We opted to take a path that would follow the Missouri river more or less. It seemed fitting since this is the bicentennial of the Lewis and Clark Expedition that took place from 1804-1806.We stayed in London, Ontario for four busy days at David's mom's apartment. Both motorcycles had their 18,000 mile service performed at Wolf BMW and David's bike received a new rear tire. We unpacked all our bags and left quite alot of things in David's mom's storage locker. One of the things left behind was the MP3 player. Even though it would have been nice to have, it was heavy and bulky and we had too many other electronic items - laptop computer with its AC and motorcycle adapters, 2 digital cameras with their cords, two radios, two electric vests with their cords, and a battery charger. All of this would take up a side case in itself. We also left behind our jeans, taking just two pairs of lightweight synthetic pants each. While in London, we had dinner with friends one night, David's uncle Geoff (great guy) came to visit, and David's sister Rebecca and her husband Russ stayed with us one night.

We said good-bye to mum on July 28 and crossed back into the U.S. at Port Huron, Michigan. We drove straight through the state to Muskegon and caught the ferry across Lake Michigan to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. It was a 2.5 hour trip and cost $50 each per person and $30 each per motorcycle. It was worth the money to avoid driving the interstates through Chicago, but the scenery was non-existant as the ferry departed at 11:30 pm. The following day, we started out on the interstate but ran into a traffic jam about 30 miles outside of Milwaukee so we took secondary roads to Madison. It took much longer than it should have but the Wisconsin countryside is very pretty. We stopped at Deb's sister Carol's house and helped ourselves to ice cream while she and her husband were at work and then continued on to Deb's parents' home in the north central part of Iowa about 2 miles from the tiny town of Vincent, arriving just as it was getting dark.

All of Deb's family came for the weekend, sisters Terry, Cheryl and Carol, brother Mark, brother-in-laws Billy and Jay, nieces Shelby and Abby and nephews Lane and Cal. Only her brother-in-law, John was missing :(. One day most of us walked to the cemetery on the other side of section from the farmhouse which can be seen a mile across the corn field but because we walked on the roads, it was a 2 mile journey to get there. This is where all of the relatives on Deb's dad's side of the family are buried including her sister, Lorilee. One evening we had cousins over from a near-by farm, grilled steaks and had the most delicious home grown sweet corn. After dark, we built a bonfire; Shelby brought her guitar and sang, she is such a talented singer and song writer. After everyone left on Sunday and Monday, we spent a few more days just relaxing, went in to Fort Dodge one day to check our email, and do laundry. We visited Deb's aunt Eleanor who, at 85, just moved from her house into an apartment. A reporter from the Fort Dodge Messenger came out to the farm one day and interviewed us. The story was in the paper the next day; we had a big article on page two with colored pictures, it was pretty exciting.

We left Iowa on August 4 with no specific itinerary. We knew we wanted to see the Canadian Rockies and discussed several alternative paths to get there. The best one would have taken us directly west through the Black Hills of South Dakota but our timing coincided with the Black Hills rally in Sturgis and we wanted to stay away from the crowds. We opted to take a path that would follow the Missouri river more or less. It seemed fitting since this is the bicentennial of the Lewis and Clark Expedition that took place from 1804-1806. In 1803, the United States purchased the Louisiana Territory from the French and President Thomas Jefferson authorized an expedition to go out and explore this new territory. Although the expedition started up the Missouri river in St. Louis, we picked up the trail in Vermillion, South Dakota. We stopped at Spirit Mound, a place that the Native Americans would not go near because of fear of little spirit beings. Lewis and Clark's Corps of Discovery decided to check it out and didn't find any little spirit beings but commented that "from the top of this mound we beheld a most beautiful landscape; numerous herds of buffalo were seen feeding in various directions; the plain to the north-northwest and northeast extends without interruption as far as can be seen." We climbed to the top of Spirit Mound; it is one place that one knows for certain they stood in the exact same place as the Corps of Discovery. The view is quite different now, still spectacular but lots of trees dotting the surrounding countryside where homesteads had been developed and certainly no buffalo. Our first campsite was in a recreational area along the Missouri River near Yankton, South Dakota.

The following morning, we crossed the Gavins Point Dam into Nebraska and rode west along highway 12 for several miles. The countryside is pretty there too, with glistening gold wheat fields interspersed with corn fields. After we crossed back over into South Dakota, we topped in a small town called Avon. David wanted to stop at the hardware store to get a spare key cut for his motorcycle. He already had the blank; he just needed to have it cut. We were telling the guy at the hardware store about our trip so he called the local newspaper guy who came down and interviewed us. He said he would send a copy of the article to Deb's parents so we hope he does it. That evening we stayed in a campground along the Missouri river near Pierre pronounced 'pier'), South Dakota. It had a swimming area so we were able to get cooled down after setting up the tent.

