June 29–July 2nd: Dreamy Tetons, pedal explosions and more rain

My zero day at Colter Bay in GTNP on the 29th was absolutely glorious. I slept in, had coffee and breakfast at camp, and finally dragged myself out of my tent and over to Colter Bay around noon for lunch. Zero days for me are all about moving as little and eating as much as possible—so I had a large chicken Cesar salad, a pizza and, of course, a lemonade for lunch. I caught up on the news and scrolled Instagram for a while (both terrible ideas), and then grabbed another lemonade to go and headed towards the swim beach on Jackson Lake.

I laid there on the rocky shore in the sun and swam in the very chilly, crystal clear water the rest of the afternoon. I’ve been to a lot of pretty places and stared at a lot of mountains, but I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anywhere as gorgeous as the Tetons—I felt that way when I first saw them 15 years ago with my dear friend Tyler West, and it’s nice to see they haven’t changed.

I had another big dinner that night and crashed early in preparation for a big day on the bike. The only downside to my visit was the curse of visiting any national park in the Summertime—you have to share it with tons of other people. There was a parade of monstrous RVs checking in to $129 campsites, folks going on short day hikes with more stuff in their backpacks than I have on my bike, and all the other funny things you see in our national parks. I also found it amusing and sad to listen to all the couples arguing, and parents yelling at or complaining about their screaming children, while the kids complained about not wanting to be there. It was a bit of an abrupt, though thankfully brief, re-entry into everyday American life, and left me thinking that everyone there seemed like they could use a bikepacking trip.

I left Colter Bay on June 30th. I ran into two NOBO riders that morning, Alex, who I’d met back in Steamboat, and a guy named Will. We all ate breakfast sandwiches, lamented about how terrible the wind in Basin had been, and went our separate ways (at this point, everyone’s sort of doing their own thing out here, and on their own schedule. Alex told me he’s planning on detouring and making his own route North, just to get to Banff as soon as possible. Can’t say I blame him!).

The ride out of GTNP was mostly uneventful, save for having to ride very defensively on the roads since most of the folks driving the aforementioned massive RVs were more concerned with spotting a moose or bear than a cyclist.

I made it about 70 miles to Warm River campground around 4pm (one of the places I’d considered stopping for the day). I found the campground host and asked her if I could refill my water somewhere, and she immediately lit up when she saw I was on a bike. She started telling me about all the Divide riders she and her family had met this year, and insisted on making me a peanut butter and jelly sandwich to take with me. Not only that, but she gave me a coconut water and a kombucha, plus a bag of almonds and dried mangos. Talk about some trail magic!

Freshly stocked, I decided to ride another 25 miles to the village of Island Park, where my map said there was a restaurant open late. It was actually a pretty easy 25 miles along an old railroad grade next to a gorgeous river. Idaho and Montana have a number of these beautiful rail trails open only to hikers and cyclists, and not having to worry about cars or ATVs is an absolute joy.

I was cruising along on a gravel road about 8 miles from Island Park when I began hearing a strange noise from the bike. It sounded like it was coming from my pedals or bottom bracket, but I couldn’t see anything wrong—until my left foot abruptly popped off the bike and I looked down to see just my pedal spindle sticking off the crank arm, with the pedal itself still clipped into my shoe. Shit.

For non-bikers, my pedal had just completely broken, which was not something I was prepared to fix in the field, unfortunately. I looked at it for a while and tried to understand what had broken and whether I could MacGyver something, but it seemed like it was going to require a bike shop. Unfortunately, the next shop on the route was 294 miles away.

The only thing I could do to continue pedaling was leave the pedal clipped into my shoe, slide it back onto the spindle, and sort of hold it in place with my foot as I pedaled mainly with my right leg. It was enough to get me to island park, but certainly wouldn’t doable for 294 more miles. I made it to Island Park and the restaurant was still open, thankfully, so I decided to get some food before trying to sort out the pedal situation. If I’ve learned one thing on this trip it’s always eat something (and usually sleep, too) before making any decisions.

I sat at the bar and ordered a beer plus my usual mountain of food. I started texting Sarah and the support crew in Santa Fe about the situation. Thankfully, my good buddy Aaron Gulley knew exactly what had happened (of course) and dug up a YouTube video showing the parts I’d need and how to fix the pedal. He offered to overnight everything to me if I needed it. I also knew Sarah would be in Montana in a few days, and could bring me a whole new set of pedals, plus my buddy Mitch (aka Sprite) lives in Bozeman and offered to bring me anything I needed—I have a great friends.

The situation felt like it called for a second beer, so I ordered another and kept eating while mulling over the plan. At that point, I overheard the bartender asking the guy next to me if he’d seen any bears that day, which caught my attention. Bill, it turns out, out was a wildlife photographer who specialized in photographing Grizzly bears, and he’d been in an area called Brooks Lake for the last week shooting several sows and their cubs. I’d ridden right by Brooks Lake (and Bill’s camper) just two days prior—so I was particularly interested in hearing about all these mamma grizzlies he’d seen there. He showed me some of the amazing photos he’d taken (turns out he regularly gets within 40 yards of the bears) and I peppered him with questions about camera gear, and more importantly, staying safe around bears. Like I’ve heard so many times before, he told me the best defense you have is your head: don’t do anything stupid, like cook near your tent or leave food in your tent, and don’t run (or ride) away from a bear. Carry bear spray, and make noise in the woods.

