September 19, 2017
to Powell: Cutting it a bit short
“Back again” the construction flagger says as we ride past. We had missed the junction and had to backtrack. Once on the right road, another construction worker shouts “Hey you’re going the wrong way, everyone else is going in that direction” he must be referring to the group of cyclists we saw in Lovell yesterday.
The rain moves in overnight, but it is dry in the morning. Large puddles are in the driveways. A friendly and talkative homeless guy moved in yesterday evening and slept in one of the restrooms. We share some of our Walmart 50 cent pies with him. The wind is cold and more rain is threatening. We pack-up and ride out of town. After only a couple of kilometers, the cycling couple we saw on the Big Horns yesterday pulls up behind us. They indeed took a motel yesterday. Just like us they are headed for Cody today and to our surprise they also live in Boise. We ride in a pace line for a while battling a strong and cold head wind, but Rachel is slower on the hill, so we let them go. Our plan is to meet them at the Irma Hotel for a beer tonight.
We pass the town of Cowley and something does not seem right. We are on road 310 and the 14A number we were expecting has disappeared. After checking the map on our tablet we discover we missed the turn-off to Powell and Cody a couple of miles back. It happened while we were drafting and chatting with the other couple. They are far out of sight by now and also on a wrong course. There is an option to cut back towards Powell on another road, but we decide to turn back to the junction we should have taken. There is some road construction and the flagger is surprised to see us back so soon.
There are a couple of small towns on our way, but none of them have a cafe. So with a couple of granola bars we keep pushing on into the wind. There is a McDonald’s in Powell so that becomes our target for a second breakfast. It is almost noon by the time we reach it, the wind is still cold and rain is coming. As we finish breakfast, the rain turned to sleet. There are a couple of motels at the entrance to town and we consider calling it a day. At the McDonalds we fire up the computer to check our messages and look on the Warmshowers website for hosts here. We had noticed there are three in this small college town, but since our plan was to ride all the way to Cody we had not contacted any. Patrick uses skype to call an interesting host right in the center of town, and even though Scott is sailing in the San Juan Islands, he is sure his wife would have no objections finding two cyclists in their home when she returns from work. Scott tells us how to get into the garage; we can get in, take a shower and make ourselves at home. The Warmshowers community is awesome! Too bad we will miss our meeting with the Boise cyclists, but fighting the wind for another 40 kilometers is too much for us today and we are ahead of schedule.
Today's ride: 51 km (32 miles)
Total: 39,759 km (24,690 miles)
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