Kiki Bikes Across America

Sunday, July 26th – 8 miles north of West Yellowstone to Virginia City, Montana

Woke up to the annoyance of having to go pee this morning. Well, I woke up at 3:45am and had to get out of the tent to pee. I’m tired of having to pee in the middle of night – it’s frustrating waking up and having to get up in the cold and go outside. Anyway, so I woke up at 3:45am and then again at 7:30am to pee so got up and Craig was up as well, and then I woke Chase up. We started packing up and rolled out about 45-60 minutes later and then Chase and I stopped at the first turn to sit down and have some breakfast (cinnamon raisin bread with peanut butter and then some apple sauce). Tasty! Then the three of us hit the road towards Ennis, Montana (65 miles from the start of the day). We did great riding today as we let Craig lead most of the way (he has a nice fast pace and a lighter load then either Chase or me)… and we were going downhill most of the way to Ennis. We were cranking anywhere from 16-25 mph or so on the way to Ennis. Our average speed for the first 66 miles was 15.9 mph and we got there in just over 4 hours, I think. It was awesome – we were really making great progress. We arrived to Ennis around 2pm and then Chase and I made our bagel sandwiches while Craig went to Subway. We then set up shop at Subway for a while to do some internet research for our route and to check email, respond, etc. and all that fun stuff. It’d been almost a week since we last had access, so we were there a while. Craig rode on as he was hoping to make it up the last big hill for the day prior to the storm. We hung out in Ennis for a bit longer and then were about to head out, but the storm was looking bad and there was lightening, so we decided not to continue. We went back into town and met a couple of other cyclists who were heading to Denver, so we spoke with them a bit and then decided to get ice cream from the former Dairy Queen Bar. I wound up with a large raspberry shake which was amazing, but totally unneeded!

Breakfast of champions alongside the road. Apple Sauce + Cinnamon Raisin Bread and peanut butter

After another long break while waiting for the storm to pass, Chase and I finally left Ennis about 7pm and started the 14 mile trek to Virginia City, Montana. We had about 8 miles of uphill grade and then 3-4 of really nice and steep downhill. On the downhill, Chase hit 40mph exactly as he hit the 3,000 mile mark and I hit my new record speed ever… I hit 55mph on the downhill without even really needing to pedal much, which was pretty awesome. I was psyched that I got that high of a speed and luckily I didn’t have to worry about big turns coming up or any traffic, so I just sat low and crouched down and easily hit 55mph – who knows, I probably could have hit 58 mph if I’d pedaled just a little harder.

Chase, Me, and Craig at Earthquake Lake

We rolled into Virginia City around 8:30 and debated whether or not we should continue. I wanted to do a century and it would have been doable since the road is downhill for quite a while before we hit another series of uphills. However, I wanted to top off on water, so I asked this lady and she told me to go to the community center and fill up there. So I did and there were the rest of the JMU guys (The “Z Team”) and Craig, so we wound up just crashing there with them. We’re staying in a really old gymnasium and sleeping on the floor inside which is great since it’s less work to put up a tent and take it down in the morning. So I’m looking forward to a good night’s sleep tonight!

We did 80 miles today with an average of 13.6 mph, which is pretty awesome, especially with our 8 miles of uphill at the end of the day.

Me and Chase riding behind Craig

So we’re estimating an arrival to Astoria, Oregon between August 5th and 7th, so we should be well on target if the route is as we expect – a fair amount of downhill along the Columbia River in Washington. Our route across Idaho is approximately 170 miles from the Montana border to the Washington border on highway 12. We’re hoping to knock that out in 2 days, but now thinking about it, it’d be really awesome to cross the state of Idaho in one day – granted, that’d be something like crazy, but aren’t we crazy?

Saturday, July 25th – Lewis Lake in Yellowstone Park to 8 miles north of West Yellowstone

We woke up fairly early, or at least I did. I got up at 6:40am and walked around the campground while I waited for the rest to rise. Once they were all up we started packing up and had breakfast (kid cereal again, which was awesome!) I had trix and apple jacks again which was amazing! We rolled out of the campground around 8:45am and headed for Old Faithful (the geyser) and watched that around 10:30, I think it was. It was pretty neat and there were tons of other geysers in the park that we could have seen, and we saw some from the roads, but not shooting the water up in the air like Old Faithful. Nonetheless it was pretty neat. I also met some Germans who were visiting and was able to practice my rusty German again which was nice – they were from Hannover and Mainz, and visiting a relative who lives in Illinois.

