Ghost Towns

My just completed Montana bike tour took me to four historic towns - two live and two dead: Virginia City, just up the road from Nevada City, Bannack and Coolidge.  Bannack was the first Montana territorial capital (and the site of the first brick building in Montana - its "capitol"), and Virginia City, the first State capital designated when it became a state in 1865, until wrested away by Helena ten years later. 

Virginia and Nevada City continue today as restored tourist destinations, with Virginia City designated a National Historic Landmark District in 1961.  The notoriety of the violent town it once was is easily discernible through the various historical plaques.  Nevada City still shows the spoils of mining along Alder Creek.

Virginia City - old times live on: ice cream in the shade!

Bannack, founded as a gold mining town in 1862, had 3,000 people within a few years, and existed in steady decline until it was fully abandoned by the early 1950's, It is an interesting ghost town in that the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks has taken over the town site that was saved from total extinction by a dedicated private effort starting in the 1940's, and turned over to the state in 1954 with the proviso that the ghost town not be converted into the tourist destination like Virginia City, but remain a ghost town.  Minimal preservation is accomplished, and one can walk through the buildings, including the original county courthouse that was later the main hotel (when Bannack lost the county seat to Dillon), and use your imagination as to what life must have been like in this community "back in the day".

Bannack window to the past

Former County Courthouse, then Hotel Meade.  First brick building in Montana

The luxury of wallcovering?  Or decorative draft stop?

Old city drug store in Bannack

Coolidge was a company mining town, founded by William R. Allen and named after his personal friend President Calvin Coolidge, continuing a primarily silver mining operation in the Elkhorn Mine (discovered in 1872) in 1913, but as poor economic tides continued to roll over the mine, it eventually ceased operation after multiple ownership changes in 1932, vacating a town that once boasted 350 people.

So why am I telling you this?

Looking at these three ways of representing the past was an interesting experience.  I bought ice cream in Virginia City, sitting on the wooden porch/sidewalk, imagining life at the time.  I bought a guidebook to Bannack with my admission to the site, guiding my walk-about the empty structures. Following a five mile uphill gravel ride, and a one mile walk through the woods to the Coolidge townsite, I came away with nothing but impressions of the time gone by, eerily represented in the quiet tumbledown nature of all but one structure still largely intact.  

And I must say I liked Coolidge most of all.  Seeing how the light played with the piles of wood, bent or broken as they fell, a runway for chipmunks, surrounded by trees growing up in and around these structures where streets, alive with activity, once were.  The intimacy and personality of the places was compelling - from the scraps of wallpaper still clinging, tipped outhouses, and tiny cabins that probably served a single grizzled miner, smaller even than the present tiny house craze.  A belt buckle, rusty tin cans, various scraps of metal still littered the landscape - all now protected detritus of a day gone by.  Perhaps the most compelling image was the schoolhouse, slid from its foundations likely from an earlier flood, where now a river runs through it, its crooked belfry still visible, calling the students to revisit this place.

The old schoolhouse captured by the creek

A Coolidge "secure" window to the past

Tumbledown

OK, at least one art photo!!!  Saw patterns, grain, nail shadow and green

Indeed the ghosts still live here, and in all these towns, they are visible to my minds eye, a glimpse into the past still living today.  And they will only disappear when the last vestiges of these towns are finally reclaimed by the earth from whence they came, like so many towns that have been absorbed since time began.

Thanks for the memories, ghosts!

The reclamation tool: lichens!

The Secret of Hills - Part 2: Finding the Way Up

People often ask me what I do to entertain myself during long days in the saddle. The answer is really quite simple - the trip is its own form of entertainment.  Mostly, it is about looking at a new scene, the detail at 12 miles per hour, or even 4 to 6 miles per hour climbing.  There is so much time to fill, my mind is never silent.

And nothing occupies the mind more than climbing hills.

I have already written about Logan Pass in Glacier, the king of climbs on this trip in terms of magnitude, all brainwaves taken together.  Or the "minor", unmarked pass of Old Woman's Grave road, minor as in "routine", but had the power to mystify - on this already written.

When will this end?   

Will the summit approach be abrupt or only a gentle saddle?

Will there be a view?  A sign? A welcoming committee?

That light of horizon through the trees, silhouetting the ridge above, is getting lower, dropping as I rise

Oh those thighs are starting to burn, ease up a bit, can I switchback across the lane?

Ten up!  Stand,  Oh there, a bit better for a fleeting moment.

