Day 23: Rawlins to Laramie

I really like the habits of some motels in Wyoming of replacing the continental breakfast with a coupon for the attached diner: I got sausage, eggs, hash browns, and toast instead of packaged pastries. I changed my planned route in order to see my Grandparents in Loveland, so the next several days will look nothing like the route maps I published earlier.

Dad and I were on the road around 7:15. The first 20 miles or so were on I-80 to Walcott – there was a bit of a tailwind, and the draft from the 18-wheelers wasn’t too bad, but it was not interesting at all. I could have taken 80 all the way to Laramie, but decided that 80 more miles of interstate would be the most boring thing ever, so I turned down WY-130 to Saratoga. The wind was out of the SW, so that turned the tailwind into a headwind, which really hurt Dad, and he stopped in Saratoga when Mom met us with lunch. I continued up into the Snowy Range – the climbing started almost immediately upon crossing the North Platte, but then the road leveled out for a few miles before the ascent up Snowy Range Pass. This was unusual, because the lower part of the pass was a fairly steep and consistent grade for several miles, but the part near the top was less steep and had occasional downhills and level sections. In fact, the road mucked about above 10,000 feet for several miles before actually getting to the summit at 10,900 (500 feet higher than the map said). The scenery was spectacular – there was some decent hiking that I would have done if it hadn’t been so late. This was the highest point on my route, since I am no longer going over Hoosier Pass in Colorado.

On the descent, I touched 50mph, and the curves were a lot of fun. Wyoming seems to have a different philosophy concerning suggested speeds than do other states. Usually, you can take the turns at about 10mph faster than the sign unless your vehicle is top-heavy, but there were a couple of curves signed for 40mph, that I took at 35, and felt extremely sketchy at that speed. Sometime I need to come back with my road bike and racing tires, and see how fast I can take that descent. Even with the touring bike, I covered 10 miles in 18 minutes.

The 30 miles or so from Centennial (at the bottom of the descent) and Laramie was quite difficult psychologically because I had treated the summit of the pass as the end of the ride, but there were a couple of small but noticeable hills between there and Laramie. Nevertheless, there was a bit of a tailwind, and I got to Laramie around 6:20, where we got dinner at a pub called the Library.

Approximate Route:

Today: 117 miles
Total: 2160 miles

Day 22: Lander to Rawlins

Today was really hard, despite the ride support provided by Mom. There is a long, but not particularly steep, hill about 30 miles from Lander. Dad and I both made it, and met a cyclist from Lander named Steve, who was out for a training ride. Mom caught up to us with lunch around 2, and we sat on the side of the road eating sandwiches. At that point, I still had 55 miles to go, and Dad decided that he would be content with a century, so we split up; I went all the way into Rawlins, and Dad went another 30 miles before Mom picked him up with the car.

This part of Wyoming is desolate – there is very little in the way of human settlement, or water. The Great Divide Basin is a bit of a twilight zone in which water drains neither into the Atlantic or the Pacific: there are old oil facilities, desert, and salt flats as far as the eye can see. Since it gets so little rain and has no rivers flowing through it, it may be the driest place in the continental US. A cyclist I met who was riding the continental divide said that he rode through the middle of the basin and didn’t see any water sources for 125 miles. Fortunately, I just skimmed the edge, and was in the basin for only 20 miles.

The climb from Muddy Gap was the hardest part of the day – there was a headwind, a 500-foot climb, it was about 4 in the afternoon, and I wasn’t feeling so great after lunch. But I got a second wind about an hour later, and the tailwind returned, so I arrived in Rawlins about 6:45.

Approximate Route:

Today: 124 miles
Total: 2043 miles

Day 21: Dubois to Lander

Three weeks on the bike! And almost 2000 miles!

It was cold in Dubois when I woke up this morning (the altitude was almost 7000 feet, so that makes sense). I think that I am getting used to sleeping outside, since I slept until six, well after the sky became light and the birds started singing. I found a Daylight Donuts (!), ate breakfast there, and headed down the road to Lander around 7:30. The first part of the day was a pronounced downhill (Lander is 1600 feet lower than Dubois, and most of the elevation change occurs in the first half of the distance between them), and there was a bit of a tailwind, so I covered the first 35 miles in about two hours. But my momentum was killed by a steep 1.5-mile climb just after the junction of US-287 and US-26, and the last 30 miles were considerably harder. Nevertheless, I ended up in Lander about 1, making this a very short day.