We crossed the Continental Divide again...

We had our last meal with Jack and Dave at the lodge and then Chase and I packed up our bikes and changed back into biking clothing and started to look at the maps again under the awning of the lodge as it was raining now. We spoke with one guy from Seattle, Washington who seemed to know the roads in the northwest fairly well, so he was trying to give us suggestions or tell us if the roads we were looking at would be good to ride and so forth. So we think we’ve come up with a new route to get back to the coast in time for Chase to get back to Texas and hopefully in time for me to ride down the Pacific Coast Highway to San Francisco.

Buffalo in Yellowstone National Park

Finally, around 2pm we headed out of the park and started riding the 30 miles to get out of the West Entrance towards West Yellowstone. Spotted buffalo, a bald-headed eagle, and elk in the park before leaving. About 3 miles before we exited we saw another touring cyclist so we stopped to chat and it turns out he’s also riding to Astoria, Oregon (the end of the Transamerican Route). Craig (the cyclist) also had ridden the Northern Tier back in 2003 and now he’s doing the TransAm Route as it’s his last free summer for a while (he’s studying at UVa’s Medical School). We rode to West Yellowstone together and just as we were about to take our photo of the entering Montana sign, Chase sees some cyclists he knows from WAY BACK on the bike tour. He ran into his “Z-team” buddies (the 5 guys who just graduated from JMU this past May). He last saw them back in Eminence, Missouri on June 25th (Day 30). So it was really odd to bump into them again such a long time later and especially since we were supposed to be on the Western Express Route and they on the Transamerican Route. But we’re caught up now and who knows, maybe we’ll finish with them or before them.

The Z-team, buddies that Chase rode with earlier in the trip. He last saw them in Missouri, and then met again in West Yellowstone!

So we stopped and ate at this pizza place which gave us a 1/2 off discount for cyclists, so that was awesome! Chase, Craig, and I all got 12″ pizzas and then shared them and they were decent – not the best, but not horrible either! After eating, we went to the grocery store to pick up some things for breakfast and lunch the next day or so. We wound up with plain bagels, ham, and cheese for lunch, and cinnamon raisin bread and peanut butter for breakfast, along with some apple sauce. Pretty yummy and odd, but tasty:) The three of us rode out of West Yellowstone then in search of a place to camp – we rode past a campground that was full and decided to camp in the National Forest Land, so we went back on an access road and pitched tents on this track that was pretty nice with grass and pine needles. We hung our bear bags (filled with food, toiletries, and anything scented), pitched our tents, and called it a night around 9:30 or so.

Camping in the national forest 8mi. North of West Yellowstone

Friday, July 24th – Flaming Gorge, Wyoming to Lewis Lake in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

Woke up about 7am or so, and then I packed up my tent and did my whole organizing routine and then showered and got all clean! It was the best shower of the trip probably – well, aside from being in a real house with a shower. But I could shower for as long as I wanted and didn’t have to feed it quarters – it was great. I must have been in there forever…scrubbing off layers of grit and grime (not really), but enjoying some hot water for a change and a shower!

We all had breakfast – an assortment of cereal was amazing. It was like being a kid but never having had that kid cereal when I was little. I had trix and then apple jacks (kid cereals!) and they were both tasty, probably because of the sugar content, haha! We hit the road around 11am and continued the 300+ mile trek to Yellowstone. We stopped at a few small rinky dink towns along the way and got groceries and then Jack bought some buffalo jerky from a roadside stand and we stopped before Jackson and got ice cream. Then we stopped at Jackson’s visitor center to pick up some state maps and Montana and Idaho maps as well, which is nice. Now we can start to plan our potential route to the coast from Yellowstone. We’re on a bit of a time crunch with Chase needing/wanting to be back home in time for his sister’s graduation from Texas A&M.

Grand Teton National Park

So we drove through the Teton National Park and then entered Yellowstone – both of which cost $25 car, but luckily I had my National Park pass, so it was free for us! We came to the first campground to find that it was full, but we noticed a campsite that didn’t have a tent on the pad, so I went and talked to the people who were staying there and asked if we could set up a tent on the pad if they weren’s using it. They weren’t and said it was fine, so we camped there on their spot for free which was awesome, especially since all the campgrounds in Yellowstone were booked and full! They did however have a special biker/hiker campsite that wasn’t occupied, so we could have camped there if all else failed. But this way, we were all able to camp together and Jack just set up the big 4-person tent he had just bought.

