Wednesday, July 22, 2009
37: Rocky Ride to Red Rocks
| Stoker's Log |
| Day Thirty Seven |
 |
| 7/22/09 |
| From Pueblo, CO |
| To Colorado Springs, CO |
| 43 miles |
| 10.5 avg mph |
Since our bike wasn't going to be ready right away, we relished sleeping in and watching part of an NCIS marathon. We were planning to have a short day anyway, just 40 miles to Colorado Springs; our destination beyond it, Denver, was about 130 miles away from Pueblo, and we only travel that far in one day when we're riding a tailwind out of Kansas. When Kyle picked up the bike from the shop, they told him about the two routes we could take to Colorado Springs. One was a busy highway, the other a dirt road with great views. We decided on the latter; we'd much rather see the country than more highway, and the open views would make roughing it worth it, right?
Wrong. This afternoon was probably the worst ride we've had so far. The heat was intense, the road became a mess of deep ruts and scattered rocks, the only signs of civilization were angry "No Trespassing" warnings, and a veritable army of bugs attacked us constantly. They were so bad that we couldn't stop for anything, not for the food that I desperately wanted, and not even to change the tire that went flat (like we needed any more problems). Instead, every few miles Kyle would hop off and reinflate it as quickly as possible so that we could get moving again before the bugs completely ate us alive. Coloransas continues to kill us with its hot, buggy, monotonous misery. The only positive moment was being passed twice by a strange Union Jack dune buggy type vehicle; as you can tell I don't really know how to describe it and I didn't get a very good photo, but trust me, it was pretty cool.
(Note that he's even driving on the British side of the road in order to pass us.) As you can see, the second time it passed us was after we made it onto a real road. We wanted to get down and kiss the pavement, but we had to wait until we reached an actual town and left most of the bugs behind. Then we were finally able to eat a snack and change the tire outside of the town library.
We spotted signs for a water attraction and decided to check it out since we were still horribly hot. It turned out to be a kiddie splash area that wasn't very accessible, but then we spotted something just as good: an icecream truck. Chasing an icecream truck around a neighborhood is actually pretty fun, and finally catching it is even better.
But just as I was enjoying my orange creamsicle, Kyle discovered another flat tire. Arrrrrrgggg. Our "short" day felt like it would never end.
As we finally approached Colorado Springs, we discovered a network of bike trails. Usually we would have loved to explore them, but after the afternoon we'd had we just wanted to take the main road into town and find a hotel room. We got very excited when we saw a LaQuinta; it had a higher price tag than we were used to seeing, but after checking a few other hotels we realized that the problem was CO Springs, not La Quinta, so we got to stay in our favorite once again.
When we were all showered and human again, we got to tour Colorado Springs with our friend Pickle (or Karen, as those who don't know her ultimate frisbee nickname call her). She'll be hosting us in Denver, but wanted to drive over to Colorado Springs a day early so that she could show us around Garden of the Gods, a park with impressive red rock and a long history. It was rainy and cloudy but we still had a great time wandering around and taking photos, and when the weather cleared up we were greeted with a rainbow.
After Garden of the Gods, we had a late dinner at a laidback bar downtown. When we went to put in our orders we found ourselves behind an ultimate frisbee team, so we used our frisbee nicknames too, which amused the guy at the window who tried very hard to come up with a song by Devo (Kyle's nickname) other than Whip It (he couldn't). As we waited for our food, we watched a kid's rodeo on TV (main event: sheep riding) and talked about our respective teaching experiences. After stuffing ourselves we headed back to the hotel and sent a few of our belongings back to Denver with Pickle. We can't wait to get there tomorrow!
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| posted at: 02:07 |
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