I saw no fewer than 9 other cyclist going west on the road today, and stopped to chat with a couple of them. We shared some route tips, since they had just been where I am going and vice versa; apparently there are a number of inexpensive hostels on the trans-am in Kentucky. Unfortunately, my route does not go through Kentucky.

I have gotten pretty good at estimating my food consumption; I stocked up in Jackson with the goal of being ready for a complete resupply in Lander, and I am indeed almost entirely out of food, with only pasta remaining.

My parents are going to be meeting me here later this afternoon, and dad will be riding with me for the next couple of days, so they reserved a motel room, and I will get to sleep inside and shower for two or three nights in a row. Such luxury!

I am trying to figure out how to make elevation profiles, and if I am successful, those may start appearing in older posts.

Day 20: Jenny Lake to Dubois

I am in the Dubois city park right now after a fairly easy day of riding. I started off by catching the 7AM early bird special to the west side of Jenny Lake (a passenger ferry; the first sailing of the day is half price). Most of the other passengers were rock climbers, but I was just there to do the short hike up to Hidden Falls and Inspiration Point. This was a great hike, but my sandals were just barely good enough for the job, and it was only about 2.5 miles round trip. Its a good thing I didn’t try the 9 mile rt hike up to Surprise Lake. If I come here again (next summer?), I will stay at Jenny Lake for at least 3 nights, and spend a couple of days hiking. I will also bring hiking boots and a small backpack.

After the hike, I napped on the dock until the boat got there, and was on the road by about 9:30. I left the park and headed up Togwotee Pass, only to find the road under construction. There were about 5 miles of one-lane dirt road during which I had to ride in the pilot truck, including 3 miles or so of the steep part near the top. This pass is a strange one in that even though the elevation change from Jackson Lake to the top of the pass is well over 3000 feet, there are only about 4 miles of steep grade near the top, and a couple of more miles up one a small ridge on the approach. So I got off easy with the ride in the pilot truck.

The wind was a major factor today. It was at my back (mostly) on the way up to the pass, but wasn’t very strong. On the east side of the pass, however, it became a 20-25mph wind out of the west. On the twisting roads in the mountains, this resulted in some really nasty crosswinds, which cause front panniers to do unpredictable things, but when the road straightened out, it was at my back, and I made ridiculously good time into Dubois, getting here by 4. I started by going to a used book store and trading

The Color of Magic

for

Anna Karenina

(I finished the former yesterday). Then I went to the public library and uploaded some more pictures. The librarians told me that the Circle-Up Camp Court, which used to charge $6.50 for tent sites, is now a KOA, and charges $22. So I went to the city park, made dinner, and looked around for signs prohibiting camping. Since I didn’t see any, I asked a passerby by the name of Maryellen, and she said that camping is not allowed, but offered the yard behind the dental office where she works. I don’t know if I will be able to make the broken tent work in these winds, but the same winds should keep the mosquitoes under control.

Approximate Route:

Today: 73 miles
Total: 1842 miles

Day 19: Colter Bay to Jenny Lake (via Jackson)

Because of the broken tent pole, I scrapped my plans for an immediate ride to Jenny Lake followed by a day of hiking. Instead, I rode 40 miles south to Jackson, where I inquired at all four sporting goods stores about the possibilities of fixing the tent. Since none of the stores could do so, and I didn’t want to buy a new tent, I went to Ace Hardware and bought a short length of brass tubing, which I used to splint the pole with duct tape. I also called the REI in Colorado Springs, and when I meet Dad in Lander, he will be bringing some extra tent pole sections. Hopefully one of them will work as a more permanent fix. While in Jackson, I also went to Fitzgerald’s Bike Shop and purchased a new computer head, so now I will have more accurate mileage numbers, and I will know what time it is while riding.

I passed a large group (~50) of riders going north on US-89 on my way into Jackson. A few were stopped at one of the turnouts, and I was able to talk to them – it turns out that they were a large supported Trans-Am tour that had just come across Teton Pass. A supported ride would have certain advantages – I could ride my Roubaix and achieve very high daily mileages. The downside is a certain loss of independence – when I ride self-supported, I save a ton of money, can stop when and where I want, and most importantly, can make impromptu route changes. Sometimes these changes are forced on me, as when I detoured to fix tent poles, but on balance, I prefer to carry my gear with me.

