OFF THE MARK: Encountering Cyclotourism

One of the things I love about summer in Northwest Montana is that you seem to meet interesting people every day.

Mindy Misener became the latest such person Saturday.

Misener, a graduate student from Michigan, was wrapping up a month-long bicycle tour of the Northwest when she rolled into Polson. Misener was the first of the cult-famous cyclotourists that we all pass on Highway 93 en route to our daily activities.

They’re the ones you see with the bags strapped to every free inch of bike frame, toting their worldly belongings on two wheels to take in vistas most of us take for granted each day. They brave the big rig-infested rural highways, gravelly shoulders and blue-haired drivers without airbags or roll cages.

I had read about these intrepid souls, seen them along the roadways, but I’d never come face-to-face with someone traveling our highways for days on end with not much more than two narrow wheels and a helmet.

Misener had left Portland, Ore. in mid-May, pedaled up the pacific coast to Anacortes, Wash., and trekked across northern Washington and the Idaho panhandle into our friendly neck of the woods.

The trek, Misener said, has given her perspective.

“It changes the way you see the world,” she said, highlighting a newfound respect for changes in elevation and the scale of this area of the country, especially.

Misener didn’t start off small; the trek of more than 1,000 miles was her first significant bicycle tour. The inspiration came when she passed through the area by car last year.

“I like traveling,” she said. “I especially like traveling over land.”

And while Misener’s trek sounds out of the ordinary, the University of Montana’s Institute for Tourism and Recreation Research reports that thousands of cyclotourists pass through Montana each year and, according to a survey they conducted, more than one-third of those spend 10 or more nights in the Treasure State. These people are a significant sector of Montana’s tourism industry (which, by the way, is the one of the state’s driving economic factors).

Misener’s trip was against the grain in many ways, too, according to the survey. Three-quarters of cyclotourists surveyed were men. Misener traveled with two female companions for most her trip.

Nearly forty percent of those surveyed were staying in motels overnight. Misener and her travel-mates camped most of the time (she did mention staying in a hostel).

According to a map in the ITRR’s report, there are three bicycle touring routes in Montana: the Trans-American, Lewis and Clark and Northern Tier routes. With the exception of Libby to Glacier National Park (part of the Northern Tier), Misener made her own route. None of the three routes pass through Polson, according to the map.

Perhaps the most striking statistic is the one that tells you anything you need to know about a bike tour: 92 percent of cyclotourists surveyed by the ITTR said they planned on taking another multi-day bike trip in the next three years.

I guess there’s a good chance we’ll be seeing Mindy Misener in Polson again.