Day 22, Sunday, June 26, 2005
Pueblo, CO to Lamar, CO
(680 feet of climbing)
121 miles, 16.7 mph, 7hr 13min 40sec
Max speed 27.6 mph
Up at 4:30AM, 5:15 load luggage, 5:45 breakfast at Country Kitchen: scrambled eggs, hash browns, French toast, juice- no coffee, 6:20 on the road.
Weather was great today. We had a tailwind of 10 - 20 mph all day. These two factors were GOOD because we had a 121 mile ride to do.
Sunrise was beautiful, we aren't usually up this early. I saw hundreds of what looked like a type of zucchini/gourd plants along side of the road. SAG 1 was at 37 miles in the town of Fowler. They have very poor water so have to purchase it at a local distribution center for $4.25 PER GALLON. We are beginning to see the hot, dry flats of Colorado.
I took a pic of a group of cows who seemed interested in us. Then I sang "Happy Birthday" to them and they ran away. SAG 2 at 62 miles was in the town of Hasty. It was here that we began to notice clouds building up behind us. Mid afternoon thunderstorms are common here and sometimes produce hail, so I thought I'd get on the road and ride fast to get to the hotel and beat any bad weather. I arrived at our hotel - Best Western Cow Palace - at 3:30, checked in, showered and started my journal. About 4:30 I heard strange noises outside my room. I went out to check it out and what I was hearing was large hail hitting the roof of the hotel. I went out front of the hotel and . . . . WOW! I have never seen hail so large. It was the size of large marbles or moth balls and was coming down very fast and heavy, bouncing all over the place. We still had 5 riders out on the road. Suddenly we saw George and my new roommate coming down the road and into the hotel. Hail was bouncing off their helmets, their bikes and their bodies. They were going very slow and getting hammered with hail. They got in safely and had experienced a scary situation. George had several bruises on his arms (see pics). The other 3 riders were stopped by Jim in one of our support vans before entering the storm area. They all waited it out till the storm passed, then they sagged in. Everyone was OK! This was quite a different end to a stressful cycling day. We had dinner at a truck stop, sounds weird, but it was very good.
We will be doing another century tomorrow (104 miles), so another early rise.
|
|
|
|
|
