Got me a ticket for an aero-plane
Ain't got time to take a fast train
Lonely days are gone
I'm a-goin' home
My baby done wrote me a letter

IT'S BEEN ON MY MIND for a while now.  Yesterday was the deciding point.  I've decided to terminate my tour here and return home; I fly out of Cody tomorrow afternoon.

Why?

The short answer is, I'm tired.  Physically, mentally, emotionally tired.  When I get tired I get negative.  Really, really negative.  So much so that I cannot face the difficult riding that I know is coming.

There's a day coming up - 95 miles, so probably at least two days - with very limited services and thousands of feet of climbing.  The weather is predicted to be hot, and quite likely also windy.  Since I cannot seem to cover more than eight to ten miles in an hour under favorable conditions I can't imagine what those days would be like.  And I really don't want to learn.

So yes, that makes me a wuss.  I don't care.

There are other excuses, errrrr, considerations as well.  

I'm not recovering well each day (particularly on days where I've spent the night in my tent), so even days that should be a snap take an undue toll. 

 There's a very tender area which, if I continue to aggravate it, will become a saddle sore, despite my best efforts to prevent it.  

I'm out of spare tires; given the run of bad luck I've had, I'm not especially interested in diving deep into the hinterlands with no backup.  It would be the worst kind of bad luck to have a tire fail, AGAIN, while I'm in a relatively difficult environment with no obvious means of extraction.

For the past three days, I've felt a stiffness in / mild pain behind my right knee.  This morning, on my way into town to do some errands, it felt like it was now beginning to spread to my right hamstring.

All of these things are, of course, pretexts and excuses and not reasons.  But they crowd into my limited mind-space and dominate the day's thoughts, to the point where the fun gets crowded out.  All I can focus on is grinding out miles, or tenths of miles.  Even those seem interminable at times.

I've said from the beginning that when it stops being fun, I'll stop doing it.  I've now reached that point so I'm going to honor my promise to myself.

It's been a grand ride and adventure while it lasted, and I'm glad to have done at least this much.  I've seen places I'd never otherwise have seen, met all manner of great people, and just generally Had A Good Time.

Thanks to all who have offered support, encouragement, and enthusiasm along the way.  You've gotten me this far, but I've reached the end of my journey.  It turns out I just don't think I'm really the type of person who can go off and do something - the same something - for months on end.