Day 39 June 25 Canon City to Guffey

Today was one of our more memorable days for many reasons. We departed the Abbey in Canon City which in itself was a lovely stay. The Abbey was super nice with it’s sandstone carved architecture and the Baptist Revival which occurred adjacent to the Abbey was interesting. 

One opportunity I think we missed out on was the Museum of Colorado Prisons which would have been super interesting but when we planned to visit a storm-front came through which was a bit unnerving. Anyway, the photo below was taken the next morning on the way out to Guffey.

From Canon City, the next memorable stop was the Royal Gorge suspension bridge and dinosaur experience park. First of all, we didn’t actually get into the Dino Park but we can attest they had both Brontosaurus and T-Rex…yep, we saw them and it appeared the T-Rex was poised for feeding.

The bike ride to the Royal Gorge suspension bridge reminded me of the scene in the movie, It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad World where the little kid coaxed them to cross the stream, “yea Mister, it’s fine!”. We were told it was about 3 miles each way which turned out to be about 4.5 miles each way with both elevation and wind. So, here’s the photo of the gorge and bridge which was truly spectacular…

From this point we hunkered down for a 21 mile ride to Guffey. While normally 21 miles is not a big deal this 21 miles included 3100 feet of climbing. It was beautiful but challenging.

So, then we progress to Guffey where we meet with our host, Bill who is the unofficial Mayor of the town and has been hosting cyclists on the TransAm trail since 1975. He shared a story with us that his first hosted cyclist showed up with a handlebar bag filled with weed for the trip…Bill said this expression of gratitude convinced him that cyclists were good peeps.

We just happened to show up on a day that Bill was sadly bidding adieu to a loyal co-worker (Ken) who had been working side-by-side with Bill for the previous 5 years. Bill had the bbq (work of art) fired up and served us delicious ribs, elk steaks and other delicious items. Ken graciously showed us the shop refrigerator which was generously stocked with beer, water and other drinks and Bill said “my casa is your casa”…

Ken turned out to be a Jack of All Trades and even shared his corn based moon-shine with Eric.

Bill has somewhat single-handedly tried his best to retain the history of Guffey but purchasing significant numbers of antiques to include many buildings. Our bunkhouse for the night had previously been the Guffey Assessors office to process gold mined from the area. Eric and I pried up a few floorboards but didn’t find and nuggets of appreciable size. Bill then gave us a key to the restored City Hall which he restored from a old caved in building to one which now houses the greatest treasures of eclectic treasures I had ever seen.

 

 

Leisa writes:

My day to Guffey was my hardest day and one of my best days so far. At 8,000 I was wiped out and could no longer pedal.  I had to stop on the side of the road and recover. Eric stayed with me as Bill and Angie rolled on.  We determined that I had some altitude sickness.  It was slow going the rest of the way to Guffey.  In time I recovered.  Guffey was such a unique experience.  I joined the Guffey Garage Gang with a salut of moonshine! 

Day 38 June 24th The Day I shifted by Eric Erickson

Tents were loud over night in the campground. With wind It was not the best night's rest. We made our usual quick breakfast/coffee and got on the road at 6 am with blue skies and head winds!!  Made peanutbutter/nutella stops along the road as there were very few towns to stop in today.  We were hoping for Wetmore to come thru with food and water...not.  After Wetmore lots of paving projects and road construction.  On to Florence for lunch and dollar store.  Fremont County, CO has the biggest super Max prison and 15 other prisons, wow! The list of who's in the super Max prison is amazing.  Canon City has a great Abbey that takes in cyclists overnight.  Also staying are 4 other riders that we ran into 2 days before in Ordway.  Angie, Leisa and Eric tried out the wine tasting on site...Eric's first time.  We all pedaled to Safeway for dianner/breakfast shopping. Leisa, Angie and Bill made a wonderfull veggie stir fry.  Rumor has it that we get to sleep in....

The road has been fairly flat since St Louis so I have been in the same gear till today...party is over.