The whole conversation was both very reassuring, and also terrifying. I don’t consider myself particularly afraid of bears, but I do have a healthy respect for them and certainly don’t want to see one up close—especially while I’m asleep. Bear attacks are very, very rare, and, like shark attacks, tend to get a lot of media attention when they do happen, so bears become this sort of evil monster out of a horror film in a lot of people’s minds. The truth is they want absolutely nothing to do with humans, and most encounters that go wrong involve food or surprising a mom with cubs.


That said, a woman riding the divide was killed by a bear a few years ago—she was cooking in her tent and kept her food there. A bear came in the middle of the night, and the group she was with scared it away, and then all went back to bed. Unfortunately, the bear came back…

One particularly poignant part of my conversation with Jim that sticks out was when he (rightfully) was making the case for NOT carrying a gun to defend against bears, and told me that Doug Peacock, a famous environmentalist, writer, and grizzly advocate, used to say he carries bear spray and a 44 magnum with one bullet—and the bullet wasn’t for the bear.

While we chatted all things grizz, another, particularly tired looking divide rider came in and sat down next to me. His name was Everett, he was from Saskatoon, Canada, and he was racing the Tour Divide going northbound (and currently in second place). There’s a small group of around 10 or so riders who started from Antelope Wells the same day as the Grand Depart in Banff (June 14th) and were effectively having their own little race. We chatted for a while, and when he asked me how things were going I showed him the picture of my broken pedal. He paused, looked at it and said “oh, you ride Crank Brothers pedals too! I think I have the part you need to fix that in my kit.”

I stared at him dumbfounded, and said “no fucking way.” He laughed and told me he works in a bike shop, and had a bunch of spare parts for the pedals as they’re sort of known for blowing up like that, but also for being relatively easy to fix if they do.

We finished our meals and he went about trying to fix my pedal under the outside lights of the restaurant. We couldn’t quite get it to work and determined that my pedals were older and perhaps the part was slightly different than the model he had, but it was enough to get me pedaling again. We shared a campsite nearby and chatted a little more, and it was nearly midnight by the time we went to bed. When I woke up in the morning, he was already gone (those racers and their early mornings…), but I looked over the pedal again with a fresh set of eyes and realized the new bearing he gave me was actually a perfect fit, we just hadn’t fully removed all the pieces of the old, exploded one from inside the pedal. Once I did that, everything was good as new and I was able to roll out. God bless those Canadians.

Disaster averted, I rolled out of camp late and headed towards Red Rock pass and then Lima, Montana. Things were going smoothly until it started thundering in the distance around 3pm, and then started raining. It quit after about an hour, and at 4 I reached Red Rock Lake State Park. That was only about 45 miles in for the day, and I was hoping to make it further, so I (foolishly) pressed on.

The rain and wind started again an hour later, and turned into a full on driving rainstorm. In New Mexico we get afternoon storms (monsoons) that come in hot and heavy and last from 20 minutes to an hour at most. Things are different here, and I rode in the rain and thunder until 9:30 when I made camp on the side of the road.

Everything was absolutely soaked, and my hands were so cold at one point that I resorted to using two grocery bags as outer gloves to try and add a bit of protection from the wind. I was getting pretty desperate and VERY over being cold and wet, and kept hoping a truck would drive by and I could bum a ride to Lima, but I didn’t see a vehicle or another soul for 5 hours. I was so miserable I even thought about knocking on a rancher’s door at one point and asking if I could sleep on their porch or something, but i finally made it to an “informal campground.” I was 70 miles in for the day and just 35 miles from Lima and a motel room, but the roads were a complete muddy mess at that point and between them and the headwind I figured it would take me another 6 hours to get there.

So, I very begrudgingly started setting up camp in the rain. At the beginning of this trip, having to outrun a storm or camp in the rain was a novel adventure for me, but a month in I’m about ready to pull the plug on the whole thing when I have to set up in the rain. Ok, not really, but it’s my least favorite thing to do out here—all of your stuff is already soaking wet, and you have to be extremely careful to make sure your down sleeping bag and sleep clothes somehow don’t get wet, because if they do, you’re screwed. Add to that the fact that I’m in Grizzly country now, and I have to be diligent about not cooking near my tent and storing my food, which becomes a lot tricker and more miserable when it’s pouring rain and there’s not a tree in sight to hang food from.

By some miracle, it stopped raining just long enough for me to set up the tent and keep my sleeping bag dry. I stashed my food in a dry bag and left it tied to a fence post several hundred yards from the tent, and went to sleep. In case you’re wondering, I did dream about grizzly bears all night, but thankfully was not visited by an actual one.

It’s 10:30am on July 2nd as I write this (racers would be aghast that I’m not pedaling yet)—I’ve been hanging out in camp all morning waiting for my gear and the roads to dry out before hitting the road for Lima. I used a barbed wire fence as a clothes line, so hopefully I won’t have to put anything away too terribly wet, and I can clean up my bike in town this afternoon.

Have I mentioned I’m excited for Sarah to get here with the campervan?