DAY 20 - Ghost town (s)

We left with the guys this morning as we all needed to stop at the only shop around.
Stopped, and shopped!
We left B and P sorting out their budget, with the intention of catching up later.
We cruised along a paved road all the way to Bannack State Park where we stopped for lunch. Prior to lunch we called in to check out the local cemetery, as you do? The cemetery was just like you would see in a western. The last person buried there that we saw was in 1910 and we think the average age of people in the graves was mid 20's!
The actual State Park is a true ghost town which people finally left in the 60's. It was purchased by Montana State and is open for people to walk around, with most of the buildings open for you to go in. Fascinating. Most buildings were built in the 1880's, photos to follow.
After a cool (actually a freakin hot) couple of hours we headed off on the second part of our day. We had intended on stopping in a small town called Grant. However Grant was as much of a ghost town as Bannack, just scarier as there apparently were people still living there, but no motels or camping as stated in our maps and guidebook. Even the pub was shutdown.
We were going to stay with B and P again tonight but they had not caught us up, so we scratched a note for them in the gravel and hoped they would see it. Just as we were about to leave we spotted them coming so waited for them.
We rode on another 12km and found a spot to camp on public land.
Our first night of open sky's with no trees around.
We sat up latish chatting again and drinking red wine from a Nalgene plastic bottle. Very posh!
Once the stars came out, Ben got out his "glow in the dark" astrological bandanna and we tried to spot constellations without much success.
Saw some amazing shooting stars with long tails. Montana really is "Big Sky Country".

DISTANCE: 77.3KM
AVERAGE: 18.7KPH
RIDE TIME: 4.08HRS
ASCEND: 400m