Welcome to Yellowstone National Park!

Jack fixed us dinner again – hot dogs, roasted peppers, corn, and of course smores by the campfire for dessert. Cindy and Paul (the two who let us camp on their campsite) joined us by the fire and roasted marshmallows as well. They’re from Cedar City, Utah and Paul commutes once a week to Las Vegas where he’s a firefighter. They were pretty fun people to hang out with and after a while, around 10:30 or so I think we all hit the sack.

Thursday, July 23rd – Hite, UT (Lake Powell) to Flaming Gorge, Wyoming (Buckboard Campground)

I woke up at 3:15am and then Chase slowly got up – we ate a bagel and then slowly started up the road out of the camping area to Route 95. Chase was really sluggish and looked like he was about to die. I waited up for him several times along the 2.5 mile hill to the main road and asked if he wanted to just wait and not ride. He looked pathetic and dead practically. He was completely drained and exhausted, yet was still drinking tons of water. We got to the main road and stopped and then Chase sat down and rested and before we knew it, we were on the side of the road for 2 hours just laying down and he started to fall asleep. I tried to get us a ride to Hanksville because he wasn’t feeling well enough to bike and was just too drained. The unfortunate thing was there was almost no traffic whatsoever. We saw maybe 4 cars in 2 hours, and 3 of them going the wrong way. One going the way we needed to go, but they didn’t have space and said they were just going to find cell service.

Chase not feeling so great and sleeping on the side of the road while we hope for someone to let us hitch-hike to Hanksville

So onward we went and left about 8:00 and slowly started biking. We had a few nice hills to climb and then about 10 miles in, we stopped so Chase could take a break and try and feel better. He was still feeling pretty crumby and all and then he rested on a bank on the side of the road and before I knew it, he had fallen asleep. I stayed awake in case a truck came by that would be able to give us a ride to Hanksville. A short bit later a truck came by pulling a boat – I tried to flag him down and he didn’t want to stop, but then did. It was an older man and he was pretty skeptical of me and Chase. He was asking questions about if I was Christian, if Chase was, and if I was with a guy or girl, and then saying that in today’s world, I shouldn’t be hitch-hiking. It was a bit weird…and then he said he’d give us a ride if he could preach to us about God. While we were talking to him and trying to figure out if and how we could fit our bikes and gear in his boat, another pick-up truck stopped to see if he could help.

Jack's truck piled with camping stuff and then our bikes and gear!

The other pick-up was pretty full, but we seemed to think it’d be better if we got a ride with him instead of the older man. The young guy and his kid are on vacation and heading to Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming. So that sounded great, especially since Chase and I talked about the possibility or feasibility of getting to the Transamerican Route. So we swapped our bags out of the first truck into the second and piled into the truck with Jack and his 7-year old son David. The truck’s completely full and piled high both in the bed and in the cab. Off we go to Hanksville. There we discuss our option to continue to Yellowstone National Park with Jack and David or to stay in Hanksville and rest and hope that Chase has it in him to continue through the desert of Nevada and the rest of Utah.

Welcome to Wyoming!

We decide to continue on for the adventure and see what happens – we’ll pick up with the original Transamerican Route in Yellowstone and then ride to Astoria, Oregon most likely. We’ll figure that out later once we see some maps and can figure out how many miles it is to Astoria from Yellowstone. I imagine we’ll tack on some extra miles going this way as our ride from southern Utah into Wyoming was really just north bound for 700 miles or so, so we didn’t gain or lose any miles east or west. It’s been a great ride thus far and we just crossed into Wyoming – who would have expected we’d be here on this ride? At least we’ll now escape the desert and get into more scenic areas in Montana, Idaho, and Oregon.

Our campsite at Buckboard Campground in Flaming Gorge, Wyoming

We pull into the campground around 8pm or shortly before and set up camp, then start to cook food. Jack had hamburgers, BBQ chips, grapes, striper fish from Lake Powell (the older man who stopped to give us a ride had caught it and gave one to Jack). We finished the night up with a campfire and smores and then off to bed.

Let the adventures continue!

