VERY busy at work, but I'll finish when I can.....more to come.

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17 Honda Africa Twin DCT
14 Honda CRF250L (305 big bore)
08 V Strom 650
Former: 82 Honda XL500R, 80 KZ750LTD, 01 XT225, 80 XS650, 07 Vulcan 900, 08 Vulcan 500, 03 Vulcan 500, 83 KZ440LTD

Well, we geared up a little after noon, and tried to get moving before too sweaty. Warm day. Put Little Bighorn in our rearview mirror and pointed home to Sask. Brother was going to ride to Regina with me, and he'd head home to Medicine Hat the next day.
We turned East on 212 through the vast Cheyenne reservation. Beautiful rolling ranch country. Horses everywhere. Turned north at Lame Deer on a small but gorgeous highway 39 following a small river. Amazing views. About 100 feet outside the reservation, there's a bar/casino, so I can only assume the reservation is dry. We kept going.
At some point we stopped for a stretch/smoke/sandwich for him at a historic marker. "Custer camped here". Pretty sure it was before June 25, 1876.
We kept going and stumbled across a massive coal mine/plant in the middle of nowhere with a quaint little town named (of course) "Colstrip". Needless to say, we needed a cool drink, some gas and I finally tried one of those infamous gas station burritos. Chili. To my surprise, I didn't hate it. My stomach did though. My brother ate FOUR! And a large coffee. I regretted following him the next few miles to the interstate.
We decided to hop on the I-94 and head East and North East and make some good time. After being spoiled for a couple of days with no traffic on the backroads, the interstate was annoying with traffic. We took advantage of the liberal 75mph speed limit and stretched them out, hoping to gain time. Perhaps go as far as Miles City or Glendive as fast as we can. Then head north somewhere to the border.
Everything was going smoothly. Passed many cars, motorhomes, campers etc (its a Sunday afternoon). I was impressed with the pace he could set on his little bike (then remembered its actually 30 more cc than mine), and we frequently floated along between an indicated 140 and 170kmh (I wonder what that is in mph? hehehe). We met lots of bikes and got biker waves from the other lane.......even from a driver in a dark car........hey........wait a minute!...........SHIT!
State Trooper.

More to follow...

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17 Honda Africa Twin DCT
14 Honda CRF250L (305 big bore)
08 V Strom 650
Former: 82 Honda XL500R, 80 KZ750LTD, 01 XT225, 80 XS650, 07 Vulcan 900, 08 Vulcan 500, 03 Vulcan 500, 83 KZ440LTD

..... State Trooper.....

