June 24th-29th: Wind, Wind and more Wind
June 27th update
Whew, what a few days it’s been. Last time I checked in I was eating sushi in Rawlins, about to head into the Great Basin.
I had some intel from my buddy Mitch that the Basin was tough, and he told me to bring all the water I could and leave as early as possible. He’d left at 6 and said he wished he’d left earlier. I set my alarm for 4, thinking I’d be able to get up and leave the hotel as quickly as possible—but, the comfort of the hotel bed screwed me over and I hit the snooze button one too many times. I also somehow misread Mitch’s message and thought he left at 7, and by the time I left it was nearly 5:30am. Oops.
The first 40 miles of the day were on pavement, and the next 30 were easy gravel riding that flew by. I spotted two groups of wild horses, countless pronghorn, a fox and several sage grouse that morning, and was generally excited about riding in the Basin—it’s a gorgeous, almost otherworldly high desert zone full of Sage and huge desert views. I’d made 75 miles by 11, and was feeling pretty good about myself, thinking the Basin would be a breeze. Boy, was that a poor choice of words.
Right around 11 the wind started to pick up, and within an hour it turned into a relentless, 25mph headwind. It just wouldn’t let up. All day. Not only does a headwind make riding considerably more difficult, it also dries you out much quicker. Add that to the fact that it was 93 degrees, and I came to truly appreciate Mitch’s warning to bring as much water as possible. I carried 8 liters of water, plus another liter of Gatorade and a Sprite (of course) with me leaving Rawlins, and I drank all of it, and even topped off my bottles from the lone creek I crossed during the day. It was a very stark contrast to the cool temps and plentiful water of Colorado the last several days.
At one point, while eating a snack and refilling my bottles next to the one creek that was flowing, a gust came out of nowhere and blasted me with sand and water from the creek, nearly knocking me over—and I was sitting down.
The only thing to do was put my head down and keep pedaling. I listened to more podcasts that day than I had on any day of the trip thus far, and finally resorted to loud grunge rock. It was not fun.
Around 6:00, a Subaru pulled up next to me. I was in the zone with headphones in and Eddie Vedder wailing in my ears, and it took me a minute to realize the driver was my buddy Craig from Taos. Craig and a friend were headed up to climb somewhere nearby for the week, and he’d messaged me asking where I’d be that day. I sent him the link to my tracker and lo and behold, he tracked me down to say hi and give me some elk jerky and fresh veggies. What a guy!
After chatting with Craig and his friend for a while, I kept riding towards my second water source of the day, something called Diagnus Well (which I had read incorrectly and been calling Dingus Well all day). Naturally, it took longer than expected to reach Ol’ Dingus, and I didn’t get there till around 9:30pm. Turns out it’s a little wetlands restoration project in the middle of the desert for birds. There’s a pipe coming out of the ground with some of the coldest water I’ve ever felt—it was heaven.
I set up camp and as I was eating dinner, a southbound Tour Divide rider named Scott rolled in. We chatted for a bit and offered each other advice about what lay ahead on the trail (that’s the nice thing about passing riders going in the opposite direction). Just as we were about to go to bed, he asked if I wanted his bear spray. I’d planned to buy some in Pinedale, but had heard that SOBO riders will often hand theirs off to a NOBO rider around here, as you get into Grizzly country around Pinedale. I graciously accepted the bear spray, and thankfully was too tired to think too much about the implications of it that night.
The next morning was slow going for me. I rolled out of camp late, totally beat down from the day before, and battled the wind again until I got to Atlantic City around 1. There was one restaurant/saloon open in town, and I had an absolutely massive lunch that consisted of a burger and basket of fries, side salad, 4 lemonades and two ice creams for desert. I ate slowly, and watched as the wind continued to blow outside, trying to decide whether to push on or stay put for the day.
That decision ended up making itself, because as I was sitting there watching the wind nearly rip the American flag off the pole outside, Sarah was having an even harder day at home, having to finally say goodbye to our dog Hitch on her own. We both had known it was coming for a long time—he was a 15 and a half year old Labrador—but that didn’t make it any easier. I’d been able to say goodbye to him in person in Salida a week and a half prior, but the thought of not being there with Sarah on his last day was killing me. It was a rough afternoon.
The only solace for me was the thought that it somehow felt right for Hitch, who Sarah adopted when she was still in college, to go out the way he came in: just him and his mom.
I wrote this in an Instagram post a couple days later, but it feels appropriate to write here, too: The day before I left for the Divide, Hitch sat with me in the garage while I packed. Once I got all the bags on the bike, I rode around our driveway for one last shakedown ride. Though he’d retired from biking with me years ago, I looked down and there was Hitch, running alongside me like a much younger dog. He’d have run to Canada with me if I’d asked him to, or at least tried his best. ❤️
I ended up staying at the saloon all day and eating dinner several hours later with Sonia, the woman from Switzerland who I’d met a few times prior, another rider named Bobby, and some other CDT hikers. It was a nice distraction from an otherwise shitty day.
