I apologize again. Pictures won't upload. Internal Error. Garbage. I'm super hella pissed. Not really, but jeeze, I got lots of pics I wanna post. And stories to go along with em.
Back to me last post. I gotta catch up:
Bout that screaming: turns out it was the sprinklers going off. The girls tents had gotten soaked once, and it was coming around for another pass.
Everybody ran around in confused circles for about 10 minutes before figuring out the only decent place to sleep was on the concrete walkway up to the church entrace. I kept on moving trying to get comfortable, and the motion sensitive light kept on blinding us. I'm surprised nobody killed me just then.
We woke up and it was Saturday, Aaron took care of the hotel for everyone else, I tracked down some groceries at the awesomeness that is Safeway, and found out the bikeshop wouldn't open till 11. I had to ride more than 100 miles, so I said screw it. I walked with Billy, Becca, and Walker down to a coffee shop that Tim said was modelled after the one in the TV show "Friends." Maybe I haven't been watching enough Friends lately, but it looked nothing like it.
I said my goodbyes and wished the others luck. It definitely wasn't under the circumstances that I had expected. I walked outside at 10:00 or so, got on my bike, and rode down 115. I talked to a couple random people, and followed 115 through Florence and down 50 all the way to Howard, instead of following the route from Pueblo. It turned out alright. I shaved about 30 miles. The roads were kinda sketch (I will rant about drivers as soon as I get the facts down), but I made it to Howard by 6:00. A lot faster than I was expecting to do 105 miles through the mountains.
I searched around for Colin and Halley for a good 45 minutes. I coudn't find them anywhere (there were only 2 campgrounds and a church). I had to ride a mile down the road to find a cellphone signal, and sent a couple text messages (coudn't talk, even with 3 bars, dur). After a lot of riding back an forth, I got some soup and had a cold, delicious meal in front of the campground. 7:30 or so, they rolled up, to my extreme delight, and I jumped up and down and waved my arms and the like. We camped at the Sugarbrush campground that night for 18 bucks. Delicious shower.
Next morning, woke up at 6 or so, went through Salida in hopes of finding a bike shop to grab a tube. Colin and Halley some breakfast there, so I kept on rolling. I found a shop at 8:45, and they opened and 9, so I said screw it, if I get a flat, I'll just cry about it.
And I rode up, and up, and up. And my knees started bothering me, so I stuck on one of the knee braces. And my achilles started bothering me so I just kept on riding.
It was wierd because I kept on feeling like I had a brake pad rubbing or had a small child stuffed in my pannier or something because I was going slow for no obvious reason. Then I realized it was because I was going UPHILL. Welcome to Colorado. You don't even notice when you're going uphill, except for the fact that you're going really slow. I think it might be because of the mountains or the air or something, but either way, I always have to check the grade by looking to my left. Sometimes I can't tell if I'm really going up or what.
So I kept on going up, freaking out when I saw snow on the peaks, getting a little sweaty, getting a little cold, but not really getting tired of the fact that I'd been doing 6-7 mph for the past hour or two. I forget how long I climbed, but it was 20 miles or something. I had been spinning in 2-1 the entire time, and my knee really started bothering me when I knew the end was near, and I dropped into the granny. 200 feet later, I turned a corner and was at the top and cursing the fact that I'd nearly made it in the middle ring, without knowing it. What the duece. Monarch Pass, 11-thousand-something feet. Weeee!!!!
There were tons of semi-semi's pulling horse trailers all the way up. They were mostly assholes. More on that in my upcoming rant.
I was expecting to get some nice altitude sickness, but yargh, no cigar. I saw a couple spots a couple times, but that's about it. Oh, and my hands were kinda shaky when I was handing over some change for a snack at the top. The cashier prolly thought I was about to rob the place.
Make a sweet tomato-and-cheese sangwich, look at all the tourists, talk to a Harley guy, look at the BMW biker who looks like a ninja (as do most BMW guys) , and get ready to BOMB THE CRAP OUT OF THAT DOWNHILL THAT I JUST UPHILLED.
Surprise. No bombing. The wind killed everything. The downhill after Monarch was quite dissapointing, only hit 35 or something- with some pedalling. I later learned that the wind goes down the mountain in the morning and up the mountain in the afternoon, which is probably the opposite of what you'd really want. So the 45 miles into Gunnison were not nearly as easy as the all-downhill-elevation-profile suggested. In fact, they were really hard (sweet 15 mph headwinds), and totally not downhill.
