Day 14: Provo to Price, UT

Tomorrow we will break 1000 miles.

I was just looking on my Garmin stats and it says I've been riding over 64 hours, burned over 45000 calories (that's around 112 bacon cheeseburgers) and climbed almost 48,000 feet. Granted there is occasional operator error and sometimes the data just looks off with too much elevation showing up on the Garmin but still ... not bad.

Today was pretty challenging. A ride some called technical and others called dangerous. We left really early at 5:45 to minimize traffic. The route had a ton of construction that left narrow or no shoulders in several places. We got it all today: Strong headwinds as we entered the canyon ... at least 30 mph ... there were several windmills at the mouth of the canyon. Crossing cement barriers and riding on dirt roads in construction zones (they weren't working). Rumble strips in the middle of a narrow shoulder that left sometimes a 6 inch strip of pavement to ride on without going into the lane. A cold rain after Soldier Summit on the descent. And we pretty much agreed - Utah drivers can be really rude.

Despite these challenges, the ride itself was beautiful. Long climbs up Price Canyon through green mountains and the beginnings of canyon lands - including the famous Utah red rock. Then after the summit the landscape became pure canyon badlands with rock pinnacles and deep narrow rifts. It was beautiful and stark. The stone was grey, pink, red and shades of brown. The descent was steep but I kept stopping to take photos, despite the rain that had already caught me at the summit fast on my heels. I got in just in time before the rain set in ...

After getting cleaned up some of us went to the Dinosaur and archeology museum. Huge skeletons of a mammoth and others extinct critters that were found locally. We'll bike pass several dig sites tomorrow on the way to Price. Should be a pretty ride tomorrow, and relatively easy. Then we can head out to Arches National Park or go white water rafting ... nice choices for a fun afternoon.

Day 13: Salt Lake City to Provo

I think most of the Salt Lake area is under construction. Is this our stimulus $ at work? Today was slow going - lots of navigating, convening with a GPS to find alternative routes and we even had a bridge to nowhere. The route sheet had roads that were shut down for construction and routed us over an overpass that had been knocked down. Seattle Bob has a GPS so he's great to ride with - besides his wonderful company - it lowers your chance of getting totally lost dramatically. Maybe it's time to figure out that GPS application on my blackberry ...

But it was a beautiful day. Sunny, 70s, and ... a good 20 mph headwind the first couple of hours. But the wind didn't matter too much as we were stopping every few blocks in Salt Lake suburbia and heading south through neighborhoods and subdivisions for the entire 68 mile day. The Wasatch mountains were on the left rising sharply. Tons of the neighborhoods we rode by had amazing views at the foot of the mountains. There is still a lot of snow up there. We rode right through Brigham Young University Campus ... a beautiful campus. Huge stadium ...

I did get a hotel flat this morning ... always mysterious ... like little hotel imps run around and let the air out of your tires. You wake up in the morning with a flat tire ... mine was caused by a piece of copper wire that are apparently all over the sides of the interstates from blown out tires. They sneakily work their way in and you have to use tweezers to pluck them out. Luckily Wonderful Shawn our mechanic changed it in all of 3 minutes. Not that I can't change my own flat, mind you, but it takes me closer to 20 or 30 minutes and usually a fair amount of dirt, colorful language and the occasional bruise (my tires are super tight on the rims - really difficult to get on.)

Our 13 new riders were with us much of the day. Seem like a great group of folks. There are 4 more women now ... I find this exciting for some reason (don't know why - I often seem to ride with the boys though I miss my Heidi and Emily and Christina and TNT gals for training rides.) Based on today it looks like I'm faster than all the new gals, too, so maybe no gal ride buddies on this stretch either but we'll see how they climb. I may well take this back after I get left in the dust.

Tomorrow sounds really challenging. Beautiful if we can take our eyes off the road long enough to see. Tons of construction. We leave at 5:45 am to try and avoid as much traffic as possible.

