Day 16: Grand Teton Delivers!

September 3, 2024

Today started with me waking up into a sinking air mattress. Boo. It must have a tiny hole somewhere. I’ll try it one more night and then maybe try a soapy solution to find the hole. I hope it’s not at a seam because that’s harder to fix. I picked up my phone to shut off the alarm and noticed I had a video message from a couple of friends. It was super encouraging. Thanks guys!

If it’s good enough for a moose it’s good enough for me.

Rolling away from the Tetons start of day.

We packed up and sat down for breakfast of bread and peanut butter sandwiches with banana. And we washed that down with a yogurt knowing that we were stopping for coffee at the fork in the road back to the highway. We also got to have a quick chat with Cassandra as they were staying and we were going.

I was disappointed at the convenience store that they didn’t have cream but they won me over with their liquid snickers sweetener. Damn! My snicker count is very low at 6 and I may have to start counting packs of mashed potatoes instead. Nope! I’ll crank it back up soon.

We could not stop taking photos. Credit to my phone case because I dropped it straight in the road going about 20 km/hr.

The coffee stop was great. Peter had to get the re-route loaded into the Garmin and had a chat with his mom. I posted to my journal.

We started rolling later than normal at 8:30 and it was a bit dark and rain was a possibility. This morning and last night was a very nice break from the cold. No toques. No gloves. Even peeling layers at night. What a bonus!

Pulling the hoodie over the ears on roads helps quiet the noise. I wear ear plugs as well.

I thought today was going to be biking drudgery but boy was I wrong. Starting on the highway the views of the Tetons were off the charts! We stopped many times both at the designated spots where cars stop and any place we felt like stopping. It was quick as well so we were making good time making up for the slow start and the continuous stopping for photo opportunities. We ended up pedalling 30 km on the highway before starting the nicest bike path I’ve been on yet; I give it that rating because of the incredible views and getting off the highway.

We continued on the bike path enjoying the views on the way into Jackson and pulled off for lunch by a bridge looking out over an Elk and game reserve. Lunch was leftovers of pizza and bagels with PB trying to clean up the food bags. We’ve ended up carrying more food than necessary this time around but it wasn’t really noticeable rolling on the smooth pavement.

Drying clothes after the brief rain. Felt like it might be a deluge but we got lucky.

We both have followed the Tour Divide loosely for a couple of years. I’m a super fan of Lael Wilcox. Lael holds the female record for the race of 14 days and hours. That’s 3 times faster than us! She’s an absolute force. She has incredible athleticism that’s topped only by her infectious energy for what she does. She skipped the race this year to tackle an even bigger goal of racing around the world (29,000 km).

Interview with Lael to learn about her whole crazy career.

Lael podcast documenting her around the world adventure.

She has a podcast to follow her progress as she attempts to set the new world record. Peter just showed me her route through Canada and she literally rode past my house on the way to the US from Whistler!!! And she welcomes people to ride with her. And I missed it! But, what’s cool is she rode past on the very same day we started riding so I’ll take that as inspiration for our ride.

She started her attempt end of May and hopes to finish in Chicago mid-September. If you are interested here is the podcast.

Riding into Jackson was unreal. There were fall colours off to our left in a marshy area and then the city with a ski resort literally right in the town (not Jackson Hole). I really liked Jackson from what we saw. We decided to go to a bike shop to resupply our electrolytes. They had a couple shop dogs that greeted us. And then I spotted a fun bike to swap for my bike. It was hard to ride but super fun with the pedal braking just like when I was a kid.

Peter asked if they had his style of brake pads but unfortunately they just sold the last set so we headed to another bike shop. We struck out there as well but we had them measure our chain wear. Both our chains were thoroughly stretched so we purchased replacements to change later in the day.

The last stop was Albertson’s. I was disappointed that we already had most food because it was fantastic! Peter has described this trip as a cross country eating contest and he’s been surprised by how much food I can slam down. I always have a big appetite but this is next level.

Back on the bikes we continued on the bike path until it finally ended on the turnoff to Pinedale. Along the way we stopped and changed our bike chains. The bike path was 60 km in total!! It was a fantastic ride.

Morning ride with Tetons view for most of the morning.

Chain change. Both our chains were well stretched.

We stopped for water and Doritos at the store at the junction and then started riding the highway for another 15 km. That stretch was very pretty as well but it was a highway so not nearly as enjoyable. Not knowing where we would stay we pulled off a couple times but continued for better options. We ended up taking a forestry side road and set up camp in a beautiful setting with a huge hill beside us and a creek running a few hundred metres away. We stopped at 5:30 which was earlier than normal and gave us ample time to unwind and prepare for the next day.

Cowboy camping / Dispersed camping / Wild Camping. Goes by many names but this was the best one yet!

We set up the tents and pegged them well. When we were on the highway it was windy so we didn’t want a repeat of Lava Mountain. Fortunately, the wind died completely and we were bathed in sunlight cooking our dinner of teriyaki noodles and tofu.

We’ll never know what we missed on the route but this was fantastic. Riding today was much easier than most days as we did minimal climbing and we were on pavement all day.

Highlights:

-Grand Teton National Park - wow!

-Morning coffee

-60 km of bike path through some of the most scenic riding yet.

-Jackson, Wyoming is really spectacular

Distance - 113 km / 643 m elevation gain.

Today's ride: 113 km (70 miles)
Total: 1,857 km (1,153 miles)

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