Category: Bike Ride of a Lifetime (C)

July 8, 2018

Day 21 – Lusk, WY to Hot Springs, SD – 93 miles, 3,310 feet vertical

“… For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.”
—from I wandered lonely as a cloud, by William Wordsworth

I wasn’t lying on my couch and I don’t think I saw many daffodils, but I did ride solo this morning through some magnificently desolate yet beautiful landscape.  The wind was favorable and the terrain was slightly downhill and so the pace was highly respectable, even without my paceline friends.  But the thrill of being alone – completely alone for as far as the eye can see – was exhilarating.  As hard as it was to stop, I did just that several times to take a photo, or just … to stare and take it all in.

It was another long-ish day with 93 miles on tap, so the main load saddled up early at 6:30. We really enjoyed our one-night stay at the slightly kitschy Covered Wagon Motel (complete with covered wagon atop the roof), but it was time to move on.  No moss grows under our feet on these segments and today would be our last day in Wyoming.  We were scheduled to cross the State Line into South Dakota at the 56-mile mark.

The morning was exquisite.  It was cool and comfortable with the usual morning sun rising in the east before our eyes.  The times were fast for our entire group and I got to the second SAG stop at 68 miles around 10:20.  With only 25 miles left to go, I saw no need to rush.  Everyone was having a great day and there were smiles all around.  

The only hurdles were two climbs near the end – four miles and one mile – that we needed like a hole in the head.  But, we ground it out and made it to Hot Springs.  It was still early and most us went to DQ for lunch and a shake before checking into the hotel.   

Tomorrow is a big scenic day with a stop at Mount Rushmore, but unfortunately we found out there was a typo in our original route sheets and our climbing will be almost double what we thought, at 6,400 feet.  Oy!

Please enjoy these photos of the day and don’t forget to track our progress at Where’s Jeff at jeffblye.com

Thanks.

 

July 7, 2018

Day 20 – Casper to Lusk, WY – 107 miles, 3,220 feet vertical

I really, really like rest days!  But, … all good things must come to an end, and it was back in the saddle today for another century-plus ride to kick off the third segment of our journey. 

The morning was sunny and warm, and while it would stay sunny, it would also get freakin’ hot.  I think the temperature may have matched the mileage at one point. (At the very least, it felt like it.) 

We had some logistics to deal with today, since we were scheduled to ride a section of the interstate, I-25 South.  The only problem was that there was some heavy duty construction and a, …uh, …section of the highway missing.  Have you seen the movie Speed, with Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves, where they find out that there’s a 50-foot section of highway missing and they have to jump the gap by flooring it? (…in a bus, no less!) Well, that’s what we had in store, except that a) we’re on bikes, not a bus and more importantly, b) this ain’t Hollywood.  

So at Exit 151 and the 40-mile mark, ABB staff loaded us on to the vans, shuttled us through the construction and dropped us off at a safe spot.  It did cut off some miles, but hey, better than dropping into the ravine.  

I want to thank my hammer team for the speedy 61 miles to the second SAG, but at that point, I needed more recovery time and so, I bid them adieu and rode solo the rest of the way.  The landscape turned desolate (except for relatively lightly traveled trucks and RV’s) and at times I would pull over, stop and get off my bike and just listen to … silence.  Pure unadulterated silence.  Until, … the next coal-laden freight train came through.  The sight of a mile of coal cars being pulled by powerful diesel locomotives and trailed by helper locomotives, still gives me a rush. 

I met Jon Dobbs with about 10 miles to go and we rode together into Lusk.  Our overnight is at the Covered Wagon Motel – a delightfully refreshing pit stop after a long hot day.  A huge salad and a bottomless stack of fancy pizzas awaited us for dinner, and then I walked next door for a heath bar vanilla shake.  After the calorie burn today, I could have ordered the large. (But I didn’t.)

WiFi seems to be as exhausted as I am, so check back some time tomorrow for more photos.  

And finally, a big shoutout to Nicosia, the manager on duty at the Covered Wagon for just being a fantastic upbeat person, and especially for handling any and all customer requests.  She knows what I’m talking about.  Thank you, Nicosia!

Dont forget to check “Where’s Jeff” to track our progress.

July 6, 2018

Casper, WY – Rest Day

After yesterday’s grueling ride, we get a well-earned day off in Casper.

So far, we have ridden our bikes a total of 1,370 miles, with 2,330 miles to go.  And we’ve climbed an aggregate of 57,060 feet.  That’s over ten miles!

As you can imagine, we’re burning a ton of calories every day and it’s vitally important to keep our energy up and to stay well-hydrated.  Our fabulous support team keeps us well fed and provides meals every riding day.  On rest days, like today, we are on our own and free to explore our host city.

