No Jobs, No Home, No Worries. A Shared Journey by Bike and Support SUV Across the U.S.

Day 22 miles: 103

Total miles: 1206

Day 22 (by bike):

I left Wolf Point at 5:40 a.m. hoping to use that precious morning time to avoid traffic and stay in the cool air.

I was wrong. Two punctures later I was on my last tube. I made 6 miles in 2 hours and kept going hoping to make it to Circle by noon. I would then reassess if I should keep going.

I had no idea how many hills there were in this part of Montana. Contrary to my original thoughts, the hills became more and more rather than the topography getting more flat.

In addition, my road flower friends also became less and less. The mosquito concentration remained roughly the same.

I resolved to keep going but it was exhausting because for the first time I had consistent headwinds all day.

I made it to Circle by noon and ate with my wonderful Road Angel at Lunch Box. It was apparent here that everybody knew everybody and I was an outsider. I saw the local Sheriff come in and he didn’t say anything. A worker brought him his regular of chili mac and cheese soup, a small coffee, and an ice cream cone.

I thought I should be able to make it to Glendive. After all, my Dad’s cousin was there and I wanted to meet him Thursday evening.

It may have not been the best decision. I had a steady climb the first 20 miles and with headwinds felt like I was going uphill in both directions.

No towns were in between Circle and Glendive. I was beginning to have some water anxiety, worrying if I would have enough to last the searing heat. I would only take breaks every 2 hours and ration my water so I wouldn’t use it all at once.

I rolled into Glendive at 6:15- just in time for my ramen noodle dinner with Lauren.

Day 23:

By car, I had an uneventful day yesterday. The highlight of the day was meeting Matthew at Lunch Box deli for some delicious but expensive sandwiches and milk shakes ($16 for a BLT??!)

The first part of our rest day involved Glendive’s dinosaur museum. An impressive number of very well preserved dino fossils are found throughout Montana.

We were excited to nerd out over the Mesozoic Era. What we weren’t expecting was to also read about Noah’s Ark. Apparently Glendive’s Dinosaur & Fossil Museum was built by a creationist. So there’s that!

While the dinosaur museum was interesting, the best part of the day was yet to come. Matthew has a first cousin, once removed residing on a ranch in Glendive. That is, his dad’s cousin lives here! His name is Carl.

Carl doesn’t own a cell phone- you can reach him by his home phone or work phone. We later learned, however, that he typically turns the ringer off on his home phone, so it’s best if you can reach him at work.

We didn’t have an address to punch into Google maps. Instead we had a set of instructions to take a small road until we hit a dirt road, then “take Y to the right to cow patty.”

Time for a true eastern Montana experience!

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Carl’s ranch was stocked with three eager greeters.

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And what a perfect life they live.

Carl and his wife, Chris, set up a golf course on their property called Cow Patty Links. The golf course is open to free range cattle, thus is naturally spattered with cow patties.

Carl rolled up in his white Cadillac Seville that had four speakers planted on its roof and no doors to speak of. A Budweiser decal stuck proudly to the upper limits of his windshield. It was unlike any vehicle I’d ever seen.

With a fresh pinch of chewing tobacco tucked behind his bottom lip, his grin stretched to its maximum limits. He gestured his hand outward and introduced us to his ride.

“This is my golf cart! Hop in, I’m going to give you a tour of the course.”

The four of us + one ranch dog slid into the car and took in our VIP tour of the cow patty golf course.

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As we approached a steep hill, Carl looked back at me to offer some timely advice.

“You should hold on to the ‘oh shit’ bar!”

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I watched as the two other dogs chased us up the hill and ran off to meet us at our next destination. Carl parked his Cadillac and invited us to take in the view.

Carl has lived on this land for most of his life. He and his wife used to run a Halloween haunt to raise money for cancer research. They would often go out to Las Vegas to a Haunt Convention and learn as much as they could about running these large scale Halloween events. Carl and Chris never made a dime off of this.

They recruited local teens to gear up in costume and spook whoever was brave enough to enter the haunted fields. The gates opened at 7pm, but people would show up by 3pm. The gates were supposed to close by 11pm, but people would remain until 3am. This unfortunately had to end, however, as the teen volunteers started to let their friends in for free and eventually fist fights and hair pulling ensued.

“We weren’t going to tolerate that shit,” Carl confirmed.

We climbed back into his Cadillac and finished the tour, ending at the old chicken coop that Carl and Chris have turned into their “second home.” It’s their place to retreat in the evenings, stocked with food and drinks, an impressive collection of beer memorabilia, and hand crafted deck tables under surround sound speakers.

Carl has been collecting unopened bottles of beer for years, with probably the oldest beer being from the early 70s.

I noticed a can of Mountain Dew up in the beer collection.

“What’s the story behind this Mountain Dew, Carl?”

“That can belongs to a friend of ours who passed away from cancer. Mountain Dew was his favorite drink. It was served at his funeral, so we had someone save an unopened can for us. They placed a sticky note on the top that says ‘Do not drink.’ It belongs to our friend.”

Chris and Carl prepared a generous dinner for us, which included burgers with veggies from their garden, egg salad, and pasta salad. Part of the meal included an invitation to a pepper roulette. They grow their own jalapeños. While some peppers are mild in spice, others are “atomic,” per Carl. You never know which you’re going to get. Matthew accepted the challenge, which was captured on video:

Matthew lucked out.

We enjoyed the rest of the evening on the deck while Carl shared some family history with Matthew. He also shared with us all of his goals and personal projects. The man always has his hands on something, and the outcome is impressive.

“I’m always happiest when I have a dream to work towards. Once I reach that dream, the high is gone. So…I make more dreams.”

Matthew originally had planned to get to bed early and be up by 4am the next morning, but we were enjoying our visit so much that time wasn’t even a consideration. We finally peeled ourselves off the stools that Carl’s son had made, as the sun had already called it a day.

Matthew and I were back in my SUV when Chris came running back towards us with a book in her hand. She handed the book to Carl.

“They need to sign our guest book!” she reminded him.

Carl handed us his guest book. We were to write our names and where we lived. Matthew and I looked at each other, at first not quite sure what to put.

“Matthew and Lauren Hermann. Homeless.”