Yesterday evening I was joined at my tent site at the KOA by Spencer, a young engineer who’s riding the Transamerican route west. I’d say we’ve been leapfrogging together since we merged paths a few days ago in Walden, but that would imply I was occasionally in front. Spencer races bikes for fun and has an average speed twice mine, so that never happened. He got up early to beat the wind, I heard him rustling about at 4:30 and that motivated me to do the same. I was on the road before 5:30, stopped at the Kum and Go on the edge of town for a coffee and stale donut for breakfast and set out. The wind wasn’t bad until the last 15 miles but the scenery was nice so it didn’t matter. There isn’t a lot to Jeffrey City. A decrepit $90 cash only motel, a restaurant bar that at first glance looks like it’s been abandoned for years and a church with a basement unlocked for cyclists. The bartender and chef has to be in his late eighties and doesn’t give a fuck about anything. There’s food “if you want a sandwich”. He put the ingredients on a plate and told me to build it myself, said he didn’t want any complaints about how it was dressed. There were two guys scouting the town for a music video by a country artist who I don’t know but I gather is big by the way they told me his name (Branson?). Anyway, they are hoping to feature the bar and bartender in their video. I’d watch it.
The church basement is a nice setup, with showers, a kitchen, and multiple rooms. There’s no one else but Spencer and myself here, Spencer arriving 5 hours previous.
Tonight it is Spencer and myself. The walls are f covered with graffiti left by previous cyclists. The place must have been repainted in 2017, no entries are dated early. And zero from 2020
