Almost a Big Moosteak

We were all up early, anxious to get underway. While Jen & Linda whipped up some scones and Dave cooked up scrambled eggs I adjusted the bikes on the trailer and tried to figure out how all our luggage would fit. After a few tries, Dave and I managed to get it all in. Cold wet snow was still falling and it was not a pleasant experience. The roads were quite slippery to begin with but luckily by Creston the roads were clear.

We were expecting the possibility of a long inspection process at the US border but I guess we didn’t fit the necessary profile and we where through with only a few basic questions. We had selected two possible routes south and after bantering it back and forth we decided to take Hwy 93 from Missoula to Vegas.

Hwy 93 is a 2 lane highway mostly in dry valleys but there was on high pass at the Montana -Idaho border. We were up over 7000 ft and there was tons of snow. It was slow going, especially on the slippery downhill but this was not the most exciting part. Just as we were starting up the pass we hit a full grown bull moose!

That’s what I said… We had a collision with a moose but it was not serious. Dave was driving when suddenly a moose appeared in the opposite driving lane walking into our lane. Dave braked hard and steered to the right. (great job Dave!) We were almost stopped when we collided with the moose. There was no damage to the car (or the moose, we think) but the moose knocked the driver’s side mirror back. (It is designed to fold back and there was no damage to it). He was so big I think that he may have bruised his knee on the mirror!

Within the next 30 miles we had an encounter with 2 elk and a deer so we decided that it was good time to stop. We got a motel in Salmon, Idaho and went for beer and natchos.