Upper Lake Campground & Wildlife Preserve, MT

57 miles, 5:30/7:00

Today we start with breakfast at the local cafe. Breakfast is my favorite meal to eat out now. I love eggs, hashbrowns, omelettes, and french toast, and these things we don’t cook at camp. Plus, usually country cafes serve up big portions, and it takes a lot to fill us up these days. This morning we order a cinnamon roll on top of the usual breakfast, and it comes with our coffee and is huge and frosted. It’s gone within a couple of minutes. Oh, that was good!

We leave Lima and have a pleasant climb and then rolling hills. I love the rolling hills. You get to put in some effort and then recover before leaning into it again. We usually get good momentum built up. Because we know it’s only a short climb each time, we put more effort in and then really enjoy the downhill. There are horses here and there on the grassy hills today and they look pretty content.

I haven’t told you yet about the horses having a tendency to race Dave. It started back when we free-camped outside of Basin, Montana. First thing that morning we were riding along a pasture with about eight horses. What looked to be the lead horse yanked his head up from the grass and took off at a gallop right next to the fence by Dave. So Dave kicks it up a notch and they all join in to race him clear down to the end of the pasture, quite a long way. It was hilarious and Dave enjoyed every second. I was laughing so hard it took me a little while to catch up. Anyway, since then it’s happened a couple of times, so now whenever we see horses we sort of hope they’ll be game for a race.

But that doesn’t happen today. When we crest one of the hills we see a horse alone in a small pen (corral? yard?) and he perks up when we get close. I couldn’t resist, he was just begging for a good scratch. Oh my, he did want some scratching. He helped by yanking his head up and down while I applied pressure. I picked some of the soft green grass just outside his reach and fed it to him. He grunted, and then gave us a show of head twisting, lip stretching and teeth displaying. Oh, and tongue curling. Two or three times over. What a ham. Is this normal? Is this a sign of a happy horse or one that has been trained to entertain? I was tempted to let him out and take him with, but I didn’t have enough apples in my pannier to keep him happy so I let him be.