Already throttled down. No idea what speed I was going. Brother ahead of me 200m slowed down too.
Watching rearview mirror.
Yep. Here he comes. Lights ablaze.
He's passing me. YAY! Pulling my brother over. Maybe he only got him? I'll try going around. SHIT! He's waving me over. I consider making a run for it. There's been many a cattle rustler, bank robber etc raced north across the Montana border and hid in Saskatchewan 100+ years ago. Hell even Sitting Bull and the Sioux did it after the Battle of Little Bighorn. I chicken out.
Trooper - "Hello fellas. How you doing? What exactly is going on here? I clocked you (brother) at 93, and you at 91 (palooka). The speed limit is 75!".
Frankly, much relief it wasn't 5 minutes earlier. But still, trepidation. Are Montana jails as bad as Mexican ones?
Us - "well geez officer, whats that in kilometres per hour? Its really hard to do the conversions."
Thereafter ensued a polite but oh so sincere discussion back and forth involving everything from hectares to imperial vs metric tons to Fahrenheit vs Celsius whereby he at one point thought maybe 75mph = approx 160 millileters maybe. Anyways, we thoroughly convinced him we were not speed crazed public enemies, just a couple of kraft dinner cooking, burrito eating, metric loving, math impaired middle-aged history nerds.
<insert Academy Award announcer-type voice here> "And the Oscar goes to...... Palooka and Weiner, for their honest and heart warming roadside performance in the play, Battle of Little Bighorn Ride Report ".
The Trooper was a good guy. He cut us some slack for our creative, heartfelt and believable excuses, and honestly seemed hurt as he announced he’d have to give us a citation for 10mph over the speed limit. Hmmm, sounds promising...... "but, there's a fine <gulp> of ..........twenty bucks.” WTF? twenty bucks? LOL. Thats a pack of smokes and a piece of beef jerky in Sask! Heres 30. keep the change. we're in a hurry.
But he was a cool guy. After asking if there's any questions when he reviewed the citation, we said "yes, will you pose for a picture for the Ride Report? Plus, help us pick a route to the Border?", and he did.
We left there, twenty bucks poorer, but a good story to tell everyone. Everyone except our father. Our father the math teacher. The math teacher who would subject us to contests of math problems during our family car trips rather than eye-spy and sing alongs. Math became a subject my brothers and I would excel at all through schooling years. I deserve that frickin Oscar!
We took his advice (and slowed down a bit) and went NorthWest then North from Terry on 253 and then MT200 and MT13 up towards Scobey-Coronach crossing. 253 was one of my favourites. Despite the Trooper telling us it was a rough road (WTF?, it was better than the best highway in Sask) it ended up being one of my favourites. It was all ours, and yet again, a different viewing experience than I’ve ever had. Eventually, we crossed the Missouri River at the Lewis and Clark Bridge and hauled ass towards Scobey, MT, rolling in to our last cheap US gas stop on fumes. Unfortunately for Weiner, they had no Burritos, so he settled for a cup of Dunkin Donut holes.
As we road the final 20 minutes towards Saskatchewan, I realized everything now seemed familiar. Everything except the smooth road. We arrived at the Coronach border crossing around suppertime, and the Canadian Border Security agents rushed out to meet us, excited to see someone for the first time in 4 days or so. It was good to hear a Canadian accent. Hang on, wtf?, that border agent has a New Zealand accent. What a ripoff! After a nice long, awkward visit, including the typical Saskatchewan custom of exchanging names of acquaintances until you have someone in common, we attempted to leave. Despite their teary eyed pleas to stay and play Kaiser and watch their Rockem Sockem tapes, we left the loneliest border crossing in the world behind us and headed north. <BANG> Good to be home. <BANG> Another pothole. There’s a sign. <BANG> The sign reads, “WELCOME TO SASKATCHEWAN”. <BANG> pothole. Another sign, this one reads “ROUGH ROAD, NEXT 1400KMS”. No shit.
Brother had never been to Big Muddy, so we winkled around through the red gravel NE of Coronach til we found it. Took a few pics. Had a whiz against Castle Butte. He ate half a sandwich and wondered when we’d stop for supper. We headed North, then East over to Hwy 6 and skirted the edge of a rainstorm, getting wet enough for my good gloves but not my rain gear. After not turning my bars for an hour while heading North to Regina on 6, I realized, yes, I am home.
Pulled in to Regina, gassed up, pulled in to the house. Went inside. Fed my brother supper and a beer. Went to sleep.
I’m going back. Who's coming with me?

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17 Honda Africa Twin DCT
14 Honda CRF250L (305 big bore)
08 V Strom 650
Former: 82 Honda XL500R, 80 KZ750LTD, 01 XT225, 80 XS650, 07 Vulcan 900, 08 Vulcan 500, 03 Vulcan 500, 83 KZ440LTD

You put in some serious saddle time to cover that in 2 1/2 days. Enjoyed the excerpt on the County Mounty experience.

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I do these things not to escape life but so life does not escape me

Nice trip. Looking forward to hopefully getting out there again one of these days, but with the little kids, who knows...

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Chris

2017 Versys X
1991 Suzuki TS200R

_________________
17 Honda Africa Twin DCT
14 Honda CRF250L (305 big bore)
08 V Strom 650
Former: 82 Honda XL500R, 80 KZ750LTD, 01 XT225, 80 XS650, 07 Vulcan 900, 08 Vulcan 500, 03 Vulcan 500, 83 KZ440LTD