Day 11 and 12: Wendover to Salt Lake City and a Hooray Rest Day

If you haven't discovered the maps featured under the Garmin Data and Stats on the right hand side of the blog, the entry from Wendover to Salt Lake is a great time to check it out. If you look at the map and change the view to satellite view, you can see the huge expanse white that is the Bonneville Salt Flats and then Great Salt Lake. It's a crazy piece of our planet.

In bike terms, riding that day meant 40ish miles across salt flats which looked alternatively like a moonscape of pure shimmery white or yellow sand and a huge shallow lake. Many of the flats were covered in water because of all the rain and storms that had come through. We passed through the flats just after dawn ... we had a 118 mile day and an early start so extra time was important - especially for slower riders in our stops-a-lot group.

We also had a wicked headwind that lasted for at least 60 miles, and then picked up again even harder the last 20 miles of the ride. Headwinds can be the hardest part of riding ... downright discouraging. To me worse than climbing mountains. To cope with the wind, a bunch of us formed up in a double paceline which had been perfected by a smaller group of riders the day before, including Bob from Seattle and Chris from Ohio - (you can see their blogs listed on the right side of my blog if interested in another take on this trip and photos - I just linked them onto mine). For non-bikers, a paceline is basically where you follow a rider in front of you closely enough to benefit from the draft. You rotate regularly to share the work ... the front of the line "pulls" and the back of the line "drafts". A double paceline is basically two columns that rotates clockwise, so you take a turn front left, a turn front right, and then fall back down the line as the paceline rotates every 1/2 mile. It's obviously important to be a very steady rider with good bike handling skills to do this safely. While I've done single pacelines frequently, doubles were new to me but really effective in an otherwise soul sucking headwind. Plus you had ever changing folks to chat with during the rotation which makes 118 miles go a lot faster.

Anyway, we made decent time given the winds. It was incredibly beautiful out there. After 40 miles the scene changed back to high desert and sagebrush. And as we closed in on Salt Lake City the snow capped Wasatch mountains rose in the skyline. For the last 40 miles we were pretty much running from an ugly black storm that slowly chased us into the city. Luckily we were moving faster than it was, but it was motivation to move along and avoid a drenching. There was nothing out there - no services, not even a bush if you had to take care of a necessity. Made for some entertainment for passing truckers, often celebrated by long honks. SAG vehicles stopped frequently for water, though official SAG stations were 40 - 45 miles apart - that's a long way for sag support.

Coming into Salt Lake I was riding with Seattle Bob and Gerard one of our ride leaders and we ended up not being able to get through and exchange and were forced off the road early. This turned out to be a good thing as we charted a better route the the frontage road by Salt Lake that went past the Kennecot Copper mine, which is a huge plant and looked pretty interesting to check out on any day when you hadn't been in the saddle forever.

A challenging biking day on already tire legs, but real teamwork made it a fun and successful day and I think helped pull the group together tighter.

And, one of the highlights of my day was the surprise gift of chocolate covered strawberries and cookies from Tracey and Neil and the 3 little Snyders waiting for me at the hotel. THANK YOU!!! Wonderful surprise and quickly gone.

The HOORAY REST DAY

Let's just say SPA. Many thanks to Gary King for the great recommendation of Kura Door Spa. I went with another gal doing the ride and had a fabulous massage and pedi, sat in the steam bath and otherwise recovered. Wonderful way to get the body back in shape for another 8 days of the (gulp) Rocky Mountains. Then we went for a nice lunch and to visit the Mormon temple and genealogy library. You'll be happy to know I did not convert. But I did look up some of my maternal ancestry at the library and found the 1930 census records for my maternal Grandparents which was very cool. Turns out my grandmother married at 17, they could both read and right and speak English. Pretty interesting look at those times by what questions are asked on the census.

Today we lost 5 wonderful riders who were just doing the first leg of the trip. But we have 13 more joining us I'll meet at breakfast. Looking forward to our next leg. It's another huge cue sheet which will mean some slow navigation out of Salt Lake to Provo tomorrow, 64 miles with hills.

