August 2, 2017
Day 11, Rest Day in Austin: Laundry, Post Office, Journal Updates
Photos Credit; Bud, unless noted otherwise
Bud speaking: (of course it's me speaking - where are Sis and Doc?)
Today was intended as a strategically placed rest day; I just finished the first of 2 smaller “no-service” days and have gotten an introduction to the heat and the difficulty of climbing these ranges and could use a rest. And the next 2 days are even more challenging with distances of 70 and 78 miles respectively, all of which are “no-services” miles. So I’m going to have to carry enough water and snack/energy food to power me through those 2 long days, before I take another rest day in anticipation of 2 more days of even longer “no-services’ stretches. I had planned these rest days with my companions in mind, especially so that Sis could have a more gradual introduction to the rigors of self-supported touring, but now it was just me. This route is hard enough that I am happy for the rest days, believe me.
The planning is tricky, because as I noted earlier you must reserve rooms in advance or you won’t get one in many of these small Nevada communities. So I’m on a regimented schedule; I have to be where I need to be each day or I will not have lodging. Should I get behind I could always skip a rest day – but that’s assuming I could tolerate doing so. So far, so good.
The heat and the difficulty climbing in it have made an impression on me, so I made a post office visit today and eliminated as much weight as I could by shipping some things home. I sent home my favorite wide-angle lens, 1 of my 3 riding outfits (the least comfortable one just happened to be the heaviest anyway), a strap I had used to carry 1 of my panniers on the airline flight, and other such things as I could part with. The weight was probably only a few pounds, but the psychological aspect of knowing that I lightened my load is significant. Like I have said before; long distance cycling is 95% mental and the rest is in your head.
The small town post office was a hoot; I was there at least 20 minutes to get this simple task accomplished as the lady in charge of everything had to help another customer first and it was a painfully slow process. They move at a different speed than we are accustomed to in our hustle-bustle lives. But I got it done, and had breakfast at the diner next door where I snapped these pics;
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Next task was to do laundry. The laundromat was almost unrecognizable from the road as it looked like someone’s storage building;
Laundry done, I snapped a couple of pics of the town and spent the day working on this journal.
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After the crazy start of this tour, it’s taken a while to finally get adjusted to a normal sleep schedule, and I’m trying to maintain an early rising schedule now. I noticed a rider on a road bike later in the afternoon and assumed he was a local out for a spin; as it turns out, we’ll meet him later on in this story and he’s not exactly local. Good night folks, I have a long no-services day tomorrow with plenty of climbing, so…
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