The road from Jackson into Jenny Lake was a lot of fun, even the short (1.5 miles) dirt section with monster potholes. It is a testimony to the wheelbuilding skills at Recycled Cycles that both my wheels are still true. There was a tailwind, and I was able to get to the campground by 5. Fortunately, there were still a couple of hiker-biker sites available, and I started to set up camp. Then, when I tried to put my tent up, the pole broke again, just outside the splint. I suspect that the crack propagated very easily, and that the only way to fix it will be to replace the broken section. I hope that one of the pole sections from REI work. Fortunately, I was able to jury-rig the tent again, and the mosquitoes stayed off of me.

Approximate Route:

Today: 71 miles (approx.)
Total: 1769 miles

Day 18: Canyon Village to Colter Bay

I woke up a bit later than usual this morning – I must have been tired. I was on the road around 8:30, and went to Artists’ Point, overlooking Crystal Falls. It was spectacular, and is the place from which Moran and others painted some fairly well-known pictures from the park. After a couple more tourist-type stops, I ended up in Grant’s Village for lunch around 1:15. While I was there, I met Alan and Dina, who are touring across the country with their son Lewis (age 9 if I remember correctly) on the back of Alan’s tandem. Lewis enjoyed the homemade energy bar I shared with him, and the four of us enjoyed some conversation before they continued south. I ended up staying in Grant’s Village for a while, then kept on south. I was barely missed by some afternoon thundershowers, but encountered some stiff headwinds along the Snake River. There were two long sections of construction between the two parks. Fortunately, the first was downhill, so I could keep up with the pilot car without too much trouble. The second was uphill, and I had to put my bike in the back of the pilot truck for a couple of miles. Since I wasn’t sure if there were any available hiker-biker sites at Jenny Lake, I stopped at Colter Bay. There are about 20 or so cycle tourists here – most are in one group that is cycling the trans-am. I also met Alan and Dina here again – they got in shortly before I did. They shared their hot dogs with me, which was awesome.

As I was setting up my tent, I picked it up to move it a short distance, and a pole broke again. The general store didn’t have any replacements, so I jury-rigged the tent with the one remaining pole, my bungee cords, and a nearby tree. I couldn’t get the rain fly on it, but it is under a tree and rain is unlikely tonight, and it will do its main job of keeping the mosquitoes off.

Approximate Route:

Today: 74 miles (approx.)
Total: 1698 miles

Day 17: Canyon Village to Canyon Village

Today was awesome, mostly in that I got a full day’s ride in without carrying all my gear. The latter also got to dry out, because I could leave my tent set up for the entire day – the joys of camping in the same place two days in a row. The route I took was to go counterclockwise around Yellowstone’s north loop. I started by going north over Dunraven Pass; this climb was not too difficult because of the relatively high altitude of Canyon Village. The descent was something else however – Roosevelt, which is on the opposite side of the pass, is 2800 feet below the summit, and that side is considerably steeper and longer. Near the top of the pass, I saw a bear right next to the road. It was brown colored, so most of the people who had stopped were convinced that it was a grizzly, but it was small, lacked the shoulder hump, and had a long snout, so I’m pretty sure that it was a light-colored black bear. At one point, the bear decided to cross the road, and sniffed at my bike (which I had left leaning against a signpost) on its way. Fortunately, it didn’t go for the food in my panniers and continued on its merry way digging up roots and bugs.

The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone was the highlight of the park for me, and the road went right along the south rim for several miles. After the road left the river, there were some rolling hills, followed by a 2-mile climb past the Mammoth Hot Spring Terraces and through the Golden Gate. By this time, it was starting to cloud up, and a thunderstorm was threatening, so I took a quick lunch break at Sheepeater Cliff and booked it south to the Norris Geyser Basin. Since the weather looked less bad by the time I got to Norris, I took some time to watch the geysers, and also learned about the color-coded biological thermometer in the hot springs. Orange colors indicate thermophile bacteria that like temperatures above 130 degrees Fahrenheit, and green indicates algae that likes lower temperatures. The last segment of the loop was about 12 miles of (mostly) gentle climbing from Norris back to Canyon Village, but there was a tailwind by that point, so it wasn’t very hard, and I got back to my campsite around 4.

I loafed around the campground all afternoon, and met a Dutch cycle tourist named Albert who rolled into the hiker-biker sites around 5:30. He had done the Trans-Am before, and gave me a lot of route tips concerning which towns allow camping in parks and the like. He also had some pretty cool stories from touring around Europe and the US. Since the power outlets for his palm pilot were located in the restroom, we sat on the floor there for about half an hour chatting.

Approximate Route:

Today: 75 miles (approx.)
Total: 1624 miles