June 11, 2014
Day 14 - Cambridge to New Meadows - Idaho: Red Bull and Pop-Tarts ........and we hit 500 miles today!!
The city park in Cambridge is very nice. While there are no showers there are nice clean restrooms and a water spigot with warm'ish water to clean up with. Best of all there are '6' double electric sockets......so charge up. The park is free and there is no need to check in anywhere ...just set up and enjoy. A very quiet evening.
While we were enjoying our evening Ricky came by. He is one of the TransAm racers. A very friendly fellow from St Louis. We chatted awhile but he needed to find food and he was looking for a motel. About an hour later he shows up and says no luck on the room so he will be joining us in the park. He is doing about 145 miles a day.
We all went to sleep and during the night Steven from Palm Beach showed up. He too is doing the race. He came up the nasty hill we did in the dark. Brave man. Steven isn't quite a young as most of the others but he is a very experienced endurance athlete. He has raced the divide and several other races.
We had a photo session this morning and then they were off! Right after they had their breakfast of "Red Bull and Pop-tarts". During the day we continued to see a few more racers. One guy on a recumbent passed us right in the middle of our day. And then later, Jeffery whose parents we met yesterday, came by. They found him.
The ride for the day started out very nice with around 11 miles of nice flat to slightly downhill with a tail wind. Then we went up two long climbs before Council and then a long hill after Council where you gain 600 ft but lose 200 of it on a down hill. The rest of the day is a slow grind all the way to New Meadows except for a nice little downhill the last two miles. Today's elevation gain was 2,612 ft. Not the day we thought we were going to have. We did hear from a man who owns a restaurant about 8 miles out of New Meadows that all the racers that had stopped there were also saying what a grind this day was.
We rolled into New Meadows about 6pm which is late for us. We intended to camp at the city park because our experience last night was so nice. We checked the rest room at this one and they were so bad Jack said he couldn't wash in it without feeling dirty. So..we went through town looking for a hotel. We found the Heartland Inn. The main house is a B&B which is very nice...we are in the motel part and have changed rooms once already..no working toilet in the first.
Today was a turning point. Don't know if I can explain it but basically there was a lifting of a felt sense of a kind of pressure and replaced with a sense of just enjoying the day 'whatever' it brings. A more relaxed feeling of enjoying the trip. Kind of an Ahhhhhhhh moment.
I have been having some difficulty posting photos because of lack of WiFi so now there is a "Photos" page on the main Table of Contents where you can go to find some missed photos. Someday when I have time they will be placed on the correct journal page but I am doing all I can to get this out each day. Check it out ......adding some here and signing off. We just came back from Pizza and beer and I am nearly asleep. Night all....
Today's ride: 48 miles (77 km)
Total: 522 miles (840 km)
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