July 6, 2006
Day 57: Lander to Dubois: Wind River lives up to its name...
I was up and on the road before most of the ACA people since they'd decided to do a real breakfast at a nearby restaurant and I wanted to try to bust out a few miles before the wind picked up. Crossed into the Wind River Indian Reservation at the Popo Agie River (didn't find out the story of that name, though) and stopped for snacks and drinks at a convenience store about 15 miles into the day where local guys about my age were asking all about the trip. They were doing construction work and getting a bunch of caffeine for the day, but I think they would have joined the trip if they could have. I enjoyed their enthusiasm for my trip even if I was still a little tired and sore.
By this time the wind was starting to show itself, and when I got 20 miles down the road, it was getting really bad. Tim had passed me at some point and was just leaving the rest area when I got there. Jacques pulled in right after me and hid from the wind in the picnic shelter where I was chomping on Goldfish crackers. Now Jacques is usually the one I joke around with, but Jim pulled in while Jacques and I were eating and joking about my continued geisha status now that I'd caught up with the group. Jim doesn't have much natural padding on his backside, so he was walking around slapping himself to get some feeling back when I quipped, 'Hey Jim, need some help with that?' Jim sometimes seems a little uncomfortable around women and I knew that would set him off. He walked away nervously while Alvin, Jacques, and I had a good laugh at his expense. Sorry, Jim (but it was funny and broke up the monotony of riding into the wind!)
The next incident gave the normally unflappable Alvin what he calls a 'sentimental moment.' Pretty much out of the blue, Jacques said, 'Alvin. My favorite moment this trip. When we went to the church together, you and me. You sang the America song. That is my favorite moment.' I didn't really know what he was talking about, but I saw Alvin go almost immediately from his backslapping, jovial persona to catching a lump in his throat and turning away from the little group at the picnic shelter. I guess just before the 4th, the two had attended mass together and Jacques had been touched by the congregation singing America the Beautiful and seeing how much Alvin loves this country. That Jacques' sincerity had almost made Alvin cry showed how special that moment had been for both of them.
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Special moments aside, we still had miles to do and I was soon in the middle of the pack instead of the front. Jim, Jacques and I made a bet on who was going to be the slowest to the next service stop, and I won decisively. As Erie, Alvin, Jacques, Jim, Tim, and maybe a couple other people sat there eating ok sandwiches and good bananas, Gracie pulled in on her unicycle for a much needed break from the wind. And just as some of the group were getting ready to leave, an EastBound couple came flying in with the wind at their back.
Now you'd think with a 20 mph tailwind (or whatever it was) on a gently downhill day would be cause for celebration. Apparently not. We made some comment about how they must be having a great day with that tailwind and the guy snapped back, 'We deserve that wind!!!' What, were we going to steal it or something? Thinking there was probably a story behind that line, somebody asked, 'Why's that?', which started this long litany of wrongs they'd had to go through thus far on their trip, apparently at the hands of Adventure Cycling. Things like how Oregon was just pass after pass after pass, how there were mosquitoes in Montana, how there was traffic on some of the roads, how they'd had to go over mountains and how they just couldn't believe there'd be so much uphill on a cross-country route. Yep. I think AC planted those hills, mosquitoes and mountains in the way just so these people would have a miserable vacation. Things got worse when they found out that Alvin was leading the Adventure Cycling group. I don't know what they expected him to do about any of those things, but the guy cut loose again. I almost couldn't keep from laughing or telling them they picked the wrong vacation or being just plain sarcastic and say something about how awful it was that AC hadn't fumigated Montana for them, but I kept my mouth shut and went back in the store with Gracie for more bananas. In there, I told her I was about ready to go tell them to go make their own route if they didn't like this one, but Gracie actually had the guts to go out there and do it, telling them to get some state maps and route themselves. Gracie rocks! To them I say Good luck avoiding hills, heat, and mosquitoes the rest of the way across, with or without AC's help!
The next miles were torturously slow. Alvin tried to ride with me a little way, but he needed to get to Dubois to pay for their campsites and get a replacement wheel for Jacques installed, so he took off. I ended up riding with Jim off and on. The wind was so bad that Jim was stopping every couple of miles. I would catch up with him when he stopped, but he'd pull away when we'd ride again. Erie caught up, too, so she and Jim rode together and I hung back with Jacques. The hills were starting to bother him really badly, especially with a bad wheel, and he was walking some of the time just to give himself a break. I knew it was bad when I caught up with him walking on a downhill.
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When I got to town after over 9 and a half hours of riding time (not counting significant off-bike time), I was tempted by a hotel and a bath, but the prices I was quoted convinced me to go camp at the KOA. I checked out the town before riding to camp and started to get worried that the slowest part of the group may not make it before dark. The evening was rapidly cooling as I set up my tent and started watching Alvin change Jacques' cassette from the old wheel to the new one (gotta learn mechanics somehow!). While he was working on that, he looked over at his own bike, looked at me and said, Uh oh. I thought maybe he had a flat or something, but the moment of panic that crossed his face didn't say flat tire. It said cracked rim.
Alvin was riding 16-spoke wheels I'd never take touring, so there wasn't much room for any kind of error or mishap. When he finished Jacques' bike, he started looking at his more closely and found not one but three places where the rim was cracking around the spoke. Bad, bad, bad. I know he wanted to start playing with it somehow, but the wheel was still mostly true and any playing could have made it worse. He was 4 riding days from any shop that could get a wheel and I wasn't sure it would hold. Since my lucky penny had gotten Jacques to Ordway on a previous broken wheel, I slipped a lucky penny into his map case and hoped for the best.
I know he didn't sleep much, though.
Today's ride: 79 miles (127 km)
Total: 2,938 miles (4,728 km)
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