But Gunnison was sweet. Really cool feel. Lots of bikes. The rack at the grocery store was full. There was a rodeo going on- Catleman's Days- as the wrought iron text proclaimed. That explained all the horsee trailers from Texas. Jerks. City park was sweet. Sat and read Kerouac and ate till Colin and Halley showed.
We ran around looking for a place to stay for a while. The girl at Tomichi cycles (I found a bike shop!)(I found a girl in a bike shop!)(The bike shop was pretty cool!) had told me bout some BLM land west of town but we didin't really want to worry about BEARS and whatnot. So we scoured the town. We found a church, Colin talked to the pastor, and he said it was cool, just "watch out for the sprinklers at 3am."
Sprinklers? No problem. We'll just rain fly it. In fact, we found a spot in the front lawn that didn't have any sprinklers, so we were golden.
During the night, some drunk guy half-woke us up when he stumbled by yelling something like "FUCKIN CYCLISTS...CAMPING....CYCLISTS...PRAISE THE LORD....PRAISE JESUS....MOTHERFUCKERS..." I was too tired to be really scared, but it was a litte unnerving. A little while later, I was woken up by the same voice saying "Hey, yall seen a guy going past here yelling? I need to find him before the cops do" (The police station was 2 blocks south) I forced myself into conciousness enough to say "Heyyyyy....lemmme get my bearings....alright, yeah, he went north." "Alright, thanks buddy" "No problem dude, no problem." It musta been his brother. Back to sleep in 11 seconds flat.
Woke up at 6. Tent is wet. Feet are wet. Oh crap, bike is wet, oh crap, no rain covers. Crawled out into the cold (40 degrees or so), and wet. Looked for some dry clothes. I had a dry jersey and shorts. Wet shoes, helmet, socks (normally don't wear socks, but when I'm about to freeze to death...). Garbage. Shivering all over the place. Took forever packing up the stuff, miserable as I was. Colin and Halley were done way before me, and took off down the road in search of nourishment.
I got all my junk ready, and headed to the bathroom in the park to get some water and take my morning dump. OH MY GOSH IT HAS HEAT. I changed, ate, dried off my socks, ate some more, dried off my socks some more, piled on some more clothes, then headed off, still freezing and wet down the road. I spent at least 45 minutes in that bathroom.
I can't describe the ensuing ride without pictures. I'll get em up as soon as possible, fore I forget about everything hopefully.
Montrose.
That's where I posted from yesterday (Sunday 08-13). Apparently some bikes had been stolen in the past couple weeks. Locked mine up around back behind a tree. I was still nervous the entire time.
Colin and Halley showed up. Colin had been stung by a bee. His lip was the size of Pike's Peak. 14'er? I coudn't stop laughing. I felt really bad about that, but it was SOOOOO BIGGGGG!!!! I thought he might accidently knock someone over with it. Okay, I'm done. I guess insta-Karma will give me one in the lip tomorrow.
Went outside and met a guy by the name of Sky that had ridden from San Fran, started the 2nd of July, and was a complete genius. His bike weighed something like 40 pounds with all his gear. It was completely sick. He was nice enough to pull everything out of his bags (only rear panniers, mind you) and give me the run-down. He may have saved my life. More on that later. THANK YOU SKY.
While I was talking to Sky, a young guy on a nice road bike rolled up, pulled a few books out of his pack to stick em in the return slot, and said hey. A minute later, he had offered us a place to sleep, showers, laundry, and homemade dinner. Scott and Jenny. We went to their house down the road at 6:00. It was the most random act of extreme generosity I've come across on the trip. Pizza and salad were amazing. They even gave us desert! And beer! Turns out they had done a little touring of their own....
I STRONLY DISLIKE LIBRARY INTERNET TIME LIMITS. THEY MAKE ME SLIGHTLY FRUSTRATED.
Back to me last post. I gotta catch up:
Bout that screaming: turns out it was the sprinklers going off. The girls tents had gotten soaked once, and it was coming around for another pass.
