You just gotta love a place that uses bike handlebars as door-handles!
Maybe I’m easily excitable, but stopping by the ACA in the middle of a long trip is akin to strolling into a small town watering hole after scoring the winning touchdown in their annual rivalry game. The first person you see (in this case Elliot, who turned out to be an ex roommate of the coffee shop manager…yeah…small town) instantly lights up and offers you free ice cream…”as much as you’d like”. Another guy pops up and snaps a Polaroid to go up on the wall…someone else leans in to ask if you want some soda pop or water or whatever. I mean, it should be enough just to be in a place where you don’t have to explain your freakish obsession with pedalling…but these people are actually built of like materials…distant cousins who respect and envy you for the very same thing that others think you’re f-ing stupid to be doing. The place certainly feels like some sort of sanctuary. Old bikes from historic trips hang on the walls next to pictures of people doing the same damn thing I was…just 30+ years earlier with way heavier equipment.
The wall of Polaroids only covered the summer of 2010, and it contained over 200 photos. Every face on that wall was anchored by a HUGE beaming smile…except for the German couple who were apparently quite unimpressed with the savage bike travel network we have here in the US. I was gawking at the notes on the pictures when Greg stopped by with his classic 35mm camera, perpetually stocked with black and white film for his portraits. We chatted and walked around to the alley behind the building, then set up his white drop-cloth background. Greg took a few pictures while I shared some stories about my latest trip. He even took a separate portrait of Pinocchio and the Headless Ninja…two mangled figurine/companion/mascots that I had acquired along the way. The tales of these two are legendary in my own mind…and to be quite honest I’d made it a point not to show them or even mention them to anyone else…but when Greg noticed the mangled little plastic figurines, I sheepishly divulged how essential they were to maintaining my sanity…or lack thereof.
When Greg was finished I asked him to pose in front of my rig for a few of my own pictures. Then I started grilling him on some of his bike trips. His stories were incredible, and before I knew it we were going through old books and photographs that he kept in piles around his desk. But time was running out on me, and the office was closing down. I chuckled a bit as we dug up Cycling’s Greatest Misadventures from their library on the way out…I couldn’t resist showing him the story I’d published, sitting amongst their never-ending collection of magazines and bike travel guides. I finally bid my farewell and said many goodbyes as the gang all packed up, hopped on their respective bikes and pedalled home.
One kind employee (who ironically turned out to be one of the cartographers) asked me how I was doing on maps just as I was walking out the door. I hesitated before admitting that I’d made it this far off of ‘maps’ that were slightly more helpful than a compass and a sextant. I was shamed, dragged back to the map area, and handed what turned out to be the most helpful and friendly document that I’ve possessed outside of my birth and marriage certificates…and a few diplomas. With many thanks, I bounced out of the place just as they were locking up the doors. On to my next adventure in Missoula…The Silver Dollar…and the ever-hospitable graces of the great Mr Brian Patterson.
A life-long friend to my old buddy Pat McNamara, Mr Patterson had taken exceptional care of me when I’d stumbled through town six years earlier. And again, without so much as a handful of hours notice, I was greeted like a long-lost cousin with a hug and a cold tall-boy. Mr Patterson has a day job that pays the bills, but he’d been working odd shifts tending bar at the Silver Dollar (one of the very old, legitimate bars in Missoula) for years and years. Unfortunately, he was such good friends with the owners that when they left town…as they had a few days before I arrived…they left the place completely in his charge. He was chained to the place without any help…but that didn’t stop him from ordering us a feast from another place!
We ate, caught up and shared stories as I tossed back the beers. A few hours later he tossed a key across the bar and opened up an apology. Turns out that his girlfriends parents were in town…so his place wasn’t going to be a pleasant respite for the night…but he had access to an unfinished apartment (thanks to his other job) less than a mile away. I was welcome to set up shop there for the night. Thrilled to have a hot shower and a roof at my fingertips, I pedalled over to check it out.
It should come as no surprise that I got just a little bit lost along the way…but eventually arrived to find a classic college student-housing apartment with a brand-spanking-new coat of stain on the hardwood floors. Brian had mentioned that a crew had been by earlier in the day to clean the place…but as luck would have it they had also stained the floors with an uber-powerful sealant that instantly watered my eyes. Well…to be honset…I could have cared less. I carried the rig inside and started tossing things around. I opened all the windows and then hopped in the shower…refusing to get out until the water heater gave up first. My clean skin got a clean set of clothes, and I was back on the bike toward the Silver Dollar!
The locals had filled in the place when by the time I returned…and the place had 4×6 portraits of most of them hanging above the bar. I got to see a dispute over some local housing issues, a girl bawling over the boyfriend who’d broken her heart a month earlier, some under-age college students trying to act WAY older than they actually were, some ridiculous trail workers in town wearing ridiculous outfits…one of which involved a guy wearing his underwear outside of his clothes…and of course, Monday Night Football on a Thursday night (I never did figure that one out). Too much fun.
I’m not even sure what time it was when I finally bowed out and gently cruised my way back to the apartment. I left the place as open as possible as I crashed out and heard the sweet sound of rain on a rooftop…not my tent’s rain fly. Thanks to the fumes, I was unconscious in seconds.