As we traveled north, it continued to get hotter. We would start earlier in the morning and stop earlier in the afternoon to avoid some of the heat. Following the Missouri River provided us with a mostly scenic trip that could have otherwise been boring if we had driven major arteries through the states of South and North Dakota. It really gave us a sense of how vast the great plains were and just how quickly the country was changed. In just 70-80 years, the area was homesteaded, the buffalo hunted to near extinction and reservations for Native Americans established. We stayed at the Abraham Lincoln State Park near Mandan, North Dakota. Fort Mandan was the place that the Corps of Discovery spent their first winter and Toussaint Charbonneau and his wife, Sacagawea, joined the expedition. The park had a wonderful interpretive center on site in an air-conditioned building so we took our time and read every placard on every exhibit. Outdoor there was a cultural festival going on but it was too hot to walk around outside to see the exhibits.

The next day brought even more heat. We cut the day short and spent a night at a small campground about 15 miles southwest of Williston, North Dakota, where it was 101 degrees as we passed through town. We arrived at the campground at around 2:00 pm and quickly dove into the lake to cool down. We went swimming and stayed in our bathing suits all day, then waited until 9:00pm to pitch the tent. We learned that we could not set up our tent fast enough as the mosquitoes came out in droves and attacked us and in the time it took to erect and scamper into the tent we were covered with enough mozzy bites to give the appearance that we both had chicken pox.

In eastern Montana, we were driving along a gravel road with deep loose gravel where there are three tire tracks, the middle one being used by traffic going in both directions. We were riding in the center track and Deb decided to change over to the track on the right just in case another vehicle came from the opposite direction. Her tire slid out in the loose gravel and down she went. One of the side cases partially detached, the connection in the front still held but it bent the bracket in the process. David turned around and helped her upright the bike, dug the hatchet out of the bottom of one of his side cases and beat the bracket back in to shape so the case could be reattached. Deb cried but then decided to continue on. We made it to the next town about 15 miles down the road without further incident. Afterward, Deb said she thought we should have taken a picture because the wipeout happened in a very pretty place right next to a limestone bluff. Dave wanted to, and was reaching for the camera before picking up the bike, but decided that due to Deb's frame of mind at the time it was better to put this learning experience behind them as soon as possible.

We rode to Havre, Montana but were fortunate not to have very strong crosswinds that day because our route took us directly west and other times we had ridden west for short distances we were fighting strong crosswinds out of the south. Eastern Montana was very arid and everything was various shades of brown. We didn't see anymore of the fields of sunflowers so prominent in the Dakotas. Fifteen miles south of Havre are the Bear Paw Mountains. They are a small, low mountain range but provided beautiful vistas. We wanted to stay in the Beaver Creek Park, but after driving 10 miles in to the park to get to the headquarters and finding it closed, we decided to turn around and just get a hotel room in Havre. It was a chance to do laundry and check our email for the first time since leaving Iowa.

We left Havre well rested and headed toward Great Falls, stopping in Fort Benton along the way. It is a nice little town on the Missouri with a train trestle that has been converted into a foot bridge. We had a huge lunch of Montana pot roast and we were so full that we ended up skipping dinner that night. In Great Falls, we were a bit disappointed in the falls because they had all been dammed. Rainbow Falls didn't even have any water running over it. We stayed at the KOA campground and had a site with a beautiful view but it was $34 to camp, almost the cost of a hotel! This will make us a little leary of other KOAs. That night a storm came through that started with hail then changed to rained on but we stayed dry.

It was about 150 miles to Glacier National Park from Great Falls so we took our time packing up and due to the weather being cooler we didn't have to worry about riding in the afternoon heat. We arrived at the park and found one of the last camp sites in the Rising Sun campground on the east side of the park. It was cloudy and started raining shortly after we had the tent set up. The following day, the skies had cleared and we could see mountains that were hidden in the clouds the day before. We rode the Going-to-the-Sun Road in both directions. The views of the mountains and glacial valleys were hypnotic and the best way to see them had to be from the seat of a motorcycle because of it's narrow, twisting nature. Vehicles over 21 feet in length and 8 feet wide are prohibited. It clouded up late in the afternoon and rained again all evening.

The next day everything was shrouded in cloud and rain was forecast so we wanted to move to a drier camp site, but no vacant sites opened up that day. We spent third evening in the rain and the following day a nearby camp site was vacated and we carried our tent to the sheltered site under a grove of trees, started a fire at noon that we kept going until 10:00 pm. It was so cold and damp; the high that day was about 50 degrees. The nights were frigid, down to 33 degrees. One evening we met an interesting fellow named Tom from California on his way back from a trip to Alaska in his van with a 250 cc motorcycle strapped to the back and a cat named Luke that rides on the motorcycle with him! Dave stayed up late talking with Tom about motorcycles, travel and theology. Tom is a theology professor and amateur inventor.

After three nights at Rising Sun, we moved to Many Glacier campground also on the east side of park with many more spectacular views. We spent two days hiking up to lakes and waterfalls and weather was cool and sunny, perfect hiking weather.

After leaving the campground, we drove north on the east side of the park, crossing into Alberta, Canada at the Chief Mountain crossing.