Adventure Cycling Association

This afternoon you’ll meet your esteemed crew of leaders and the rest of the group in Montana’s “Garden City,” home to several national nonprofit organizations — including, of course, Adventure Cycling Association. Tonight you will enjoy the first of many delicious meals together and get the run-down on the week from your savvy Event Director before getting a goods nights sleep.

This morning you’ll wake up to coffee and a hearty breakfast before boarding our shuttle to Bozeman. We’ll arrive in Bozeman, pitch our tents, and have a chance to go on an optional shakedown ride to loosen those legs up post-shuttle.

We’ll leave camp and begin heading west. For those looking for a bit more riding, you can add about 15 miles by heading to the Museum of the Rockies on the Montana State University campus to check out its vast collection of dinosaur fossils. Back on route, we’ll ready our legs with a leisurely day to Three Forks, where the Gallatin River joins the Madison and Jefferson to form the great Missouri River. We’ll spend one night here under a beautiful starry canopy.

Leaving the headwaters of the Missouri, we’ll work our way up our first Continental Divide crossing over Pipestone Pass in the Highland Mountains surrounding Butte. There’s ample history to explore in the great Montana mining town of Butte, rich in Irish culture and home to the infamous Berkeley Pit, a toxic mining superfund site turned tourist attraction. Butte is also the birthplace of stunt performer and entertainer Evel Knievel.

Today, we’ll ride towards the Pintler and Anaconda Mountains, a stunning backdrop of towering peaks for the miles ahead. We’ll make our way out of the Silver Bow Valley to Anaconda and then climb to over 6,700 feet. From the top, we’ll meander our way back down to Wise River, following the Big Hole River — a world-class fishing destination — before reaching town.

We have two stunning climbs today. Our first will be a gradual but steady ascent to the crest of Crystal Park, located at nearly 8,000 feet in elevation. From there, we’ll have nearly 15 miles of generally downhill terrain before climbing up to the day’s second high point, 7,360-foot Big Hole Pass. From here, we’ll have stunning views of the famous Big Hole Valley. Today’s route follows the Pioneer Scenic Byway, a low-traffic road flanked by lodgepole forests and vast alpine meadows with the rugged granite peaks of the Pioneers to the east. The day ends with an optional soak at Jackson Hot Springs.

Today’s ride is long but should feel refreshing since it has twice as much descending as it does climbing. Leaving Jackson, we’ll head north to Wisdom and cross the Big Hole River whose trout-filled waters draw fly fishermen from around the world. From Wisdom, we’ll turn west and visit the Big Hole National Battlefield. This site commemorates a terrible chapter in the U.S.–Indigenous Conflicts of the late 1800s. From there, we’ll spin 16 miles before climbing over 7,241-foot Chief Joseph Pass, named for the Nez Perce chief who you learned about at the battlefield, then pop over 6,990-foot Lost Trail Pass. Between these two passes, we’ll dip in and out of Idaho and cross the Continental Divide again. A stunning decent of nearly 20 miles awaits as we reach the Bitterroot Valley and follow the river of the same name.

Our last day of riding brings us back to Missoula. In 15 miles from our overnight in Darby, we reach Hamilton, our biggest town in some time. From just outside of Hamilton all the way to Missoula, we’ll pedal 50 miles of bike trail that parallels U.S. 93 and the Bitterroot River. To the west, the high crags of the Bitterroot Mountains scratch the big Montana sky; to the east, the lower Sapphire Range lines our way. You might consider a short side trip to Stevensville, Montana’s oldest continuously inhabited town of nonindigenous people, where you can visit the old St. Mary’s Mission, established in 1841, to learn the story of Father Pierre DeSmet and other “black robes” who arrived early on the scene in this part of the Rocky Mountains. Late in our ride, we’ll reach the town of Lolo where you can have a look at Travelers’ Rest State Park. The park marks the site of an ancient Native American campsite used by the Lewis and Clark expedition in both 1805 and 1806. Finally, we’ll end our day and our tour in Missoula, ready to rest after our Big Sky adventure.