I camped right outside town along a river, and rolled out at 6 the next morning for Pinedale. The wind kept at it, to the point that all of the Southbound riders who zipped past me with a tailwind that morning were literally cheering me on, clapping and yelling “you got this man,” “keep at it,” or simply, “sorry” as they rode by. Thankfully, the views grew more spectacular as the day went on, so at least there was something to look at.
I made it to Pinedale around 3, totally spent. After a quick sandwich at a local market, I found a great little motel in town called the Gannett Peak Lodge. It was cheap, the rooms were very nice and clean, and they even did my laundry for me for $10. I re-supplied in town at a local outdoor store, had some good Mexican food for dinner, and crashed.
The next morning I took my time and rode to a breakfast spot called The Wrangler Cafe, where I enjoyed an amazing veggie skillet and blueberry pancake (I’m sure you’ve noticed by now that “Bryan Eats his way to Canada” is back on track).
Pinedale is an awesome little town at the base of the Winds, and it was hard to leave. I rolled out around noon, and headed towards my next stop: Grand Teton National Park. It rained on me a little bit during the ride, but it was mostly pavement that day so it wasn’t bad. When the road finally turned to dirt in the Bridger Teton National Forest, it became clear that I was officially out of the Great Basin (and the wind).
I started to climb up towards Union Pass through a beautiful valley along the Green River. I passed several Tour Divide riders and got some beta from them about a “warming hut” about 25 miles up the road. I’d been planning to ride past that, but they urged me to stop and camp there because of how nice it was.
At one point, 6 racing side by sides (or whatever the hell the brap brap bros calls them… Polaris Razors or CanAm Mavericks) came whipping around a blind corner on a narrow section of road in thick timber at 50 mph and nearly ran me off the road. None of them slowed down at all, and they dusted the shit out of me, so I channeled my inner old man and shook my fist and screamed profanities at them as they whizzed past. I used to think those things were cool, but once you spend several weeks and over a thousand miles riding your bike on gravel roads across the West, they (and the people driving them) put a pretty bad taste in your mouth. Those things are going to be the death of the backcountry and should be illegal on public land—nobody needs to go that fast on a dirt road. Plus, the folks driving them could stand to ride a bike, or you know, walk, every once in a while… just sayin. Aside from that, it was a lovely ride.
I refilled my water just before the warming hut, and rolled up to it around 6 (pleasantly early). Turns out, it’s a brand new structure called the Strawberry Creek Warming Shelter that was built by two local backcountry snowmobiling groups: the Sweetwater Snowpokes and the Pinedale Snow Explorers. It’s a cute cabin with three picnic tables and a wood burning stove inside that’s open to anyone who needs to get out of the weather. I was pretty stoked to have such a sweet place to camp for the evening (especially considering it was my first night in Grizzly country).
I lit a fire and had a very nice evening next to the wood stove. A woman from New Zealand stopped in for a minute to warm up, but decided to continue on, so I had the place to myself when I went to bed.
As I was falling asleep I wondered if I’d get any other visitors overnight, since often the tour divide racers will ride well into the evening. Turns out the only visitor was a mouse, who scared the shit out of me not long after I’d fallen asleep by crawling on my arm and waking me up.
I flipped on my headlamp and couldn’t see what had been crawling on me, so figured I must have dreamt it. Then I heard what sounded like chewing, and flipped on my light again—nothing. This happened several times, and finally I heard something hitting my bike wheel’s spokes (I’d brought it inside to keep the scent of any food away from bears). I flipped on my light again and finally saw the mouse, and confirmed I hadn’t been dreaming about something crawling on me.
I chased the mouse away, and moved my sleeping pad and bag up onto one of the picnic tables so it wouldn’t wake me up by crawling on me again. Unfortunately, I’m a light sleeper and that little bastard kept coming back and chewing on my frame bag, which at 2am was the loudest thing I’d ever heard. After several attempts to chase off and/or kill the mouse, I finally gave up and put in some ear plugs. This morning when I woke up, the persistent little shit was sitting on my bike. Turns out he had managed to get into one of my bags and eat half a granola bar. Good for him.
I left the warming hut and my mouse friend behind, and headed towards the Tetons. I stopped at a place called Lava Mountain Lodge for lunch, which was very nice except for the waitress’s story about the momma grizzly and two cubs she’d seen on the road on her way into work that morning…
Thankfully, it was a gorgeous, bear-free rest of the ride into the park. I skipped a 3 mile section of gravel some guys had told me about and rode the rest of the way on the highway, and got my first view of the Tetons around 7:00. I made it into the park around 8:00, and had a bit of trouble finding the “cyclist-only campsites” I’d heard about (they jam us in the back of the group site area about as far from anything as you can get), but was beyond grateful there were available campsites on a Summer weekend in a National Park. I got camp set up and biked back onto the main thoroughfare, where I found a bar still serving food at 9pm and had one of the best burgers I’ve enjoyed so far.
I’m taking a zero day today and plan to soak my legs in the cold water of Jackson Lake. Happy Summer, everyone!