Everybody ran around in confused circles for about 10 minutes before figuring out the only decent place to sleep was on the concrete walkway up to the church entrace. I kept on moving trying to get comfortable, and the motion sensitive light kept on blinding us. I'm surprised nobody killed me just then.
We woke up and it was Saturday, Aaron took care of the hotel for everyone else, I tracked down some groceries at the awesomeness that is Safeway, and found out the bikeshop wouldn't open till 11. I had to ride more than 100 miles, so I said screw it. I walked with Billy, Becca, and Walker down to a coffee shop that Tim said was modelled after the one in the TV show "Friends." Maybe I haven't been watching enough Friends lately, but it looked nothing like it.
I said my goodbyes and wished the others luck. It definitely wasn't under the circumstances that I had expected. I walked outside at 10:00 or so, got on my bike, and rode down 115. I talked to a couple random people, and followed 115 through Florence and down 50 all the way to Howard, instead of following the route from Pueblo. It turned out alright. I shaved about 30 miles. The roads were kinda sketch (I will rant about drivers as soon as I get the facts down), but I made it to Howard by 6:00. A lot faster than I was expecting to do 105 miles through the mountains.
I searched around for Colin and Halley for a good 45 minutes. I coudn't find them anywhere (there were only 2 campgrounds and a church). I had to ride a mile down the road to find a cellphone signal, and sent a couple text messages (coudn't talk, even with 3 bars, dur). After a lot of riding back an forth, I got some soup and had a cold, delicious meal in front of the campground. 7:30 or so, they rolled up, to my extreme delight, and I jumped up and down and waved my arms and the like. We camped at the Sugarbrush campground that night for 18 bucks. Delicious shower.
Next morning, woke up at 6 or so, went through Salida in hopes of finding a bike shop to grab a tube. Colin and Halley some breakfast there, so I kept on rolling. I found a shop at 8:45, and they opened and 9, so I said screw it, if I get a flat, I'll just cry about it.
And I rode up, and up, and up. And my knees started bothering me, so I stuck on one of the knee braces. And my achilles started bothering me so I just kept on riding.
It was wierd because I kept on feeling like I had a brake pad rubbing or had a small child stuffed in my pannier or something because I was going slow for no obvious reason. Then I realized it was because I was going UPHILL. Welcome to Colorado. You don't even notice when you're going uphill, except for the fact that you're going really slow. I think it might be because of the mountains or the air or something, but either way, I always have to check the grade by looking to my left. Sometimes I can't tell if I'm really going up or what.
So I kept on going up, freaking out when I saw snow on the peaks, getting a little sweaty, getting a little cold, but not really getting tired of the fact that I'd been doing 6-7 mph for the past hour or two. I forget how long I climbed, but it was 20 miles or something. I had been spinning in 2-1 the entire time, and my knee really started bothering me when I knew the end was near, and I dropped into the granny. 200 feet later, I turned a corner and was at the top and cursing the fact that I'd nearly made it in the middle ring, without knowing it. What the duece. Monarch Pass, 11-thousand-something feet. Weeee!!!!
There were tons of semi-semi's pulling horse trailers all the way up. They were mostly assholes. More on that in my upcoming rant.
I was expecting to get some nice altitude sickness, but yargh, no cigar. I saw a couple spots a couple times, but that's about it. Oh, and my hands were kinda shaky when I was handing over some change for a snack at the top. The cashier prolly thought I was about to rob the place.
Make a sweet tomato-and-cheese sangwich, look at all the tourists, talk to a Harley guy, look at the BMW biker who looks like a ninja (as do most BMW guys) , and get ready to BOMB THE CRAP OUT OF THAT DOWNHILL THAT I JUST UPHILLED.
Surprise. No bombing. The wind killed everything. The downhill after Monarch was quite dissapointing, only hit 35 or something- with some pedalling. I later learned that the wind goes down the mountain in the morning and up the mountain in the afternoon, which is probably the opposite of what you'd really want. So the 45 miles into Gunnison were not nearly as easy as the all-downhill-elevation-profile suggested. In fact, they were really hard (sweet 15 mph headwinds), and totally not downhill.
But Gunnison was sweet. Really cool feel. Lots of bikes. The rack at the grocery store was full. There was a rodeo going on- Catleman's Days- as the wrought iron text proclaimed. That explained all the horsee trailers from Texas. Jerks. City park was sweet. Sat and read Kerouac and ate till Colin and Halley showed.
