Let's Ride

Chapter 10

Today was our last day, despite the cold, we started packing and rolling, Greg crawled in the tent and started rolling up the bags, and pulling everything out. He was a genius when it came to packing gear, "When you're carrying this s**t on your back you want to make everything count," he was always saying.

We savored our coffee and stuffed down some doughnuts while we got everything in our packs. Before long, we were ready to go, a last trip to the "john" and we were soon on the road. The chill cut into my clothes even with the leather, there was always somewhere that wasn't protected. However, once the sun was up it started to warm up quickly. I was hoping Old Faithful would be going giving us one last look, but no such luck,

We were about nine miles from the west entrance when we witnessed a bad accident, made worse because it involved a motorcycle. We were several hundred feet behind a Gold wing also heading west , suddenly a pick-up truck shot out of a picnic site access road striking the bike knocking it aside spilling the two riders but the truck didn't stop and kept going Greg pointed at me then the fleeing truck, "Get his plate!" he shouted. I kicked it down and twisted the throttle, making that V-Twin roar, Greg pulled up in front of the down bike and jumped off. I really poured it on the truck tried to speed up but my bike was faster, I didn't want to get too close, but as soon as I got the plate number, I backed off and slowed down making a U-turn in the road. Moments later I was approaching the accident scene, there was another car pulled off the road, the bike riders were sitting along the road, an older man and I presumed his wife, Greg and a man and woman were crouched down by the couple rendering assistance. I pulled off and ran up to the scene. "Get the license?" Asked Greg as he applied a bandage to the woman. "Yeah, green Chevy pick-up, between the four of us we got the couple fixed up since they had been wearing full leather and helmets they only suffered scrapes and cuts. We were able to move their bike off the road, but it wasn't going anywhere. It wasn't long before a ranger arrived; apparently, Greg had called 911 on his cell. I gave the ranger the license plate number. Shortly an ambulance arrived as well as a wrecker, I got their valuables out of their saddlebags and trunk for the couple before the wrecker hauled their bike away, we answered questions for the accident report, then about an hour later resumed our trip. Stopping in West Yellowstone, we visited the museum there as well as a couple souvenir shops. We spent almost two hours in West Yellowstone before heading up route 287 towards Ennis and Virginia City. We stopped along the way at Hebgen Lake where the earthquake occurred in 1959 killing a number of campers. We looked at where the land ha just dropped and cut off the main road as well as the remains of cabins still half submerged in the lake.

It turned out to be a rather nice day; we passed several bikers heading south towards the park. We stopped for the night in Ennis Montana at the "Lure Me In" a collection of cozy cabins that were just the "ticket" for two road weary riders. Greg had talked about doing some more fishing but hadn't made up his mind yet, so we booked for two nights. We rode back into town for supper, enjoying a wonderful steak dinner for two with wine, very romantic, but not half as romantic as back at our cabin. I was certainly ready for it, a nice hot shower together to get things started, a full sized bed to "play" on. We found it much easier to "do" certain things spread out on a soft bed we couldn't do in a sleeping bag inside a small tent.

Morning found us tangled in each other's arms ready to give it another go. It was back into the shower to wash off all the accumulated body fluids then outside for a ride into town for a much needed breakfast.

After a leisurely breakfast, we rode up to Virginia City to the reconstructed Ghost town; we spent almost two hours up there looking at their museum and shops. While we were there, quite a few bikers showed up. We ended up drinking beer and sharing stories at the Bale of Hay microbrewery, naturally we had to try a variety of their brews very tasty! Then back down to Ennis for another great dinner only trout this time. Back at the motel, we watched a little TV then played with Greg's "trout" for awhile before zonking out.