Notes From The Common Man: June 28 update

On Tuesday we had a long ride from Rawlins to Jeffrey, Wyoming. We started early because we seen that we would have strong headwinds by about 10:00. Sure enough, at 10:00, about 45 miles into a 65 mile day, the wind began to howl. We formed a 3 man paceline with each of us rotating a 10 minute turn at the front. After about 2 hours of this I was excited to see Jeffreys, Wyoming, one of the most God forsaken towns in the country. But, even the pitts has its perks.

We stopped at the Split Rock Bar and Grill, a place opened in the fifties, and not swept since. We ordered a couple of dusty Coors from Bill, our somewhat slow or intoxicated bar keep, and washed away the trail dust.

After quenching our thirst, we rode over to the church hostel. It is a good sized place that is rough by Concord standards, but it had a kitchen, showers, and separate rooms with mattresses on the floors. The walls were covered with notes from bikers who had stayed there, there were literally thousands of comments.

After we got established in in our quarters and took a brief nap, we headed back to the Split Rock for dinner. The cast of characters in the bar by this time was reminiscent of the bar scene from Star Wars. One fellow who's hair looked like he had had electroshock treatment walked in dragging his new puppy on a piece of rope. He called him Come on Dammit. I went outside to take a picture just as a family drove up with grandpa. They got out of the car and two of the men tried to help grandpa inside. Before they got to the door, he collapsed to the ground and they struggled to get him back to his feet. I thought something was seriously wrong with him, but it turned out he was just drunk. They got him propped up on a barstool (fortunately one with a backrest) and went about their business, two of them off to shoot pool, and the rest, including grandma set down at a table.

We had a pretty good dinner there, but fortunately, I couldn't see the kitchen from my seat. It took Bill a good bit of time to get our bill together as he was well into his cups by then. They made us a sandwich to go because we did not have any place to eat on our next ride

This morning, we got up at 4:00 and began our ride at 5:30, again to beat the wind. The temperature was in the low forties, and my hands were cold for the first hour or so, but the ride was spectacular with a beautiful sunrise and some amazing vistas. At one point we arrived atop a high plateau which overlooked a distant valley and the snow covered Wind River range off on the horizon. From the top of the plateau we had a six mile descent at a 6% grade. Our bike speed was never under 30mph on the ride down. The rest of the trip traveled through impressive rock formations and red rock hills. Sure enough, about 10:00 the wind came up and we were back to drafting again, but by then we were close to Landers.

Landers is nice old western town with lots of shops and bars, and an excellent library where I'm sitting now. Tonight we are staying at a warm showers host house, which is a reciprocal housing arrangement for bike travelers. This will be my first try at one of these, I understand the host has a teepee and a tree house to stay in. I'll take pictures and give an account.