GPS Stats (hitch-hiking + biking):
366.16 miles
08:02 moving time

Computer Stats (bicycle-riden portion):
11.54 miles
01:30:54 moving time
7.5 avg speed
40.0 max speed

Wednesday, July 22nd – Blanding, UT to Hite, UT (Lake Powell)

After such a long day yesterday (I biked 7+ hours but waited in Monticello for 8.5 hours for Chase), we decided not to set an alarm last night, so that we could sleep as long as possible (until the sun came up). We both didn’t have much sleep the night before, so it was good to sleep. We woke up naturally due to the sun rising – got up at 7am and packed up and rolled out from Blanding around 8:30am.

We were heading for Lake Powell today and had a pretty long climb, 13 miles with some steep grades, as much as 10%. We just took it slow and kept on pedaling. Along the way, another cyclist (part-timer, named Mark) showed up and chatted with Chase for a bit (I was a good bit ahead on the hill climbing)…and I kept on going, and then eventually Mark said bye to Chase and caught up to me and we chatted for a bit. After reaching the top of the climb at 7,110 feet or so, I stopped and waited for Chase to catch up and we snacked a little and then started the 40ish mile descent down to Lake Powell. We thought it’d be a piece of cake, but it proved more difficult than we were expecting.

Climbing up over a smallish mountain enroute to Lake Powell

30 miles into the ride and just as we were descending from the big climb, the clouds above started to look a bit ugly. We saw the skies were changing really rapidly and then a few raindrops fell. Before we knew it, we were caught in a torrential downpour of rain and then hail – my first hailstorm on the trip, and hopefully the last one. It was pretty intense and lasted about 15 miles with us racing to outrun the storm 3 times. We were going about 20-25 mph to try to outrun the storm and we did, but then we ran into a couple of other touring cylists, Aaron and Seth. They started in Portland, Oregon and rode down to San Francisco and now are riding to Yorktown, VA. While chatting, of course the storm caught up and it started to hail again on us. We said our quick byes and then started pedaling fast to outrun the storm again – and we did. Finally, we were storm-free and past the ugly clouds.

Lake Powell, Utah

We still had 30+ miles to go and it was supposed to be primarily downhill, but it was more unhill than we knew or expected. The sun had come back out and we hit a few headwinds and it was pretty brutal. Chase was really beat – I had gone ahead a bit to try to get to the store before 5:30pm when it was supposed to close (according to the cyclists we met yesterday). I was just cranking as hard and fast as I could in hopes of making the store before it closed. About 5 miles from the store I decided to stop and wait for Chase, since it didn’t look like I’d get there in time – there was still one big hill to do, and I didn’t know how long it would be. A little while later Chase showed up and we climbed to the end and rode into Hite (Lake Powell) and stopped at the bathrooms to get water and clean up. We were so exhausted we just stayed outside the bathrooms. I have never seen two pathetic people so exhausted and drained from the day and the heat we endured. Chase was beyond pathetic and pooped – we looked like we could fall over and just go to sleep for hours on end. We continud to hydrate (we’d already gone through all of our water during the day – and then on top of that continued to drink a ton). I cleaned up in the bathroom and then started to cook shells and cheese for us. We split that and were still hungry, so I made fettucini with spaghetti and alfredo sauce mixed. We finished that off, cleaned off, and then moved our bikes behind the bathrooms and I set up the tent and crawled in and fell asleep till 3:15am.

Cooking outside of the bathrooms at Lake Powell

GPS Stats:
80.5 miles
06:57 moving time
11.6 avg speed
49.8 max speed

Computer Stats:
81.38 miles
06:48:51
11.9 avg speed
51.0 max speed

I woke up really early this morning after staying two nights at the Lazy Lizard Hostel in Moab for $9/night (not bad at all). Chase went out with a couple girls from the hostel and was having a good time and didn’t come back till 2:45 or so. Needless to say, he wasn’t ready to get up at 4:45 when my alarm went off (we had planned to get an early start as we’d heard it would be 100+ degrees today). I got up and asked Chase if he was coming. He said no and so I headed out on my own at 5:30 in the morning. I had to get to Monticello to pick up mail (a water pump that a friend got and mailed to me). I figured it couldn’t be a bad investment for getting across the desert in the heat – with hopes that we’d find water somewhere if there weren’t any service stops.