The food so far has been pretty good.  We’re all so hungry at dinner time that we’ll eat just about anything.  The hotel breakfasts, though, are not so great but I eat a light one anyway – usually just a bowl of cereal or granola with yogurt and some eggs.  I did draw the line one morning when I saw donuts with icing and bacon.  Seriously: bacon donuts.  Thanks, no thanks.  Occasionally, we go out for a real breakfast. 

Sorry to say, the coffee leaves a lot to be desired and the Europeans must think we’re a country of barbarians given the state of coffee service.  I haven’t seen an espresso machine for 1,000 miles. (Actually, I did stop in at a Starbucks a few hundred miles back, and even that was sub-par.)  With the help of Google Translate, I told Maurizio,   “Soprattutto, voglio scusarmi con te per il nostro pessimo caffè americano. È appena bevibile, non è vero? Per favore, accetta le mie più profonde scuse.”

We’re grazing throughout the day on nuts, granola bars, bananas, peanut butter, watermelon and whatever other fruit treats Deana, Karen, Judy or Pam have for us at the SAG stops.  Many folks drink Gatorade, but I find it to be just all sugar.  So some of us bring our own powders and electrolyte supplements.  And on long days, we often stop at a Dairy Queen in our destination town for a milkshake or Blizzard.  I haven’t had a milkshake in almost forever, but on this trip it’s ok.  

Dinner is either catered in at the hotel, or a walk to a nearby restaurant and mostly hit, but sometimes miss. (Last night was a miss.) Back in Baker City, dinner was at a local brew pub and we ordered off the menu.  This was a treat – real food at a real restaurant.  I pondered the special:  Coffee-rubbed flat-iron steak with beer cheese sauce.  

Hmmmmm …  beer cheese sauce.  

“Excuse me, miss, I’m not from around here. Could you tell me, please – what is beer cheese sauce?”  

“Oh,” she replied, “you’ve never had beer cheese sauce?” 

“Why, no, I haven’t”.  

“Well … ,” she went on, apparently unsure exactly how to describe this local delicacy, “have you ever had beer cheese soup?”

“Hmmm,” I shook my head, “I’m afraid not.”

“Oh, because it’s a little like that.” 

I paused. 

“It’s really good,” she added reassuringly.

“Ok, I’ll have the steak then, medium rare.  And, … um, … could you put the beer cheese sauce on the side?”  

“Certainly,” she answered, “I’ll just mark it SOS.”  And then, as if to let me in on a trade secret, she added, “that means sauce on side.”

When the entrees came, the steak was delicious and medium rare (or, close enough).  And there, on the side, was a rather large bowl of the beer cheese sauce.  It actually looked like a bowl of Mac and Cheese, but without the Mac.  I gently dipped a piece of steak in and tried it.  It was quite good.  It had a bit of a kick – the beer, I guessed.  I shared the new find with my table mates and pretty soon, everyone was taking a dip and nodding affirmatively.

Live and learn.

***

Our rest day was spent sleeping in, relaxing and taking care of equipment issues.  Some of us hiked over to the National Historic Trails Interpretive Center which had a fantastic exhibit on the history of the pioneers and the development of the West.

Mostly, it was a stark reminder of the harsh conditions of the pioneers and traveling in covered wagons without America by Bicycle SAG support!!  A walk into town for dinner capped off our relaxing day.

It’s another century-plus ride tomorrow of 107 miles, so I will say adios for now.

 

July 5, 2018

Day 18 – Riverton to Casper, WY – 119 miles, 2,840 feet vertical

Brutal.  Period.  

Today was the longest single day of our journey – 119 miles.  When Judy previewed this stage for us about a week ago, she warned us about our 119-mile longest day.  This caused Jon Dobbs to lapse into a convulsive fit of laughter.  We all stared at him. “Jon, are you ok?” He just continued to laugh. “Oh yeah,” he finally stammered.  “Because 119 is just SO MUCH LONGER than the 116 miles that we just rode!”  It was pretty funny. 

What wasn’t funny was the brutal headwind that dogged us almost the entire day.  At least on the climbs, you get some sort of reward on the downhill.  But the wind was just relentless.   And as for scenery, it was a whole lotta nuthin’  for 100 miles.  

With this kind of mileage and unfavorable wind, I decided to get on the hammer train early.  Those of you know me, know that I don’t do mornings and I have been, … um, … not always on time for load and go.  Tami warned me last night that they were leaving “promptly” at 6:30 and if I was late it would be “an FM day” (and I don’t mean the radio.)  Everybody loves a story of redemption, and forewarned is forearmed, so there I was at 6:25, ready to rock and roll. 

