July 8 - Sunday - Billings MT to Williston ND - 369 miles

Very meditative day today. A Muffler Man holding a tire wished me goodbye as I left Billings. Eastern Montana took the entire day to get across (at my speeds), but it was actually pretty pleasant. After the turn-turn-turn of Bear Tooth yesterday, today felt like a day off.
The temperatures started in the mid 60's and didn't get above mid-80's until I got to the end of the day in Williston. And it was sunny all day with no clouds to speak of.

I stuck the bike at 55 pretty much all day which gave me plenty of time to daydream about those crazy people who shuffled along day after day in the 1800's across all this grass land.
Rout 200 is the road a Harley guy from North Dakota gave me and it is an interesting road. There is enough traffic (Montana, North Dakota and Minnesota plates) to make you feel like you don't have to worry if you have a problem, but the gas stops are few and far between. Same rule, less than 1/2 full, fill it. There are also several 24hr self serve gas "stations" that are just big tanks with a pump sitting beside the road. I ran into these a few years back in some remote place I had traveled with the BMW.

The X300 has been getting 70-73 mpg, I assume since I am not hauling ass. When I was travelling with Jeff I was getting 62 mpg with the higher speeds. So my 4.5 gal tank will get me 300 miles if I take it easy.
And the bugs are back. I stopped for gas in Jordan which I assume exists so all those cars, campers, truck pulling boats (where are they going out here??) can fill up half way between Billings and wherever they are coming from. I soaked the windhshield, helmet shield and safety glasses I wear and did a bug scrape so I could see again.
A bee stung me this morning which caused the usual frantic "slapping your jacket" to kill it as it crawled around under my shirt. I pulled over and shook it's remains out from under my short and tried to find the bites. I just had a conversation yesterday with a guy and he talked about getting stung by bees on a motorcycle. And I was near one of the bee hives they keep around the various crops here.

Traffic was so light that I always had an open road in front of me and the few folks that came up behind passed easily, no drama.
I kept expecting the North Dakota border to come up, but it only appeared late in the day.
I crossed the Missouri and all the Lewis & Clark signs returned.

An hour before I pulled into Williston, I started seeing a lot of oil pumpers and then tons of "man camps" which is temporary housing for all the workers out here cashing in on the gass and oil drilling. Stockpiles of steel pipe and tons of service companies drilling, or installing pipe, or maintaining the above.
Williston feels like a "man's town" where most of the vehicles are big American pickups or work trucks. Looks like no planning so all kinds of places just plopped beside the road. They must still be booming here.
Walked next door to a Mexican place and had the usual taco salad. Nice quiet day..

Odometer = 27,843