Day 10: Elko to Wendover, NV

A long ride today and our first century - 107 miles. Folks are getting tired -
including me. You see a lot more shifting around in the saddle trying to get
comfortable ... Derrieres are starting to complain. Rear ends become dinner
conversation with favorite remedies offered up with extreme confidence. We have a
doctor with us who has offered to examine any suspect spot ... Don't know if anyone
has taken him up on it.

Today's ride was just exquisite. The Ruby Range to the south was snow capped with
sagebrush and pasture land leading up to it. Just one beautiful view after another.
It never stopped all day ... Mountains in the distance, ranch land, and sagebrush
and wildflowers. And we'd keep going and it would just get better. We climbed up a
canyon over the Pequot mountains - about 10 miles to around 7000 feet. These
mountains had beautiful rocky outcroppings and the canyon felt narrow after riding
in the huge open spaces. At the top we had a long and fast descent into yet another
gorgeous dessert vista ... This time more sandy and spare. Clearly it had missed a
lot of the rain. But maybe not for long - to the right was a massive black storm
and you could see the grey where rain was falling. I missed the rain, but some
riders coming behind me were pulled because of lightening. The bike is a bad place
to be in a storm ... Hit the ditch. The final descent into Wendover was amazing.
You crest the final hill and a huge expanse of white stretches out in front of you.
White salt flats as far as the eye can see.

Wendover is a scruffy looking stain on the salt at the base of the mountains ...
Dotted with neon from all the Casinos. Gary - totally agree with you and stayed in
the hotel. Because why should you leave? The rooms have one wall that is all
mirrors, black lacquer furniture and fake tortoise shell walls and doors and 3 big
plastic plants. The casino down stairs is mirrors walls and ceilings with blue and
pink neon lights everywhere. And there is a fake rain forest in the all you can eat
buffet. They lost money on us ... I had 3 plates of food and dessert and I was
eating light compared to my table mates.

Tomorrow is our last ride before a day off. We are riding across the salt flats to
Salt Lake City. Right now the winds don't look promising ... It's a 118 miles day
and we're hoping it shifts to a tail wind.

Day 9: Battle Mountain to Elko, NV

I can tell everyone is getting tired. Nine days of cycling in a row takes its toll. Tired legs. Sore behinds. A bunch of us started in a large group meandering along at around 14 mph, chatting and generally lallygagging. But the problem with riding so slowly is that it may be easier on the legs but it means more hours in the saddle. Hmmm - dilemma. Brad from Ohio and I did the breakaway after around 10 miles.

The day was beautiful. Mostly sunny, cool. The ride was mile after mile of large green expanses of sage brush, wildflowers and greenery framed by mountains. We are still at around 5000 feet elevation in the high desert - the sky is huge. We climbed Emigrant pass and had a fun 10 mile descent. Probably the highlight of the ride today was a 4 mile stretch through Carlin Canyon - which was a key route for the first railroad, road and before that the pioneers going over the California trail on their way to the gold rush. Beautiful with dramatic rock formations and steep walls and wildflower covered riverbanks.

On the ride in the Canyon we met a guy who is the head of the Elko Velo club ... he was marking the road for a time trial coming up. He was telling us how unusual the weather was ... I guess it's usually 100 degrees and brown. I'll take the random rainstorms over that anytime. He was also saying how lucky we were not to have these crazy huge crickets that I guess come out and are everywhere. Bikes smash them and the pop cricket guts everywhere - ugh. They can be so bad they make the interstate slick and the highway patrol puts up warning signs. Funny that's not in the tour literature ...

We're in Elko getting ready for a long day tomorrow 107 miles with some climbing and a long descent to Wendover. Then another 100 + mile ride into Salt Lake. Long days ... hopefully no headwind. Make an offering to the wind gods for me ...

Day 7 and 8: Lovelock to Winnemucca to Battle Mountain ... and Jerry the Cowboy

Lovelock is in the DESERT. It gets an average of less than 6 inches of rain a year. That is probably less than 10 days of rain?