It was a rough day all around and I won’t bore you with the gory details.  Let’s just say, we have really earned our rest day tomorrow in Casper, WY.  

Please enjoy the photos of the day and don’t forget to follow our progress at Where’s Jeff at jeffblye.com

(Oooops, hotel doesn’t have any working WiFi, so photos will be posted tomorrow.  Please check back then.)

July 4, 2018

Day 17 – Dubois (rhymes with Joyce) to Riverton, WY – 79 miles, 1,251 feet vertical

The alarm went off at 5:15, then again at 5:30, and after hitting snooze a few times, the sun came up at precisely 5:43. “Hrmmmpf,” I thought, stretching.  “Morning already?”  I clicked on my Weather Channel app. 38 degrees.  Seriously?  Is that Fahrenheit? Are you kidding me?  Back home, I have an absolute floor temp of 43, below which, I go to the gym instead.

It looked like it would warm up gradually, and the forecast for our destination in Riverton was 80s.  So, this was a day for layers and for stripping.  Thank goodness for the vans and their perfectly timed “drop baskets”.  We could go on stripping all day to our heart’s content.

The early rollers were already geared up for their early departure (god bless them), while we headed next door to the Cowboy Cafe for breakfast.  Oh, right!  It’s The Fourth of July!  All the wait staff were loosely dressed in red, white and blue Americana of various sorts.  And when I say “loosely”, I mean that in every sense of the word.  

Breakfast was a “real” breakfast in this Wyoming cowboy town.  And that meant: huge portions of eggs potatoes, cheese and meats of various ilk.  Oh wait, I meant elk.  I followed Randy’s lead (see? not just on the bike) and ordered the “Yellowstone” skillet.  This was an enormous melange of eggs over-easy, potatoes, cheese, spicy elk sausage — our patriotic waitress recommended this over the buffalo. “Definitely, go for the elk!” she declared — and all this on a cast iron skillet, complete with a potholder. “Careful, honey, that plate is hot!” The coffee kept flowing non-stop and the sourdough bread was perfect.  I ate about half of the plate before I surrendered. 

Being Independence Day, — quick pop quiz: anybody remember which king we are celebrating independence FROM?  (Oops, sorry, I promised non-political.) — we were directed to wear our festive red, white and blue America by Bicycle jerseys.  This meant figuring out how many layers to put underneath. It was already in the low 40s and warming rapidly, so the trick was to stay just warm enough at the start and strip layers at the first opportunity.  I decided this would be a smart time to break out the long fingered gloves — finally. 

I was a little slow out the gate, and my hammer team left without me. Waaah. I figured, ok, easy ride today, no big climbs, mostly flat or downhill (emphasis on “mostly”), so I resolved to get back to Lawrence O’Donnell and ride solo.  About a half-mile out, … there they were, waiting for me! “C’mon Jeff, this is YOUR day.”  Translation: today is flat, you suck at climbs, but we need your cylinder firing in the paceline, and besides, we want to be in your pictures.  I held out my arms, “I feel the love!”

The opening section today was spectacular, with red rock cliffs, jagged abutments, rocky streams and photo ops everywhere.  It was so beautiful, the train actually stopped twice for a photo!!!  By now it was getting toasty and we all stopped at the Deana’s van and peeled off all the extra layers.  

We passed Jon at the 40-mile mark today.  He was pulled over at a rest area as we flew by. “Hey, that’s Jon,” someone yelled.  As we waved to Jon, Jon waved back at us and yelled out “You’re LATE!!” ‘Twas true. My fault. Sor-ry … 

At the second SAG stop, and after an all-too-short interval (I thought), the train was ready to pull out. “Ya coming, Jeff?” someone yelled (probably Randy).  “No thanks, I think I’ll fly solo the rest of the way.”  I love these guys, but fact is, I missed a number of good photo ops while on the morning train.  Not the big huge vistas that make everybody ooh and ahh, but the details, the small stuff:  the unique road sign (“WANTED: Antlers and Horns”), the quaint house nestled in a canyon, the Indian Reservation sign that reminds us who was here first.  And so on.  

I met an orthodox Jewish bike rider 12 years ago in Israel.  After waiting around an unduly long time for the day’s ride to start, I had a lot of trouble clipping into my pedals.  I finally realized I had forgotten to remove the protective cleat covers from the bottom of my shoes.  I felt really silly.  I sheepishly looked at him and sighed, “Details.”  He looked at me and held up a lecturing finger, “You will find god in the details.”

I pulled in to Riverton around 1:30 or so.  It was hot.  I checked the temperature.  The digits had magically reversed.  83 degrees.  In the shade.  

Tomorrow is our longest day at 119 miles and it will take us into Casper, WY for our well-earned second rest day.  

Happy Fourth, everybody.