Lots o' water

I rode all morning and the first 15 or so miles were slightly sluggish and I hit a patch of construction on a hill, so had to bike on the shoulder as far over as possible with oncoming traffic in my lane – not very fun, but luckily I only had to deal with two rotations of oncoming traffic. After the first 15 miles it seemed like things picked up a bit. As I was riding down a hill, a car was parked below on the side of the road – as I rode by, a man was standing outside his car and started clapping and turns out he was from Washington DC (by looking at the license plates), so that was kind of neat. I’ve had a few encounters where people start applauding and really giving you thumbs up for riding across the country with all the heavy gear. It happened the other day when I was riding up the mountain to La Sal – a big semi truck was coming down the mountain as I was going up and both the driver and passenger started applauding as I pedaled up. They must have thought I was crazy since they shook their heads too with a funny smile on their faces.

I reached Monticello about 5 hours and 15 minutes later (pedal time) after climbing one fairly large hill (about 2 miles long) and maybe 6-7 % grade. Once at the top of the hill, it was all relatively flat or downhill into Monticello. I got there just a couple minutes before noon and went and picked up my mail and then met up with a couchsurfer that I’d been in touch with. Nicky and I went to grab lunch at the Peace Tree which had excellent paninis and macaroni salad!

After lunch, I went to the library to update the site a little and check email – then I got really sleepy (I’d only slept 4 hours prior to waking up). After the library, I packed up my computer and went out underneath a tree to take a cat nap for about 20 minutes or so. Then I walked down to the post office to mail a couple things and then just hung out at the Peace Tree waiting for Chase to show up. He finally appeared to town at 7pm, just as I was sending him a message that I was going to continue on to Blanding and would see him there. He arrived and wanted to eat so I stayed and we went to a pizza place and he got pizza and then we finally left there abotu 8:30pm after running into two other touring cyclists coming from San Francisco and were heading to Brooklyn.

We rode for about an hour and 45 minutes until we reached Blanding – we got there about 10:15pm, just 15 minutes before Subway closed. We got a sandwich and split it and then refilled water bottles – each of us has well over a gallon of water a piece in water bottles. Once refilled we went in search of a park or place to camp in town – explored the city park, but it was a bit out in the open, so we opted not to sleep there. Then rode to another park, but couldn’t really make out what was going on there – lots of low shrubs/bushes to the ground and red dirt, so that didn’t appeal too much either. Plus some cacti too – not too great for our tires. (Chase had a flat in the morning when he went out to his bike ready to leave Moab – apparently a thorn got caught in his tire).

Finally, we settled on camping behind a school under an overhang – we just rolled out our mats and sleeping bags on the cement and called it a night. It was actually quite pleasant and no one bothered us.

Our camping spot behind a school in Blanding

GPS Stats:
76.20 miles
07:20 moving time
10.4 avg speed
38.6 max speed

Computer Stats:
78.20 miles
07:19:49 moving time
10.6 avg speed
39.5 max speed
2,584.88 total pedaled miles to date

Monday, July 20th – Canyonlands, Moab, Utah

This morning we met up with Colleen and went to visit Canyonlands together (by car) – it was amazing. Really awesome views of the canyons and all – the only downside was the awful heat. It was blazing hot and the sun was out the entire day. We did some small hikes into see a few arches or viewpoints and they were amazing – really stunning views and incredible scenery. Photos will be posted soon. We even had to take a nap in the hot car because we were all so exhausted from the heat/sun and couldn’t get the energy up to go to the last viewpoint before taking a nap. So we napped for a short bit and then got up 10 minutes of energy for the last viewpoint. It was pretty cool – similar, yet different from the Grand Canyon.

Me jumping around in Canyonlands

We got back to the hostel around 5:30 and then Chase and I went downtown to Moab and stopped in a couple bike shops in hopes of finding a double bike bottle cage to fit behind my seat, but at last, there were none to be found. Instead, I just invested in a couple bungee cords to strap more water bottles onto my bike. We’ll need anywhere from 1-2 gallons of water per person to get through the desert and Utah where there are no services for 75-80 miles. It’s going to be brutal, but we’ll be carrying tons of water… 1 gallon = 8.3 pounds! That’s the major downside there.

Me and Chase in Canyonlands

But we had dinner at an italian place in Moab and it was good – I got their special of penne pasta with red meat sauce and garlic bread..yummy and filling. Tempted to get ice cream afterwards, but we passed on that since we’re getting rather fat these days…all that ice cream and lack of biking, huh? Guess we better get back to pedaling here soon!

