The Loneliest Road in America

Oh Nevada, no thank you. This whole trip we were all waiting for Colorado. It was the promised land, it was going to be so beautiful after all the rows and rows of corn, and so many people on our trip had never been there. After Colorado we knew that Nevada would be hard, it would be chalk full of head winds, really hot and flat as far as the eye could see. How could we have ever been so wrong about that last part!? Did you know that Nevada holds the title for most mountains per square mile then any other state? Well, it does, and it most certainly does. Holy mountain climbing! At one stretch we did 13 passes in 4 days. Isn't that insane? In between the passes are these long stretching valleys, some of them go for ten miles or more before the next mountain. What a strange feeling to come over a mountain and see the next mountain right in front of you, but know that it will take hours to get there. Depth perception in Nevada is such a weird thing, you can see so far that it seems simultaneously as though you are right next to your destination and as though you have been biking in place for hours because it sure isn't getting any closer. It was so frustrating, and at times the wind nearly blew me over. Slogging through Nevada was such a hard thing to do, and so discouraging. We took Hwy 50 the whole way, and it sure is a lonely road. We went the whole day without passing through a town, just going and going in the middle of nowhere. We camped a few times, and didn't see much civilization anywhere. It was just plain tough, and we had ten straight ride days in a row. Nevada is also a state that doesn't have many bike shops, and my bike chose this time to rebel. I haven't had many big problems with my bike on the trip, but of course I did when we had no way to fix it. On maybe day one of the ten day stint, a cable snapped on my bike and I lost the ability to use any of my gears except my granny gears. I quickly learned that there are few things more annoying then having to pedal, pedal, pedal, coooooaaaast, pedal, pedal, pedal, coooooaaaast for days on end. Drew helped me get a few more gears, which came and went with no real pattern. Luckily (?) we basically climbed all day long, and that meant I was sitting in my low gears any way. We did it though, and though some of us are a little worse for the wear, we made it across the loneliest road in america.

Moustache Monday helped get us through the day..


Our camp site, the morning after. We used the rocks to hold down our tents, the wind was absurdly strong during the night.

1 mile down, 95 to go..

In the first mile leaving Green River, the road was flooded and we got to cross it as we saw fit. Lindsey had a momentary brain lapse and crossed it shoes and all, some people biked through, Robby and I stripped our shoes and socks and carried our bike over the water..you never know what you'll get on this trip!

Moab!

The ride into Moab was gorgeous, but a bit lost on me as I was battling a migraine for the majority of the day. We were out of cell phone service for most of the day, and through a mix up with the van I missed being picked up twice. It was kinda horrible, but I booked the last twenty miles at about 27mph, showered in a daze and promptly passed out on my thermarest in a back room of the church at about 8:00. I woke up feeling back to normal, in fact probably better then normal because of the large amount of sleep I lucked into! Moab was our first break after a nine day stint of riding through colorado. We were fortunate enough to have back to back days in town, with our first being a build day and our second being a real day off. It was nice to feel so normal, sleeping in a little, grabbing coffee, poking around the bookstore...in short, a much needed break! First I'll tell you about the build day. We were all excited to get to work on/see our first straw bale home. Hands down the coolest site we've been on this whole trip. We met with a family who are building their own home along with Rebuilding Together, an affordable housing program in Moab. We learned all about the architecture planning that goes into all the different stages of this kind of house; orientation to the sun, maintaining constant temperature in the walls, overhangs, maintenance. It was amazing, and the house itself was gorgeous. The family took so much pride in their work and it really showed. We toured their house and then shuttled to another site to help lay parts of the foundation down. We had a radio, also a first for a build site, and worked on tamping dirt into the floors.

Here are two pictures of the straw bale house we toured.

These two are from the actual build site, the tamps and Rudy and Robby working hard on the flooring.

