Riding Hiawatha

What or who is Hiawatha, you may be asking.... The Hiawatha is an old train route that they have converted into a biking trail. I have heard about this trail for 10 years, since I moved to Spokane. Today, we finally made it....it is right on the Idaho/Montana state line, which is about an hour and a half from us. Before we got there I told the kids that we were going to a new place, called Montana. Brayden said, "Like Hannah Montana?" Good lord, my kids are getting old.... I didn't even know he knew about her. We made the trek up the mountain, unloaded and prepared for our 15 mile ride down. I was thinking this would be a quick, easy trip down the mountain.

It wasn't quite what I expected. Right off the bat you enter a tunnel that is PITCH BLACK, 45 degrees, with ditches 4 feet deep on both sides full of water. I did know about this, but I didn't realize how hard it is to balance and ride a bike in the dark. We had flashlights strapped to our bikes, but it was still the blind leading the blind with me in the lead.....

We made it through the tunnel without any major catastrophes, as you can imagine, people could hear us coming, and cleared out of our way! There were about 8 tunnels and 7 trestle bridges, which were amazing, but a little scary too. The trail was a gravel road, which made it rough for me to pull the trailer. I was more worn out than I expected to be. I thought it was paved with patches of gravel, no such luck, 15 miles of gravel.

We ended up going on a day that wasn't hot, good planning on my part, BUT it was a cool 60 degrees with rain! Mud was flying everywhere, the kids thought it was great!

At the bottom of the trail, you pay to catch a shuttle (school bus) back to the top where your car is. It took us about 2 hours to get down, with stops and a picnic lunch, and it was a 30 minute bus ride back to the top. On the way back home we asked the kids, "Was that fun, would you like to do it again?" They all agreed, "YES, I want to ride that school bus again!" Fabulous, we will be sure to do it again really soon!

On the drive home we were driving down the mountain pass, which of course, is a huge hill. Every hill we go down the kids think they need to say, "Weeee!" (thanks Grandma Phillips) Kent said, "Ok this is a really LONG hill so can you say that in your head?"

Dani screams: "WEEE in your head! WEEE in your head! WEEE in your head!" Thankfully she starts pre-school in a couple of weeks. Maybe Ms. Jenny will have more luck than I have had with her. :) I love you Claire Bear!