Tomorrow we’re aiming for Blanding, Utah – I have to pick up a water pump in the mail in Monticello and if we’re too exhausted to go any further, we’ll probably just crash there at a couchsurfer’s house possibly. We’ll see, but I really hope we make it to Blanding since we have 74 miles of no services from Blanding onward…and we need to do that on a fresh day with lots of water stocked up!

So that’s it for now – we’re staying in the Lazy Lizard Hostel – room of 8 beds and really friendly people. And best of all, it’s only $9/night – how amazing is that for a hostel in the US? Hot showers too, a kitchen one can use, a common room, and free wi-fi (pronounced of course wee-fee, according to an older man we met in Ohio City, CO last week)… and he also says “yay-hoo” instead of ‘yahoo’ – interesting guy he was. So whenever we are looking for wi-fi or internet we joke about how he mispronounced everything and said kgs instead of Kilobytes or Gigabytes… silly ole man

Sunday, July 19th – 4 miles east of Utah to Moab, Utah

Well we didn’t wake up at 5:30am like we’d hoped – the alarm went off and I immediately turned it off. I was exhausted, but thankfully Lauren knew we wanted to leave early and she woke up early anyway, so she came and woke us up about 6:30am in the camper van that we slept in. So that was definitely nice and then she offered to make us a breakfast burrito, so we had egg, cheese, spinach, and tomato in the burrito – amazing! We departed about 7:30am and climbed for a good number of miles – about 14 or so before we were finally able to try and enjoy some downhill, only to be mixed with some really heavy headwinds. The winds were terrible – I was going downhill at one point, but crawling at 5mph pedaling. Finally about 12 miles later and we were at the bottom of the downhill portion and at La Sal Junction where Utah Hwy 46 intersects with Hwy 191 that goes to Monticello and Moab. I tried getting info from Google on when Arches National Park closes, but was unsuccessful (google failed me). It was now about 11:30 or so and I was wondering if we’d make it to Arches in time since the wind was so horrible. I figured the park would close at 5pm or something and we still had 30 or so odd miles to go. Chase and I debated what to do and then I just decided to ask the next person driving out of La Sal and turning right towards Moab if he was going to Moab and if we could get a ride. Sure enough, we lucked out – Wayne was heading to Moab to do some errands and had space to give us and our bikes a ride.

We threw our stuff in the back of his truck and hopped in and rode about 25 miles to Moab and then before we knew it we were at the grocery store picking up lunch items to take into the park and then off to Arches. We were able to convince Wayne to even join us for the park visit, so we just hung out all afternoon with Wayne while visiting all the arches and everything. It was great – the park really wouldn’t have been nearly as enjoyable if we had to bike it – the roads were narrow without any shoulders and it was hilly…and HOT. It was 102 degrees and the sun just blazing down on us, so we were very grateful that Wayne also wanted to see the park and had the time. He hadn’t been before so it worked out well that we all visited the park together. We had a nice lunch up underneath one of the arches in Windows and I climbed up another arch across the way – but it was super hot, I climbed barefoot. Amazing view from above though, but I didn’t climb with my camera – I was just trying to be super careful that I didn’t slip or fall and that no matter how I got up, I had a way down without risking any chance of falling. It was amazing though.

So we spent about 4+ hours in the park and got lots of photos and then Wayne drove us back to Moab and we unloaded the bikes and each ate two snickers ice cream bars before splitting ways.

Afterwards, Chase and I went to the laudromat to do laundry and I started transferring photos to the computer. Once done we rode up to the Lazy Lizard Hostel in Moab and got a bunk in a dorm for $9/night, so not bad. It’s air-conditioned too which helps and cheaper than camping, believe it or not. We unpacked, showere, and then rode our bikes back down into Moab’s restaurant area and grabbed a bite to eat at Hogi Yogi where we had spicy hot chicken on rice, a drink, and ice cream. Back to the hostel afterwards to catch up on photo album stuff and then crashed around 1am.