Day 37, June 23rd Fowler to Lake Pueblo, CO

A night in a hotel is usually a good thing.  For me last night in a small motel in Fowler was great as I slept soundly for 7 hours.  We did not have an early start as we were only going to Pueblo - 33 miles away.  The start was most enjoyable because Bill went to the CS next door and brought us hot coffee.  No having instant coffee today, yay!   The Rocky Mountian Drag Racing Show was moving to a new town as we rode to Pueblo so we had a constant stream of drag vehicles going in the opposite direction from us.  It was a great show of crazy vehicles.  Almost all waved, even the "hearse" that was carrying its equipment is a coffin behind.
Pueblo has a most lovely downtown "riverwalk".  It is about a mile. It was built in 1970 when part of the Arkansas river was diverted.  The art that is along the route is phenomenal.  We were impressed with what we saw of Pueblo, but most of the people we talked to said they had a theft problem.  We locked our bikes even though we couldn't see anyone making off with 60 lb. bikes
Tonight we are camping at Lake Pueblo campground.  Already Bill and Eric have repaired a bike tire for "Eddie". He is a young man who had a flat on his mountain bike.  I am amazed and happy that our guys have been so good with bike repair for others.  Angie and I explained to Eddie that he very fortunate to meet two very good bike mechanics. He seemed to shy to say anything. Angie and Eric took a dip in the lake. Our last adventure for today ( I hope) was a quick thunderstorm that forced us to sit tight in our shelter while it came over.  We are now back to sun and nice clean air.

 

Day 36 Jun 22: Eads CO to Fowler CO

 

Pulled out of the fairgrounds at Eads early. That was a bit of a rough camping. The facilities are very dated and wonky and we were pretty much squatters on concrete near the concessions with the biting flies and odors of livestock manure. None of us got very good sleep because the wind made it sound like people or critters were out, and our tents were flapping around with the strong wind.

As for the ride I’ll briefly report that it was pretty flat, wicked windy and 79 miles for the day. Towards the middle I was starting to grumble that it felt like a slog and a time trial. I think the wind, the long straight stretches of road, the Plains, drafting off Bill and watching his back tire for hours; it was just getting to me. Don’t get me wrong, the Plains are beautiful with it’s infinite horizons of grass, big sky and Americana towns and architecture. I was just ready for a change.

We all took a peanut butter break a few miles in at Haswell CO population 71. You have never seen a sadder, more decrepit town. And yet!… they have claims to fame. They are purported to have the smallest jail in the United States. In 2013, Intel named their newest processor Haswell after the town. I can’t imagine why. 

We had a proper lunch break at Feeling Saucy cafe in Ordway. They are a pizza/pasta joint but for some reason we craved hamburgers. Met four other east to west TransAmers and swapped stories. Apparently they spent some time with our former fellow traveler Tom. It was nice to hear he is progressing on his journey. We had planned to end our day in Ordway, but decided to push a little further on to Fowler. 

Fowler is on the old Santa Fe rail line and also on the Arkansas River. It had a very cute depot and a cute old timey Main Street. We stayed at a renovated motel lodge, the Fowler Inn which proved to be clean and comfortable. It is such a crack up how we pile four people and four bikes into a tiny room.

Day 35 - June 21; Scott City, KS to Eads, CO

After having endured super nasty headwinds, crosswinds and blistering heat, we decided to get an extra early start today at 3am and were pedaling by 3:30am. The previous few days winds had us all a bit nervous since we were planning a 78 mile day which given the same conditions of past days would have been high on the difficulty scale. Our first 10 miles were more of the same with 25+mph winds from the north. Since we’re heading West, the only way to protect yourself (draft) would be to essentially ride parallel with the stronger rider which then puts the drafting rider further out into the traffic lane.

Unfortunately, the traffic lane has massive 18 wheeler trucks carrying anything from cattle, grain or the occasional farming combine! Yep, the farming combines are massive and definitely qualify as a wide load! Remember, we’re out in the road at 3:30am and although are well lit with front a back lights it still is a bit unnerving to ride with big trucks wizzing by!

Following the first 10 miles of challenging winds we experienced some light to moderate rain. This was nice at first since we had been broiling the past few days but eventually we sought some shelter at a gas station convenience store and geared up a bit for the weather.

