DAY TWELVE - THE HARDEST DAY

I left Joes and headed West towards Byers today. I knew it was going to be a very hard day because of the remoteness of the road with very few services along the way…I was right. I traveled 32 miles before I came to the town of Anton which had a grocery store. I stopped and got a cold ice tea. After I left Anton I had 50 straight miles of nothing until I got to the Diedrich Dairy Farm.

I don’t recall exactly what the temperature got to but it felt to be around 90 degrees. The Weather Channel said the wind show blow from the ESE at about 8 mph. I think they were wrong. It started from the SE about 10-15, which did help keep me cool a little but it eventually came directly out of the South that made me fight to keep the bike stable at times.

When I had about 25 miles to go I thought I would die. There seemed to be a lot more hills than I anticipated and I had to walk up quite a few. They aren’t short, steep hills like Missouri, they are long and gradual. I usually can pedal right on up most gradual grades by just putting my head down, gearing down and being patient. That wasn’t working too well this time.

One really bad thing was that, even though I had plenty of water, it was all warm. I needed something cold once in a while but didn’t see that happening. I called Jeanne Diedrich to let her know that I may be late getting there because I was about spent and was doing almost more walking now instead of riding. It seemed my legs were like lead. She said she’d come after me in a truck when she got home from work if needed. I checked my watch to see what the elevation was. It showed I was over 4300 feet at some places. I didn’t think the altitude would be affecting me yet but maybe it was.

The miles seemed to go by so slowly but eventually I got out of the hills and started a fast decent that lasted about two miles. That seemed to help, all though, any time that I was not using my legs, as in not pedaling, when I started pedaling again, I’d have upper leg pain for about 20 seconds until they got loosened up. It got rather painful, but I had to keep going.

I could finally see the Diedrich farm and pulled in about 5 minutes before Jeanne did. I was sure glad she did not have to try and come rescue me. The Diedrich’s were wonderful hosts. I got to watch them milk their 22 milk cows and Jeanne asked if I’d like to join them for supper. So, I sat down with Jeanne’s husband Dave, their daughter’s Jolene, Michelle, their brother-in-law Dan, and Dave’s mother Shirley. It was a great meal and I especially liked the watermelon and plum mixed fruit. They were soothing to my dry lips.

I set my tent up and got to see a beautiful sunset over the Rocky Mountains. Their farm was the first place that I had got to view them. It was a very hard day but I was so thankful that there were people willing to take me in at the end of it.

This is the Rocky Mountains where I first saw them, from the Diedrich Dairy Farm.

Tomorrow’s destination – Littleton CO. My aunt and uncle’s house.
Miles traveled today - 82