:: shift7 ::

:: north/south adventure ::

idaho: day 10, sun 7 sep
thayne (wyoming) - rendezvous beach (bear lake, utah)

stats:
100.4 @ 16.2 = 6:10:16, max 42.0, trip total: 778

eats:
doughnut holes (like 12), short stack, bacon, peanut butter & jelly sandwich, triscuits, oreo cookies, 2 klondike bars, cream soda, cheese & truiscuits, turkey & cheese sandwich, potato chips, red bull
[no restaurant open- mini mart dinner]

sleep:
beach campground, $3

thoughts:
thoughts swirling inside me. if you want it, come and get it - for crying out loud...
the world is here for you to enjoy. to live and be alive. not to be afraid. not to doubt. go with it. wide open. such a beautiful day, the rain must have poured all through the night and now its gone. blue sky, streaming morning sun. no gloves, only one over layer, rested- surprisingly.

note: ok so today is classified as an idaho day since we did most of our riding through idaho. we started in wyoming and ended up a couple miles into utah.

i knew enough from our drive last night that there was about 30 miles before we went up a major pass. and that would lead us over and into idaho. a great descent on the other side. but it was a tough wind that gave us the challenge of the day as we crawled up the valley to the pass. it was slow and it was tedious. but before we got there we stopped in afton for breakfast. photo shown- cowboy bar. it was a great cafe that still had the strong odor of a saturday night crowd. usually that would be a turn off but the cocktail lounge sign and the people were all very interesting. there were six of us. six hungry people ready to chow down. it cost $24 something! scott alone had four french toasts - there must have been enough to feed two families and it was less than $25 bucks? yep. what a deal-- we were loaded and ready.

then came the pass, ooof, the food had to settle. and it did as we climbed slowly and methodically. the payoff going down was enough to crank up without caring about an ankle or spokes. we got to the top and basked in our accomplishment. looking down on the valley like it was a mural. wow- what a nice day- especially after yesterday. clip in, it was time to go down... 42mph- like fire we were blazing down without a care.
screaming down the pass clip

in no time we made it to the border of idaho. first thing thomas does is take his shoes off like it was a ritual- ten seconds tops. what the hell? apparently his shoes (new shoes from jackson) were a bit tight. ouch. no time like the present to break them in. the border was none to exciting except that we had finished another state.
idaho border clip

we got the road closed and found out from a certain individual in a suit (in some random car that stopped to talk to us) that we could bike through and not to worry about it but cars had to go around a 28 mile detour. ok, sounds good, that's nice to know! so we had lunch before taking off down this "do not enter" area. come to find out it was all newly paved and widened from two lanes to four- but there were no painted lines or mile markers yet. it was perfect! four lanes of blacktop cruising through with not a single other soul for 14 miles. it was all nice until the first ten feet when we noticed it was windy again - against us and it was another major pass! but it was still sweet. if you thought it was quiet before, now it was like being air dropped into nowhere. there wasn't even one house or driveway. we got to the top and like clockwork thomas had his shoes off. i was in the porta-john- very clean. and then we went down- again just enjoying the speed and no cars.

after that it was around bear lake with a headwind again... that wind just did not give up at all today. we got a beautiful camping spot on the lake, but everything, and i mean everything, except one minimart, was closed on sundays! so that's what we had for dinner. it wasn't great but it wasn't the end of the world either.
campsite on bear lake clip

oh, and we made it into utah! by about 10 miles. its probably those mormons that close everything down on sundays- but it will be monday in the morning.