But of the other climbs?  There is much challenge surveying the landscapes ahead and to "read" them, predicting where the pass might cross. Or, as one climbs, to read the geometry of pitch, traverse, and elevation, sensing the optimal way to power through this rising terrain. There were some remarkable climbs, and many unremarkable ones born of necessity, merely to get to ones destination, not the anticipated "prize". One truth is herein spoken - that climb at the end of a long day is the hardest physically and mentally.  The long climb first thing in the morning is fresh and energizing (though many would disagree on that point).

What's that new squeak?

How can flowers grow in such tiny crevasses of rock?

Cool striations in that rock!

What's with these flies circling like satellites?

Scooch little yellow butterfly, flying so seemingly uncontrollably.

Those shifting clouds, occasionally masking the intense sun

Consider the minor passes, unmarked and otherwise unremarkable between Helena and Three Rivers. Or between Norris and Ennis over the Bozeman Trail: wide open range lands, wide views of the valley behind and mountain ranges astride, extreme sunshine and often fickle winds.  Or the unmarked Stemple Pass (6,376'), a gravel climb, very steep, less than fully "engineered".

Granny*, you still there?  Ah yes - haven't sung your praises yet. You're in reserve in case I need you!

Wish I knew Mom's mom - I remember Oma.

What would Dad think of this trip?

 God it's hot

Wish there was a tailwind - would it make a difference?

Looking at the shadow of me grinding, creeping slowly past the gravel.

Or the morning climb over an unmarked pass between Ennis and the historic old town of Virginia City (first capital of Montana), itself situated on the west facing slope of the Greenhorn Range - a steady rise out of the Madison River valley through dry scrub, the road up ahead fully visible, switching back and forth to an unseen pass, the passage through which can only be speculated upon, with every mile higher the coniferous forest cover starting to appear, in full form at the physical pass.

There goes the coyote - slipped slyly right under that fence.

What was that bird?  Oh, an oriole!  Becky would know!

How did this underwear get to the side of the road?

Does anyone in a car see these delicate flowers?

There goes the deer - be careful

From Dillon, the climb over Badger Pass (6780'), though anticipated on the map, was a steady, beautiful climb through mostly wooded forest over a broad pass, revealing the Grasshopper Valley ahead, a dry, scrubby expanse leading to Bannack (the first territorial capital).  This followed the next day by a steep climb out of the Grasshopper Valley along the PioneerScenic Byway, a wondrous, mountain environment with a fresh morning forest smell, wide open alpine meadows with snow capped mountains of several ranges all around.  The Chief Joseph Pass (7,264') climb from the open Big Hole valley out of Wisdom followed this pattern of an evolving landscape, rising gently at first, steeply toward the end.

I can hear you, but can't see you Mr. Screech Owl

Why is there so much cowshit on the road?**

Sound of rushing water - climbing, rising and fading away

That ditch has water flowing - what collects there? Oh, there is not much shoulder - have to hold the line.

Car coming - I spy you in my tiny mirror.  staaaaay wide - righto!

A bit of a blind inside curve - need to pedal harder to get around to be visible. Oh, but . . .

Have I really climbed this high already?

And perhaps the most daunting climb was the final major climb, the Skalkaho Pass (7,260'), following the Skalkaho River to its source - a waterfall - high up a winding steeply sided canyon road, itself largely unpaved and single lane with no guardrails, stunning for the evolving views, and its ability to hug the steep canyonsides.

The light - the light is perfect, casting a bright spot on the forest floor

Look at those wildflowers.

Awww, look at that fawn staring me down.

Should I stop to get a picture?

Whoa, steep ravine off the side - watch your line, no railing

Doppler effect of a small spring cascading down the mountain side.

Wind in the pines, whisper as soft as the bed of needles

Creaky trees - catch that fragrance!

Oh, the reward is now given!  How quickly will we fall back down the hill?  The next valley opens up before me. Feel that speed rising with no effort, the wind washing my face faster and faster, my legs ceasing to pedal, just coasting to enjoy.

Oh, look at that view, had I climbed that high?

Nicccceeeeee!  Grip tighter.  Glance at speedometer, approaching 40

Hold it steady - cars coming down behind.

I do trust my bike at this speed, don't I?  It is rolling nicely . . .

Miles are clicking by -  long descent. Crouch for a few miles per hour more! Stay off the aerobars!

Wow, what a hairpin, lean in - see that road laying out in front of me.

Glide and ride all the way down, slowing now as the road flattens out. Have I shifted gears?

Only to do it again . . .

*Granny refers to the lowest gear available to ease climbing, after which there are none lower, literally and painfully obvious!
** The reason? The roads and shoulders are used to drive cattle to different ranges, witnessed several times.  The result is, well, obvious!