Day 22: Much to do about nothing
Monday, 2:36pm. We are in Pueblo, CO.
Today was the first day we were weaned off of our cycling maps and took another route on the whim of a KOA associate we spoke with. He told us Highway 50 would be shorter and less hilly than the map’s indirect route to Pueblo, CO. For a while HW50 was great, but then toward the end it turned into an honest city freeway with a pull-off that we rode along.
There was a lot of sharp debris in our “lane” of the highway, so we had five flat tires today (3 for John, 2 for Max). John had so many flats the car had to backtrack to pick him up since we ran out of tubes to give him on the fly. That’s five flats for John in two days (almost 25% of our trip total). Max was alone, so he was sent in the wrong direction by a local and was rescued only by chance by our support car.
John and Max were slowed by the flats, but the rest of us blew threw the 70 mile trek to Pueblo at an average of 25mph. Our mountain legs are destroying this flat terrain, but I expect things will get very boring shortly.
When we reached Pueblo and tried to find the KOA, all hell broke loose. The map said 5 miles, it was 8 miles. And the map sent us down a road that only partially exists. It dead ends, reappears down the road, and dead ends again for good. Paddy and I ended up having to cross the black-tar highway during construction traffic a few times… and the construction workers kept hooting as us. So violating… yet self-image boosting.
When we found the KOA it was… in a less remote location than we had hoped. It has a pool, showers, and free Wifi, so we’re extremely pleased to be here none-the-less.
Tomorrow is a rest day in Pueblo… time to do some laundry.
Today’s Numbers:
Miles cycled: 75.8
Flat tire tally: 21 (John 7, Ezra 6, Max 4, Paddy 2, Jacob 2, David 0)
Water sports invented: 1
DVDs ripped to laptop: 3
VHS movies at the KOA: 112 (and they’re good films!)
VHS players at the KOA: 0
Times Paddy had to cross the freeway for “art”: 2
July 24th, 2006 at 8:29 pm
We checked out your site–very funny. I got the wifi in Gunnison all sorted out–I decided to implement a town wide connection…..
You missed a huge hail storm on Monarch that hit the Jane team in the afternoon. We saw them on the way back to Gunni. (OH yeah Monarch is only closed occasionally for avalanches)
GOOD LUCK! You guys will need it with all those flat tires.
Jarral
July 24th, 2006 at 9:04 pm
Now I understand. I wondered what you guys were doing with your time. I figure that 75 miles at 25mph is 3 hours of riding, say 4hr including attempted gondolla rides. This leaves you with a lot of time for mayhem. But now I see that you need extra time to shred tires, back track, get lost, get errant info. from the locals, and as do what ever Paddy was doing running around on the highway. Thank you for the insight.
July 25th, 2006 at 11:52 pm
Don’t think of the terrain as “boring”, think of it as a relaxing 75 miles of meditation. It might help. I hope…