some unusually shaped rocks for a while, so when I reached the turn-off for a state park, I was pretty sure it would be a good idea to check it out. It's a good thing I did, because the park is full of fantastic rock formations that defy description. A few years ago I would have attempted to describe them anyway, but thank goodness I've discovered the magic of photography.
Those are just a few of the hundreds of cool rocks. There are also some pine trees in the park, but I won't call them view blockers because they are quite sparse. I spent over an hour hiking and biking around the Medicine Rocks while the moon began its advance over the face of the sun.
I was completely unprepared for this place. It was nothing like the land that surrounds it. I was spellbound. If it hadn't been so early in the day, I would have been pleased to stop there for a night of blissful camping.
I was back on the road when the solar eclipse achieved 90.6% totality. I was expecting it to be darker than it was--like 90.6% darker. At best, I would describe the atmosphere to be kind of a silvery-gray. It wasn't like early evening; it was more like I was viewing the earth through cheap sunglasses--and I wasn't even wearing my cheap sunglasses at the time.
It's a testament to the powerful forces of the sun that it can still generate so much light when 90.6% of it is covered up.
Soon after the moon and sun finished up their eclipse thing, a woman driving a pick-up truck pulled up alongside of me while I was eating a spoonful of peanut butter. She rolled down her window and almost ruined my near-perfect day.
"How are you doing," she asked?
"I'm doing GREAT!"
"I just stopped to ask if you could keep an eye out for my dog. I live just up the road and I've informed the sheriffs' offices in both Baker and Ekalaka that she's missing. So if you see a little dog out here maybe you could give them a call. She's very friendly, so she might even approach you since you're moving slowly."
"For sure I'll do that if I see her. I have a little food to keep her with me until I can dial 9-1-1."
"She's such a good dog, and she NEVER runs off like this," she finished.
How do you get something like this out of your mind, especially if you're a dog owner yourself? I felt awful. Somehow I knew I wouldn't see the dog, and I knew the woman probably wouldn't hunt me down to tell me whether she found it or not. I just had a bad feeling that either a coyote or a car got her dog.
With a heavy heart, I made my way to the friendly town of Ekalaka. It was much smaller than Baker, but I liked it WAY better. I bought some supplies at a tiny grocery store and moved on to a National Forest campground I noticed on my map. Little did I know that I would have to go off-route six miles on a fairly steep gravel road.
I almost reconsidered, but as often happens, I pushed on and was rewarded with great scenery and solitude. Six miles. No cars. NOBODY else at the campground. Red headed woodpeckers. NO BUGS! An hour in the sun wearing nothing but shoes. Yeah, it was worth the effort.
Today's ride: 47 miles (76 km)
Total: 309 miles (497 km)
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