Two tiny towns in a row. Probably the two smallest towns I have ever been in. Dubois was pretty dang small and Shoshoni is even smaller with a population of just over 600 people. Walking around it looked like half the stores had been shut down years ago. But I will start from this morning because it was a good one. Wake up was 6am which was a nice break, we were out and ready to ride a little before 7. I was sweeps with Brandon and Jeff and as we were waiting for the last pace line ahead of us to hit the road a lady from the Kiwanis Club of Dubois came out and asked if one of us had a second to talk to their group about what we were doing, well this is my favorite thing to do so I volunteered. I walked into lodging where they were meeting and got to tell them all about the Journey of Hope and Push America. It is so cool to see the shock on people's faces when I tell them the numbers. Miles: 4,270, per man fundraising: $5,500 minimum, our route fundraising: over $170,000, total between all routes: $526,000, so amazing.
After that we rolled out to start our second 100 mile day. Not more than a couple miles down the road we ran into one of the first pace lines out that got a flat, turns out they would not be the only flat on this ride. The last man on the route who hadn't gotten a flat was Evan, but he ended up getting two today, Sam who was riding with Evan got a flat and to top it off I got two flats myself, the first was a small puncture but the second was a real nice slice through my gator skin hardshell tire which are supposed to be very puncture resistant. The slice was too bad to continue riding so I ended up having to rack until I could get my spare tire out of my van which had unfortunately just leap froged to the front so they were about 30 miles ahead of us. I got dropped off there, threw the new tire and tube on and got driven back maybe 7 miles to meet up with Brandon and Jeff and hopped back on the bike to ride the rest of the day with them. Almost the entire ride we had a great tailwind, we were pushing 25mph on flats and barely working, if everyone was feeling 100% we could have easily gone 27-28mph but we were cruising along soaking up the sites. We passed these gorgeous red rock mountains, I swear we saw some purple rocks too, over these little mountains you could see snow covered mountains behind them. We did ride in the rain and wet roads for a bit but it wasn't too bad. We also ran into another cyclist on the road who was carrying all his own gear, while at a crew stop he came up and stopped to ask us what we were up to, we talked to him for a minute or so and found out he was on his way to Canada, not really sure where he started or why he was headed East but he was loving the ride. Once we got into Riverton the ride got tough, we turned and suddenly our tailwind was coming from every direction but our tail and it was strong. One of the crew guys said he was laughing every time a pace line came up to his van because we were all leaning against the wind trying to stay strait. But we powered through the wind and made it to lodging with an hour to spare arriving just after 2:30.
Before our dinner we had a little time so a group of us went to grab some coffee and milk shakes at this local place called Fat Boy which had some amazing shakes. They also had an interesting menu item that some other guys tried so I figured why not give it a shot. 6 of us spliy an order of deep fried Bull Testicles and they were not too bad, tasted a little like chicken I guess but not really something I would order again, good to have the experience though.
We don't have a friendship visit here but our dinner was sponsored by the Shoshoni Senior Center who provided a ton of food for us, we could not even finish it all. Best part was they had goodie bags for us! Chewy bars, chocolate, cookies, nutri-grain bars and waterproof sweat proof sunscreen! It was perfect and they had a bunch of extras so we got two of most of them. Clif products are starting to get a little old from eating them every single day so I am going to throw one of these candy bars into my saddle bag just to get the taste of something else besides peanut butter crunch clif bars during rides. We are starting to run our of all the good flavors like sierra trail mix, and the shot blocks are becoming more and more rare. We get a new stock of clif products in Colorado though which is getting closer and closer!!! Only 5 more days and we will be pulling into Fort Collins on the 22nd and Denver on the 24th and Colorado Springs on the 26th. Which means only 460 miles (including two more 100+ mile days) standing between me and my lovely girlfriend!
Tomorrow is another century ride, 105 miles to Casper followed by a day off. Looking forward to the break to recover from these last two long rides. No idea what the terrain and climbing looks like but surprises are always fun.
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