I walked out of my safe room this morning just as another bike tourist was emerging from his room.  We introduced ourselves, talked for about a minute and agreed to ride together.  He had a lightweight road bike and was very lightly packed as he is riding 100 miles per day from motel to motel.  With my touring bike and 35 pound load I was sure I would not be able to keep up with him and I urged him not to let me slow him down.  We ended up riding about 50 miles together.

I'm embarrassed to say my memory is a little hazy as to his name, but I think he said it was Mustaf.  (I'm also embarrassed about the possible misspelling.)  He immigrated from Pakistan with his family when he was very young and he said his father was very worried about him riding alone through the "red states" given his brown skin and the anti-Islamic tone in our country right now.  He has had no problems so far. 

His trip is taking him from his home in Oakland, CA to Worcester, MA.  Mustaf was smart, friendly, and a good riding companion.  Most of the time we rode either side by side or else he'd be just a few bike lengths behind me.  About 20 miles into the ride I looked back and noticed he was fiddling with something.  He had a video recording device attached to his bike.  "You don't mind being on YouTube do you?" He asked.

In the town of Cutbank we took a lunch break on the sidewalk outside of a gas station.  After riding another 15 miles I had to use the gigantic restroom that is the Montana plains.  From that point Mustaf continued on by himself.  He still  had a long way to go today.

Too bad for him because he missed getting a video of the pair of coyotes I saw trotting across the highway.  I also saw many soaring hawks.  And I sang praise to the perfect weather, the little cotton balls of clouds in the sky, the straight, level roads, and my first full day of cycling on America's Great Plains.

Heart

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I am encamped at the Lake Shel-oole Recreation Area, a city park on the north edge of Shelby.  It's small, quiet, and set among a few shade trees and surrounded by barren hills and mounds of tall grass and sagebrush.  As the sun lowered in the sky, that scene became enormously satisfying.