We ran around looking for a place to stay for a while. The girl at Tomichi cycles (I found a bike shop!)(I found a girl in a bike shop!)(The bike shop was pretty cool!) had told me bout some BLM land west of town but we didin't really want to worry about BEARS and whatnot. So we scoured the town. We found a church, Colin talked to the pastor, and he said it was cool, just "watch out for the sprinklers at 3am."
Sprinklers? No problem. We'll just rain fly it. In fact, we found a spot in the front lawn that didn't have any sprinklers, so we were golden.
During the night, some drunk guy half-woke us up when he stumbled by yelling something like "FUCKIN CYCLISTS...CAMPING....CYCLISTS...PRAISE THE LORD....PRAISE JESUS....MOTHERFUCKERS..." I was too tired to be really scared, but it was a litte unnerving. A little while later, I was woken up by the same voice saying "Hey, yall seen a guy going past here yelling? I need to find him before the cops do" (The police station was 2 blocks south) I forced myself into conciousness enough to say "Heyyyyy....lemmme get my bearings....alright, yeah, he went north." "Alright, thanks buddy" "No problem dude, no problem." It musta been his brother. Back to sleep in 11 seconds flat.
Woke up at 6. Tent is wet. Feet are wet. Oh crap, bike is wet, oh crap, no rain covers. Crawled out into the cold (40 degrees or so), and wet. Looked for some dry clothes. I had a dry jersey and shorts. Wet shoes, helmet, socks (normally don't wear socks, but when I'm about to freeze to death...). Garbage. Shivering all over the place. Took forever packing up the stuff, miserable as I was. Colin and Halley were done way before me, and took off down the road in search of nourishment.
I got all my junk ready, and headed to the bathroom in the park to get some water and take my morning dump. OH MY GOSH IT HAS HEAT. I changed, ate, dried off my socks, ate some more, dried off my socks some more, piled on some more clothes, then headed off, still freezing and wet down the road. I spent at least 45 minutes in that bathroom.
I can't describe the ensuing ride without pictures. I'll get em up as soon as possible, fore I forget about everything hopefully.
Montrose.
That's where I posted from yesterday (Sunday 08-13). Apparently some bikes had been stolen in the past couple weeks. Locked mine up around back behind a tree. I was still nervous the entire time.
Colin and Halley showed up. Colin had been stung by a bee. His lip was the size of Pike's Peak. 14'er? I coudn't stop laughing. I felt really bad about that, but it was SOOOOO BIGGGGG!!!! I thought he might accidently knock someone over with it. Okay, I'm done. I guess insta-Karma will give me one in the lip tomorrow.
Went outside and met a guy by the name of Sky that had ridden from San Fran, started the 2nd of July, and was a complete genius. His bike weighed something like 40 pounds with all his gear. It was completely sick. He was nice enough to pull everything out of his bags (only rear panniers, mind you) and give me the run-down. He may have saved my life. More on that later. THANK YOU SKY.
While I was talking to Sky, a young guy on a nice road bike rolled up, pulled a few books out of his pack to stick em in the return slot, and said hey. A minute later, he had offered us a place to sleep, showers, laundry, and homemade dinner. Scott and Jenny. We went to their house down the road at 6:00. It was the most random act of extreme generosity I've come across on the trip. Pizza and salad were amazing. They even gave us desert! And beer! Turns out they had done a little touring of their own....
I STRONLY DISLIKE LIBRARY INTERNET TIME LIMITS. THEY MAKE ME SLIGHTLY FRUSTRATED.
***okay, back. I'm back. Screwed the system!!! yeah!!!
Yeah, so Scott and Jenny had ridden "5000 for Thirst." They made a bike sideways horshoe from Oregon, out to Michigan, down to Utah. They even had a sweet map to show for it (yargh I forgot to photograph). 5000 miles!!! ON A TANDEM!!! I was told those things were Divorce Machines, but they seem to have faired just fine. They raised $9000 for a charity: which one I can't remember, but I'm prettttttty sure it had to do with thirst. We exchanged crazy stories listening to Dave Brubeck, and crashed on the couches and bed.
