A light morning drizzle tickled my bones. I sought shelter with some folks who were sitting on their porch. Joe, Cynthia, and Nancy, who run a small RV park offered me a cup of coffee and we chatted as I waited out the rain.

Before leaving, they encouraged me to explore the Christian faith and to pray. I left.

Lots of riding on the interstate.

I was warned by the Swedish folks I cycled the midwest with and are now several days ahead of me that there is a bridge crossing — with no reasonable alternate routes — where the highway shoulder disappears. There is likely 8,000+ cars that travel on that section of the interstate every day. It was a bottleneck with several hundred feet of cycling directly in the lane of freight trucks and cars moving 80+ mph.

I would have to look behind me, and time it exactly correctly to make it over this bridge with no cars behind me.

The route going forward, for lack of better word, would be horrible. Going through the mountains, the highways are built in the narrow river valleys that cut through the mountain. More often that not, there are no alternatives to riding on the major interstate.

I had lunch at a bar in Alberton and ran into a local insurance agent that was infatuated with my journey. He noted that there was a grizzly on the road I just passed through a few weeks ago. But Mike quickly wiggled his way out of the conversation when I hinted that I was looking for a ride over the bridge.

Before I left the bar, I jotted down in my notebook a sort of dog tag — a note for someone if they found my body on who to contact and some last wishes I had.

And sure, it was likely overly dramatic. It seemed like there were folks that had made it out alive over the bottleneck. But those who died were also not around to warn me about it.

As I pedaled out of Alberton, I said a quick prayer. I texted my good friends as if I was going to die. Something just did not feel right. The road over the next few days was perilous, and ladden with stories of death.

Everytime I came down a hill quickly, I shouted aloud “Heyyyyyy bear!” to give any big critters a warning that I was around (sometimes they will attack if spooked).

For some sections, there was a trail that paralleled the highway — old railroad track ballast — an unmaintained, thick, gravel and rocky trail that few dared to tackle on bicycle. I saw on the facebook page of some Flemish cyclists a picture of one of them attending to an injured cyclist on that trail. After exchanging information with other bike tourists passing through the area, they said they only saw one or two groups of people a day when passing through.

My fear was that taking that trail to avoid the highway would not only be incredibly slow, but also dangerous. If I got injured, fell off the trail, etc. there is potential that it would be a long time before I would be found.

As I approached the entrance to the interstate that led to the bridge crossing, I flagged down a black pickup truck. There was man with a thick mustache and his wife beside him.

“This is going to sound a bit strange…” I started. I explained to them my situation.

His name was Jim and he said that he was falling asleep on the interstate so dropped onto the frontage road where there were less cars to hit. He was drowsy but willing to let me sit in the pickup with my bike and go across the bridge. Beggars can’t be choosers!

I laid down flat in the pickup bed as the truck zoomed down the highway and found peace staring at the perfect, blue sky. I giggled to myself knowing the ridiculousness of it all. I used my phone as a periscope to peek out of the truck.

After we finished, Jim, his wife, Virginia, and I chatted about my adventures and their life. To my luck, Jim rode his bicycle in the early 70’s from Texas to Tennesse with a dog and a guitar. We took some pictures, exchanged phone numbers, and I thanked them for likely saving my life.

As I cycled away from the highway on the quiet frontage road, I let out a devious cackle — an erruption from my soul that revealed how I felt — I had just cheated death.

I settled into a town park in Superior, MT, where I would pitch a tent for the night. I spoke to one of the groundskeepers, that insisted he buy me a proper dinner (I had just munched on some gas station food). We talked and talked and talked until he had to head home. He said he would give his neighbor, who was also the police on duty for the night, a headsup that I was there in case some locals tried to call the police on me.