Friday, July 24, 2015
From: Billings, MT
To: Ten Sleep, WY
Miles: 294
Again, another beautiful morning and again, another light shower came through but everything was dry and ready to be packed for today’s journey.
A beautiful morning in the “back 40”
Had we opted to camp with the masses, we’d be in the middle of this somewhere
Found hiding in the tall grass
Most of us got up and either scattered to look at some of the vendors again and make last minute purchases, or signed up for the various events/seminars later that day or the next day.
More craziness
A bit of coffee and a monster breakfast burrito later, Rusty/Debbie and I found ourselves back at the exhibits…
Wandering over to watch the BMW Challenge course, we ran into Thomas
The BMW Challenge course….. Wow, what a learning experience that was. Big bikes and little bikes alike, the participants started out on ruts, then had to navigate a steep short hill followed by a sand/gravel pit which led them into a series of very tight barrels to do tight turns. From there, they ran down the tops of telephone poles buried halfway in the ground, then did a series of uphill sharp u-turns. Some did very well, others not so well.
The tight barrel section
The hill u-turn section
The steep “go down and stop on the hill” section
…but ‘ya gotta make it UP the hill first
The sand pit section
More fun
Rusty, Debbie and I broke camp, loaded up and saw this before heading to Ten Sleep.
The ride was what I’d call high desert. It was browner in color than the rest of what we had seen, had more sagebrush and generally void of everything except hay and corn.
We rode along the Big Horn mountains which started to turn a rich red in color. I knew we were getting close at that point. Sure enough, we made a turn and there it was, the Ten Sleep Brewery nestled just under a big red rock formation like the pictures I’ve seen. We pulled in and geared down and out comes Justin (Coolhand) with a hearty “Welcome”.
We went inside and started to sample the various offerings he has and took a quick tour of the facility. Some randomness….
Debbie, Rusty and Justin
Friday nights were also dinner nights and we feasted on Indian Tacos (a piled high type of nacho on freshly fried bread or freshly fried tortilla chips)
So it’s off to poke around some more…..
Yes, hops
Seems only appropriate that a KTM rider (Justin/Coolhand) keeps a new tire with his beer supplies, right?
They make a mean shandy
Before it got dark, we geared up and made our way back to Justin’s place, unloaded, then piled into some vehicles where he and his lovely bride Jody drove us to the top of their property to watch the sunset. Although not as spectacular as it could have been according to Justin, what we did experience was in my book pretty darn nice.
I could get used to this….
Justin and Jody, Suri and Yoshi
Yoshi, Justin and Rusty
After the sun had set, we headed back to the house where we had to navigate up a long rutted hill that was filled with silt. Justin’s 4x4 truck had a difficult time getting up the hill, and he had to simply blast his way up the tracks in the Subie.
The subie…
The hill…
And the little Subie that could…
A very large storm was headed our way for the night and we were all glad to be safe inside their home.
Sleep came quickly for all of us.
.