We left early again, for Ridgway and Telluride for the night. Again, I need some dagum pics to show how suhweet it is.
But in the meantime, I can RANT!!!! And it's all the way at the bottom of this post, so nobody's going to read it!!! SWWEEET. I'll just make it super obvious.
>>>>>RANT OF AGES<<<<<<
Okay, here we go.
Cars suck. No wait, different rant.
Colorado cars suck. Actually, the trucks, SUVs, MASSIVE campers the size of 747s, little campers the size of 767s, and some of the cars SUCK. To prime you on how much they suck, let me tell you about a few of the pickles I've found myself in in the past 3 days, all occuring on windy, narrow 2 lane roads, with vehicle speeds between 50-70 mph:
- SUV oncoming, panel truck passes the SUV, swerving far into my lane, no shoulder on my side, I stop on side and prepare to jump over guardrail. Panel truck gets back on his side with 20 feet to spare. I flip the bird.
- SUV/truck approaching rear, another SUV pops out from behind him to pass, I'm stuck on shoulder, cringing as they both roar by at the same time, with little room to spare. Sometimes one's hauling a camper. One time, there was a truck in the oncoming lane, leaving the passing SUV about 25 feet to spare
- This one happens constantly on HWY 50: oncoming traffic, hugenasty semi approaching rear, I watch it all the way in my mirror, he gives me 1 foot to spare, I jump off the road, cursing
- Monarch Pass, all day: Texas horse trailers do the same thing
- Road to Sapinero: fast 2 lane, me chuggin uphill at 8 mph, I hear some lady scream "GET OFF THE ROAD" The shoulder is some fine loose stuff, I sink if I ride in it. There are 2 SUVs oncoming, I figure the lady can wait 10 seconds to pass safely. They pull up next to me. Dad driving, Mom sticking her torso out the window, waving her arm at me. She shrieks "WE'VE GOT A CAMPER BEHIND US, DON'T HAVE HAVE ANY RESPECT??" No. I do not have any respect for your rich, wastefull, impatient-tourist-ass who can't wait 10 seconds to pass. All your hubby has to do is hit the brake, the hit the accelerator 30 seconds later. The worst that can happen is a toe cramp. The worst that can happen to me is I can pull off the road into the soft crap, sink in with my touring tires, and end up laying in the road for your camper to squash me. Please go to Yosimite and be devoured by a bear. I wanted to give her a digit, but instead I gave her a wave and inadvertantly swerved into the soft crap. Yay for me.
- I'd say it was just toursits, but here's one for you: Oncoming cars, 70 mph. Big white truck with muddin tires pulls to pass. I'm in wide shoulder. Muddin man pulls so his perfectly clean noisemakers are riding the white line a couple feet from me, staring the whole time. It's people like him that make me want to carry a brick. Or an RPG. I couldn't resist the finger. Turns out he did the same thing to Colin and Halley, who where a ways behind me.
Other crap that has happened lately:
- Colin and Halley told me bout this one: most dangerous turn in the Rockies (that's a hyperbole) , theres a sign right before it that says "MOTORCYCLISTS USE EXTREME CAUTION..." and a million of those arrow sign things. Oncoming cars. Little sports car pulls around to pass on the outside lane, heading straight for Halley. Apparently she would have been done for if the dude hadn't seen her and swerved back in. Idiot.
- On Thursday, a cyclist was killed on 50, riding on the other side of the road we took into Ridgway today. Turns out some genius parents let their 14-year-old drive, the kid hit the cyclist, made a U-turn, and drove away. The rider was from Illinois. That's all I know. All I know is people is idiots.
Bottom line is, most of these here situations could be averted by wider shoulders, more driver patience, less malice in the hearts of a few idiots, and eradicating campers from the face of the earth. THEY CALL THEM TENTS. Why would you drive something the size of a tourbus in order to enjoy nature?
Rant over. Please comment on this annonymously if this offends you or if you agree or if you know of a way to eradicate campers from the face of the earth.
Let me just say that I'm thoroughly blown away by Colorado, and am happy to deal with the ridiculousness in order to ride these roads. I'll miss it when I go, and I hope to come back one day. These towns are just awesome.
Now I gotta check out Telluride, which seems to be the most awesome of all.
Telluride!!! ,CO
Steven
Steven
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