So lucky us ... we got cold rain on the 72 mile ride between Lovelock and Winnemucca. Despite being from Seattle where I should know better, I didn't dress quite warmly enough for the ride. Needed the arm warmer layer under the jacket. See, I had this Pollyanna delusion in my head reinforced by chirpy weather channel talking heads that it would clear off. And it did ... about 2 hours after we arrived in Winnemucca. So despite what was no doubt beautiful country for riding, I was pretty much pedaling as fast as possible with my head down, shaking water off my visor and wiping my glasses so I could see the road. It was one of those rides where you can feel the water sloshing in your bike shoes. Stopped briefly to top off water, pedalled on. Too cold to stop - warmer to keep moving. Needless to say made great time on this ride and arrived before noon.

So the staff at America by Bike pointed out that usually this stretch of the ride was 90 to 100 degrees, and at least we weren't burning up in the desert. Which is true. The locals were ecstatic ... it had been a while for rain.

Rooms weren't ready till 2:00 so some of us headed over to the laundry mat to catch up and then washed off all gear: bike, helmet, jacket, pants, booties - it's all covered in road smooge.

Road smooge is grimier than just mud. It's a toxic mixture of dirt, oil, and whatever else is deposited on the highway since the last rain. Your bike kicks up a trail of it from the rear wheel which goes in a cold mucky streak right up your back. It's up your legs and embedded in your bike chain and derailleurs. If you were at home you might be tempted to ignore it a while, but having to ride the next morning means it's all got to be cleaned up and dried out. But I'm becoming much more zen like about my bike and riding as it's pretty clear on this ride we're going to do things that I never considered possible before and 72 miles in the cold rain is just one of them. Overall that's a good thing.

At the laundromat (a happening place on Saturday afternoon) we saw a large number of cowboys doing laundry. They looked like real cowboys. So I was chatting with a couple while waiting on the spin cycle and they said they were in town for the Nevada State High School Champion Rodeo. Folks from all over the state had come in. SCORE! Gotta get to that while I'm here.

Dinner that night was a a place called the Flying Pig and it had neon pigs in flashing lights and what my roommate Judy calls "beefcake" (cutouts of sexy scantly clad men) taped up around the top of the ladies room. I got the smokehouse which had 3 kinds of meat and was an unbelievably huge platter of food ... scary. No, I didn't eat it all.

The next morning we were riding on to Battle Mountain. (If any bookclubbers are reading, Battle Mountain is one of the towns in The Glass Castle where whatshernames family lived.) Anyway it was only 55 miles today with one decent climb, pretty easy, so we slept in till 7 AM and got a late start. On the way out of town we pass the the fairgrounds and ... SCORE - there is the rodeo. There are 4 of us and in we go.

Now 4 spandex clad cyclists in our tighty shorts and neon jackets and helmets do not exactly fit in at the Rodeo. But it took about 2 minutes to be approached ... "So where are you going on that bike?" That's how I met Jerry - a real life cowboy, movie star handsome who was originally from Longview Washington but ended up in Hollywood working for 30 years as a stuntman in movies. Really! He was great. We chatted for a while and he gave me the lowdown on the area and the rodeo. We were eventually joined by other cyclists and overall it was like the circus came to town. We saw the bareback bronc riding and some calf roping, and then had to move on up the road. It was a blast.

Heading to Battle Mountain turned out to be a harder ride than anticipated. We had a pretty good climb - about 3.5 miles - and some bad road. Bad like - I didn't know you could ride your bike over 6 miles of this. So rough it shook my water bottle cage off and I had to put it back on the road. But now my perspective of "bad road" has been exponentially altered.

We are still doing a lot of interstate riding. It's literally the only way across Nevada and we'll be on it all the way to Salt Lake except for stretches on rural roads when possible. Otherwise no place to stay. It actually isn't bad ... wide shoulder and not that much traffic. And you can go REALLY Fast ... which is kinda nice. Trucks give you a lot of room and the roads except for the 5 miles today are in excellent condition. John - who's doing this ride for the 4th time - gave some great advice about putting an earplug in the traffic side ear ... you can hear easily but it cuts down the roar.