From Fernie we rode one of the alternate routes, the Flathead Alternate. This route goes through a very remote area where many grizzly bears live. They also call it the grizzly highway, apparently this area has the highest density of grizzlies in all of North America. Nobody lives there, the only people there are some fishermen, hunters and other campers on the few small primitive campgrounds.

We picked up the Flathead route about half way. We had heard that the top part wasn’t very interesting and the road was really bad and extremely rocky, so we crossed over about half way so we could ride the bottom part. Indeed it was beautiful and remote, we only saw a few other people. We spent 2 nights next to cabins where we could put all our food inside so the bears couldn’t get to it. We slept in our tent because the cabins were infested with mosquitos.

The second day we had only been on the road for a little bit when we saw a grizzly bear on the side of the road. He saw us too, got up on his back legs and checked us out. Then he turned around and ran off. Although it is called grizzly highway, most people don’t see any bears when they’re riding there. So we were lucky to see one without getting into trouble.

The whole route was a lot of climbing and at some point we faced ‘The Wall’. This isn’t called this name for nothing, it’s nothing more than a narrow hiking trail leading straight up a hill. We had to take the panniers off and carry them up seperately. Then the bikes, 1 by 1. One of us would take the front to pull and the other would be in the back pushing. It had rained a few days earlier and parts of the trail were still wet and slippery. There also were some tree roots to lift the bikes over. When we thought we were finally there and put our  panniers back on the bikes, it turned out there was another section where we had to take them off again. Finally we reached the end and we could ride again. After a long day we arrived at Trappers Cabin, the cabin where we wanted to stay, and were able to cook and eat dinner right before it got dark.

It had been pretty warm all those days, but because we were at pretty high altitude it was actually very nice. But when we descended to the US border after Trappers Cabin, we found out how hot it actually was. At that low altitude it was scorching hot and waiting in line for the border didn’t make it any better. Fortunately the immigration officer let us wait in the shade.

And then we were in the US (Montana) already, 9 days after departing Calgary….

The first town we rode through was Eureka, where we could also do some grocery shopping for the coming days. In the next 2 days we rode to the larger town of Whitefish, which turned out to be a really nice town. It was a lot of climbing on pretty bad, rocky roads but the scenery was beautiful. It’s a bit more open than in Canada, so we could see more of the surroundings. We camped at the top of a pass on a beautiful lake with mountains surrounding us.

In Whitefish we camped at the State Park campground and met many other cyclists. We had met quite a few already, but here we met a lot more. We stayed for 2 days, our first rest days in 11 days of riding, and had a good time with Seth and Ray. We kept meeting Ray after that and kept in touch with him. There also was a large ACA group, an organisation that organized guided tours on either part of the GDMBR or the whole route. This group was doing the whole route, from border to border. It was the first time we met them, but it definitely wouldn’t be the last time. We’d meet them a lot more and in a way we became part of the group a little bit.