GPS Stats: (Arches and biking portion)
105.3 miles
66.0 max speed
20.2 avg speed
05:13 moving time

Computer Stats:
25.7 miles
33.3 max speed
9.0 avg speed
02:51 moving time

Saturday, July 18th – Telluride, CO to 4 miles east of the Utah border

Well after last night, Chase had a bit of a slow start this morning. I got up at 7 and woke Chase a short bit later; we had some raspberry coffee cake and hot chocolate for breakfast, then I went into Telluride to snap a few photos since I hadn’t earlier. Chase finished up packing. Justin, a Mountain Films guy saw me taking pictures and offered to take one of me, and then we wound up talking about the route to La Sal Junction, Utah. He suggested we do that instead of go the long way down to Dolores and Monticello and back up to Moab. He helped with telling me about few big climbs and where we could restock on water and food since there was a gap between Naturita and Moab with nothing available to get water or food really. Just one little place on Hwy 191 where one can stop for touristy stuff at Hole in the Rock.

So finally we rolled out of Telluride about 10:30 and went downhill for 31 miles or so (slight downhill grade) and then climbed Norwood Hill which was 2 miles, but not horrible. We rolled into Norwood and stopped at the grocery store to get some lunch. I wound up with an odd concoction just because I felt like it – I bought pita bread, shredded cheddar cheese, ravioli, and some powerade. I heated the ravioli with my stove (just left it in the can) and then once it was hot I put the ravioli in the pita bread and cheese on top. It turned out to be pretty tasty

Back on the road again we had another 20 miles to Naturita which was fairly easy – mostly downhill grade and some pretty easy pedaling with a few small hills. We got into Naturita about 3:30 or so and refueled with water – we each bought a gallon and another bottle of water to carry with us. We filled up all the bottles in preparation for the next 60 miles or so without any services or places to find water. I also bought more Heet for fueling the stove, some yummy soft chewy candy for fueling me and some muffins that we got for the morning.

And more downhill for a bit – about 65 miles into the ride a car passed us (it was rare at this point – such little traffic on Hwy 90. Chase recognized the car that passed us and it turns out they recognized us as well – they camped across the way from us in Telluride and were from Texas and just doing a road trip of sorts. They were off to Moab, or so they thought (later found out Moab was too hot for them and they continued on to Salt Lake City). We had another 15 miles until the climb up out of Paradox. The climb was about 2 miles long and about 1,000 feet or a bit more of elevation gain – it took around 45 minutes to climb and luckily the sun was setting at this point so we were in the shadows and it was a little cooler. We got to the “top” and weren’t at the elevation that I thought we should be at, 7,500 feet, so when we started to go down in elevation I didn’t like that, because I knew we’d have to climb it all over again. We had a good bit of downhill – dropped down to around 6,000 feet and then we passed by a house with sprinklers on and a fire going – I suggested we stop to see about refilling water bottles and the next thing we knew we were sitting around the fire eating steak, roasted peppers, and pickled asparagus. Lauren, who was staying at the house offered to let us stay the night and join her for dinner, so we couldn’t pass up the offer.

It was really nice getting a yummy meal, having great conversation, and not having to pitch a tent and being able to shower. Awesome time there and great time talking to Lauren – come to find out she used to live near Braddock Road and Guinea Road in Fairfax and also graduated from James Madison University, so we had a lot to talk about and compare things to how they were when she was there and when I was there. We finally hit the sack around midnight in hopes of getting up at 5:30 and rolling out at 6am.

GPS Stats:
2,586 miles
06:42 moving time
42.4 max speed
386 avg speed

Computer Stats:
87.01 miles
06:41:22 moving time
13.0 avg speed
44.0 max speed

Friday, July 17th – just a rest day because we can

Felt it was necessary to take a rest day since Telluride’s a pretty cool town and we didn’t get to see much yesterday. We’ve just been hanging out and checked out the farmer’s market this morning with Kyle (fellow cyclist) and ran into another cyclist (Nate) who’s riding from NYC to San Francisco. So we’re just relaxing and catching up on stuff – web junk, and all..

A cute kitten that was up for adoption at the Farmer's Market in Telluride, CO

Nate, Me, and Chase

I just posted more photos and a few more videos as well today. A new album is up for photos and just added 4 or so more videos.

That’s it – hoping to catch Colleen and Dean today since they texted last night asking if I was in/near Telluride….surprise surprise, I am here. So hoping to catch them this evening whenever they arrive!

Dean and Colleen on the gondola to Mountain Village

The group up at Mountain Village

Met up with Dean and Colleen tonight – as well as their friends Shaw and Mark. We rode the gondola up to Mountain Village where everyone had appetizers and drinks and then we went back down and ate pizza at the Brown Dog place (that has an amazing YX Sandwich!)

Dean, Random drunk guy, Me, and Colleen