We were on the road by 6:00 am headed up Hwy 12 to Lolo. A beautiful drive along the river with steep mountains on each side. The river gradually becomes shallow and rocky with a few whitewater rapids, not suitable for kayaking, but the road is good. We saw many motorcycles with trailers, mostly Honda Aspencades coming in the opposite direction from Montana. We pulled in at a place called Lochsa Lodge and several of the motorcyclists were there gassing up. I approached one guy to ask him why we had seen so many of his buddies on the road. He remarked that there had been a motorcycle convention in Billings with some 18,000 participants from all over the country. He showed me his bike and trailer, which was very impressive. We continued up the Lolo pass and crossed into Montana at the top.

We then headed for Missoula and then south on I-90 through Anaconda, Butte, Bozeman, and alongside the Yellowstone River through to Billings. Here we left I-90 and headed up I-94 and on to Custer still following the Yellowstone. We stayed overnight in a rest area and slept in the van.

We were on the road by 5:00 am and traveled through Forsyth, Miles City and up to Glendive where I-94 heads southeast. We continued along the Yellowstone using Hwy 16, which briefly crosses into North Dakota then back out again until it crosses the Missouri and joins up with Hwy 327. At this point we headed 2 miles east into North Dakota to see the confluence of the Yellowstone and Missouri rivers. There was a little park with picnic shelters and an information board showing types of fish including sturgeon, which populate the river. Both rivers were slow flowing and muddy and while Val took some photos I went down the boat ramp to put my toes in the river and looked upstream to the Missouri where one day soon I would paddle off in a westerly direction.