Tuesday, August 06, 2013

August 6, Tuesday

We got up at 5am and were out of camp by 7am. Nancy still beat us out and we didn't see her again until the next campsite at A &M Reservoir, north of Rawlins.
We chugged through the extremely dry region of the Great Divide Basin. It was mixed climbing, flat and downhill, without a continuous lot of any one terrain, but the sun and the 70 miles took its toll. It is difficult to imagine the task it was to cross this in a wagon over a hundred years ago.
Jamie and I left Roger and John at lunch and ended up way ahead of them, because Roger lost something off his bike and went back for it.
The sagebrush rarely grew over 2" and you travel over a hundred miles without a natural source of water on the route. There was a well 12 miles into the ride today and we saw a lake off in the distance, but we had filled all our bottles and reservoirs.
The only signs of civilization were a cow camp,  where we stopped for lunchtime  shade, a couple of oil pumping /collection sites and a few vehicles.
The reservoir was a truly welcome sight. The water was cold and refreshing, so we "swam". Nancy was already there. Since we got there at 3:30, we mostly lay in our tents and drank water.
Stats:
Start 1624
End 1693
Total 70
Max 32.1
Avg 10.3
Time 6:41

No comments: