Day 11, Eureka to Columbia Falls, Montana

Ride distance; 67 miles; ride time: 4:16; average speed: 15.7 mph; calories burned: 4541; ascent in feet: 2849. Today, we had breakfast at the First Baptist Church in Eureka. We had pancakes and sausage. Someone had donated 200 pounds of homemade sausage to the church. It was very good but I’m sure they didn’t cook up all 200 pounds of it for us. We saw deer along the ride today as well as elk (at an elk ranch). We passed by many unusual white plants that only grow at a certain elevation and micro-climate. I later found out that they are called bear grass. We had lunch near Whitefish, Montana. After lunch, we went into town. The two most popular destinations were they bike shop and the ice cream shop. I must confess that I visited both. I bought a new pair of gloves to replace my old ones at the bike shop and a cookie dough ice cream cone at the ice cream shop. We arrived in Columbia Falls in mid-afternoon. Our host church today is Our Savior’s Lutheran Church. They have been great finding us host families to stay with and providing meals for us. Stewart, Dan, and I are staying tonight with Allen and Carey Chery and two of their grandchildren. Tomorrow, we’ll be traveling along the southern boundary of Glacier National Park. Several of us wanted to ride on the Going-to-the-Sun Road through the park but it’s still closed over Logan Pass due to extremely high snowfall this winter. The road crew is presently working on a snowdrift over the road that is 75 feet deep.