July 23, 2006
Day 52: Dillon, MT to Wisdom, MT
66.3 Miles, 6:12:28 Ride Time, 10.81 Average Speed, 35.9 Maximum Speed
I woke up this morning and I was very, very tired. I'm not sure why, since yesterday really wasn't a very physically demanding day. It might have been that it was Sunday morning, and I was more aware of that fact than usual. The conventional wisdom that one hears a lot regarding bicycle touring is that you should "listen to your body." Today my body was telling me to go back to sleep, but I decided to ignore it.
I looked out my window and saw that it was overcast, so I checked the weather on the internet, which said that there was a 30% chance of rain today. So far I've only been rained on a total of about two hours in 50 days on this trip. I haven't had to face riding out in the morning in the rain; now that would be tough, especially on a morning when I was already tired.
I ate some granola bars for breakfast, and started packing up my stuff. My red jersey (my favorite), which I had washed in the sink last night, hadn't dried well at all, so I tried to dry it with the hair dryer, but that resulted in a burning smell, and the hair dryer seeming to have shorted out. I decided I would blow $.75 on the dryer in the guest laundry, but it was full of someone else's clothes. I went to the front desk, and the nice lady there agreed to let me use one of the hotel's industrial-strength dryers, even though that was "against the rules." She didn't even charge me.
It was 8:30 before I was riding out of the motel and into Dillon's deserted-on-Sunday-morning downtown. I had trouble finding my way out of town (and it's not like this was a huge metropolis or something), so I asked an old lady for directions.
I continued to be very tired; this was the slowest and most sluggish I had felt in a long time - definitely since the day I had trouble with the high elevations in Colorado. I actually felt worse today.
For a while I rode past green fields, including one recently mown one - I hadn't smelled freshly-mown grass in a while, and it made me a little homesick.
The green fields ended with the first big climb of the day, up to Badger Pass at 6,760 feet. I didn't have too much trouble with this one, although I was slower than usual. The second one, Big Hole Pass (elevation 7,360 feet), kicked my butt. I was stopping to rest after every half mile, practically.
After finally reaching Big Hole Pass, I coasted down the long descent as it started to look increasingly rainy.
It still hadn't rained by the time I reached Jackson (pop. 38). I had ridden about 48 miles today, and had never really "gotten into it." There wasn't much in Jackson - tiny grocery store, cafe, a lodge/restaurant/bar (which looked like the most thriving enterprise in town), and an elementary school, I was surprised to see, given that the stated population of the town was only 38 - that's even smaller than Jeffrey City...
I decided to eat at the little cafe, which, in a first, didn't have any diet cola. So, I had a diet 7UP with my hamburger and fries, and actually enjoyed it. I associate 7UP with sickness, since it was a tradition in my family to drink that, and eat orange sherbert, whenever you had a cold or the flu. Maybe I should give it a chance in non-illness contexts more often...
I was somewhat energized by my meal, and the 18 miles to Wisdom went by fairly quickly. I felt a few drops of rain in the first mile or so, and then no more. It was hot and sunny the rest of the day.
I rode past more fields, some containing the large haystacks the area is apparently known for. Wisdom (pop. 114) contained the usual small grocery, a couple of bars/cafes, a couple of motels (although one seemed out of business), and one restaurant. I checked into the pretty nice Nez Perce motel, which seemed to be one of the very rare newly-constructed small-town, family-run motels I'd seen on the trip.
I went to the restaurant, The Big Hole Crossing, where the food was above average, but, as I've seen before, the service was not great - I can usually predict this when the greeter asks "Just one?" The "just" is a giveway that they're not too interested in a person eating alone. While I was eating, a group (yuppie couple, their parents, and three very spoiled children) came in. I was amused/mildly disgusted as I observed the three little boys dictate the seating arrangements at their table. What misguided, overly permissive parents these were, I (childless at forty, but still entitled to my probably uninformed opinion) thought smugly to myself...
After dinner I went back to my room at the Nez Perce, where I was surprised to find a working wireless internet connection (the motel didn't advertise the fact that it had one - It may have belonged to a neighbor). I used the computer, while half-watching a television show on the Discovery Channel about a guy whose face was nearly ripped of by a cougar - thus giving me another reason to avoid camping on this trip.
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Today's ride: 66 miles (106 km)
Total: 3,306 miles (5,320 km)
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