Day 46: Jeffrey City, WY to Lander, WY

July 17, 2006

58.43 Miles, 4:00:35 Ride Time, 14.88 Average Speed, 34.6 Maximum Speed

I was up and almost ready to ride out by 6:00, when I heard I knock at my door. It was Gordon. Yesterday evening while he and Mike and I were trying to find the source of a clicking sound on my bike (which I hadn't been too worried about; it's been making the noise on and off for a year), he had noticed a couple of bad bald spots on my rear tire. I was shocked, because they hadn't been there the last time I checked, which wasn't that long ago. This morning he offered to let me borrow his spare Continental touring tire for the ride to Lander (where there was a bike shop), in case mine didn't make it that far. I accepted with thanks, and the two couples rode off, headed for Lander.

About twenty minutes later, I rode out of the motel parking lot and immediately had a flat on the rear tire. I returned to my room (which I hadn't locked behind me, fortunately) to replace my bad tire with Gordon's brand new one. I had trouble getting it on, because of my still-messed-up wrist; it was also a little harder than usual because the tire had been folded over, probably since the beginning of Gordon and Wendy's trip. Once again, though, I had some luck - Richard, an Eastbound cyclist who had arrived in town late yesterday evening, rode past my door. The prospect of spending any more time than necessary in my room in Jeffrey City, struggling with the tire, overcame my reluctance to ask him for (literally) a hand. He was able to get the tire the rest of the way on, and was quickly on his way.

I belatedly rode off into the same sort of scenery as the last few days - more desert-like like landscape. After about twenty miles, I stopped at Sweetwater Station for a breakfast of Gatorade and Little Debbie cakes. From there I climbed up Beaver Divide, which wasn't too difficult, and then rode downhill about five miles. This was a pretty fun descent, as I anticipated when I saw multiple signs warning truck drivers to check their brakes and to use lower gears...

Around this time the scenery became more interesting; I started seeing the "red rocks" of Wyoming that I had been anticipating for a while. I met a young couple who were riding from Oregon, and had decided to end their trip in Pueblo. I got the impression that the ride had stopped being fun for them at some point. I thought to myself that I was lucky that the occasional difficult/boring day had so far always been followed by a fun day that got me back in the mood to continue - as it had recently after my low point in Rawlins.

As I got closer to Lander, I started seeing green fields for the first time in days, a welcome change from the non-stop desert vistas. A few miles from town I met two young guys riding from Oregon to Virginia, (and getting an awfully late start today - they had stayed in Lander last night!). As would be the case from now on in this situation, I was much closer to finishing my trip than they were, and it felt odd to be the one providing most of the tips about the route ahead...

When I arrived in Lander I checked out the first couple of motels I saw, but they were too expensive. While I was riding around, I saw Mike's and Gloria's bikes outside a restaurant whose sign announced "Breakfast all Day". I went in, ordered blueberry pancakes, and asked Mike to let Gordon know, in case I couldn't find him, that I had used his tire and would buy it, replace it, or do whatever he wanted. Mike mentioned that after we found the bald spots on my tire last night, he had checked theirs, and found that one of theirs needed to be replaced, too...

After the pancakes, I rode around until I found the nice, reasonably priced Holiday Lodge motel (not to be confused with Holiday Inn, of course...). I checked in, cleaned up, then rode around downtown Lander (pop. 6,867) for a while. The town seemed to be thriving - quite a contrast to Jeffrey City, which, incredibly enough, had a similar population only 30 years before. It was too bad I hadn't gotten to town earlier; there were a couple of bookstores that looked interesting.

While I was riding around, I spotted Gordon and Wendy, who had decided to ride nine miles further and stay at a campsite outside of town. I told him what happened to my tire, and we agreed that I would buy another one at the bike shop in Lander (when I found it) and give it to him when I cought up with them tomorrow.

I soon found the bike shop, and was happy to find that they had the exact match for the tire. As I was getting ready to buy it, in came Gordon. He had just found that one of his tires was delaminating, and needed to be replaced... this was becoming an epidemic, we agreed.

So, he soon left the store with two tires (one of which I paid for) and left for the campsite down the road. I asked the guys at the bike shop to check out the clicking noise on my bike, and while they looked it over, walked around downtown until I found an "Arctic Freeze", a Dairy Queen type of place, where I had dinner #1.

After that, I picked up the bike (which was fine) and rode to the motel to get out of the now oppressive late afternoon heat. Later, near dusk, I walked over to the McDonalds near the motel for dinner #2.

I went to bed fairly early, thinking how lucky I was to have had the spare tire this morning in Jeffrey City - it would not have been fun at all to have been stranded there, miles and miles from anything.

Today's ride: 58 miles (93 km)
Total: 2,869 miles (4,617 km)

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