Our second day a bunch of us got to go rafting, and of course the sun that had been blazing chose that time to go behind the clouds. We had so much fun though, the rapids were class one and two, so we mostly just hopped out of the rafts and swam around while knocking each other out of the kayaks and splashing about. It was a perfect way to let loose and relax off the bikes.

photos

Late to the Colorado sign party, due to vanning, but here it is!

Makeshift rain jackets..remember how Colorado changes weather every ten min? We forgot..

As you might have expected, in Colorado we climbed and climbed. I was surprised at how okay my body was with it. I have even gotten to a point where I can enjoy the climb for the climb and not just for the descent. I've gotten a lot stronger and am much more confident that I can handle whatever gets thrown at us next, but I still can't believe I crossed the Rocky Mountains!

Trail Ridge Road

From Estes Park we climbed Trail Ridge Road, the highest paved road in the US, which entailed 25 miles of straight climbing! It was a gorgeous day, and the climb was long but steady and beautiful. I can't tell you how different it is to take that road by bicycle as opposed to car. It was amazing, such great views at every turn. You can really see your progress as you climb mountains, especially because of the switchbacks. We stopped a lot just to take in the scenery and snap some pictures. Getting to the top was the most amazing feeling I have ever felt. It was windy and pretty cold, but I had so much adrenaline going and the actual realization that I had climbed that far for that long was a crazy rush. I can't even describe it really, and the descent was so great too. There weren't many cars by the time we shot down the other side, so we were able to enjoy the ride all the more. Here are a few pictures of the day:

Starting off!

Climbing, climbing, climbing...


First to the top! Kinda bad ass...

Just taking in the view..

Colorado!

Riding into Loveland was an amazing feeling, the Rockies had popped in to view, I had friends waiting for me to arrive and we were about to climb mountains! We had a build day in Loveland, which gave us some well deserved time off the bike. JP came from Denver for the night and Emily and Micheal came from Minneapolis to hang out too! It was such great timing to see all of them, with everything as it was, and it really made me feel like I got a slice of my traditional summer time fun. We found an italian restaurant that had a big gluten free menu and so Rudy and I each ate an entire pizza. Mmm eating after biking 90+ miles is an incredible thing. Our first climb was into Estes Park, and we were all anticipating a tough day ahead. Our mileage was about 60, and the climb was absolutely gorgeous. I've driven in the mountains lots of times, but you can see an entirely different side of nature when you are experiencing it at about 7 miles per hour. Everyone was so happy and pumped. Robby and I made it to a sign that said Estes Park at about mile 30, and when we realized that we had made it to our host site and the day was actually over we almost cried it was so exciting! We had been climbing fairly quickly, anticipating a long afternoon and then we arrived at the church just as the 10:30 service was starting! It was perfect timing for a pretend day off. We all explored the town and my friends got to spend an extra day with us too! A great send off for our big Rockies climbs!

Building, building..

They tolerated our exhaustion with great patience!

A long, long day as sweep when we got in at 9:00 but the sunset was worth it.

Racing to the host between a storm on the left and a storm on the right..

chalking

A fun thing that is pretty central to bike & build is chalk. We each carry a piece of chalk with us in our jersey pocket, or in our camelbak, and take it out to write each other messages on the road. While riding we get pretty spread out along the road, and the chalk is a way to keep us connected and informed. We chalk the turns that we have to take even though we each have a cue sheet with directions, it's nice to see that you are indeed going the right way. We chalk when we pull off the road to stop at a gas station, or a lake so that the sweep riders know where we are and don't accidentally pass us by. My favorite is chalking encouraging or random funny messages to each other. We chalk a lot while climbing, messages that keep us moving up the mountains and make us laugh. It's a great way to feel connected. An alumni from 2008 came up with the idea to chalk for Paige, and so we have been writing messages to and for her and they were included in her memorial service. I thought you might like to see a few examples, so here they are:

Sometimes on steep climbs, popping a wheelie is a real problem...

After big climbs, we like to congratulate ourselves.

Megan chalked for Paige at the top of Trail Ridge Road.

I wrote mine in Estes Park.