Gratefully, the wind shifted completely in our favor at about mile 30 and what had been a challenging crosswind then became the tailwind we had all been dreaming of for the past week or so.

As mentioned, we had all set the goal of 78 miles for the day and had wrapped our minds around achieving that goal which would have put us into Sheridan Lake, CO and given our experience of the past few days we were hoping to be there by noon at the latest. Sheridan Lake has a Bible Church which hosts cyclists and this is where we had planned to spend the night. Well, since the wind gods decided not to punish us today we actually got into Sheridan Lake around 9:15am. We decided to make the most of our early arrival and purchased sandwiches from a local deli and took them to the Bible Church to eat an early lunch (we did get up at 0300 after all!). Here we met the pastor and were blown away by how nice the place was…see inset picture.

So, since it was so early and the wind direction  remained in our favor, we made the team decision to push on to Eads, CO which is another 28 miles past Sheridan Lake putting our day’s total mileage at 104 miles which we completed by 1pm today!!!!! YES, we just completed our first 100+ mile day and are so thrilled with our accomplishment! AND…we’re now in Colorado and bidding adieu to Kansas. Much love and appreciation to all the folks we bumped into while in Kansas and a special thanks to Deanna Jensen at Cake Batter Batter and to the amazing bicycle mechanics at the Hutchinson, KS Harley’s Bike shop!

We’re super excited to enter into Colorado and looking forward to meeting folks here as we journey from the plains to the foothills and finally the Rocky Mountains.

Day 34 June 20th Ness City to Scott City, KS by Eric Erickson

Left Ness City at 4:40 am with light wind to begin the day. The mornings are so nice to ride very quiet,  beautiful sunrises, the moon, all good. We had another dog attack, thought it was over in Kentucky. Leisa and Eric got some more excitement and Leisa got banged up. Air horns are at the ready again.
Wind was a factor. We found out later it was over 31 mph, so it slowed us down. Must be harvest time as many oversize loads were passing us today. Reached Scott City around 11:00 and went to do laundry and had a nice lunch at Tate’s.  While at Tate’s got to talk to 2 Transamereica Racers from England and saw 3 more on the road.
Rode our bikes around town and got more food for a great dinner back at the Lazy R Motel.
Colorado is 62 miles way and we have traveled over 2000 miles.

 

Day 33 June 19 Great Bend KS to Ness City KS

 

We rolled out of the Baltzell Lodge in Great Bend KS around 4:45a and the wind was already blowing pretty hard and just continued to get worse as the day progressed. Kansas is brutal! I think we have been pedaling through twisters, Auntie Em!! As you can see, the route is pretty unremarkable: flat and due west. Pedaled around 32 miles with the goal of taking a break in Rush Center and getting some coffee or goodies at a convenience store, but it was a no go. There is literally nothing out here on the prairie. Rush City had a bar and grill (closed of course because it was 7am), the ever present Baptist church, a couple abandon gas stations with 50s or 60s looking pumps and various old dilapidated buildings. This seems to typical of this region; a bit economically depressed and stuck in a 60s time warp. We took a potty stop behind some bushes and found a bench in the shade for our. 2nd breakfast, peanut butter tortillas.

Arrived in Ness City wind blown and a bit parched. Eric already had the ceremonial ice cold Bud Light ready. Checked into the Derrick Inn Motel. Ahhh air conditioned, clean enough and comfortable. But what is this? An empty pool in the middle of the court? Wonky wiring? The smell of spilled bong water in the lobby? And apparently no business license displayed? Courtney and her husband recently purchased The Derrick and have been trying to renovate it. The motor lodge has potential but oy what a project and money pit.  Shortly after they purchased, robbers stripped the copper wiring and various other things. Of the ~40 rooms, only a couple were opened for guests and Courtney and her family and friends seemed to be occupying a few others. Anyway, all very strange. We concluded they must be operating illegally because so much is out of code. An unfenced pool in the middle of the court? Filled or infilled, what if someone fell in?

Got some killer Mexican food at El Dos De Oros and checked out the “Skyscraper of the Plains” downtown on our way to the grocery run. A beautiful sandstone building erected in 1885, variously serving as Prairie Mercantile, courthouse and bank.