Fourth Shift: Ahead to Arco

There is always something surreal about waking up to rain pattering against your tent, like natural alarm clock, although without a snooze button. Sticking my head out the fly expecting dark clouds I was surprised to see the storm just leaving Idaho Falls, with “rain” falling from the tree branches instead of the sky. We got started late because we needed to stock up on bike tubes, simple yet vital pieces for any type of cycling. After saying good bye and thank you to our host that night, we made our way west, or so we thought. Two miles in, I realized we had made a wrong turn. Before we would correct this, we stopped at a gas station to enquire of the road ahead. They claimed that while there was not many services from Idaho Falls to the town of Arco, there should be a few gas stations. Not wanting to weigh ourselves down, we stocked up on water and only bought a loaf of bread “Just in case”.

The first 20 miles we had a steady cross wind from the south, making riding not ideal but doable. At one water break along the road we saw a dot up ahead, why yes! Another cyclist! The turned turned out to be a women who was riding a large loop from Missuola to raise money for charity. After a nice chat, we pressed ahead only to meet up with another cyclist. This man, who looked in his late 60’s was biking from Seattle to South Dakota, just for fun. We found out from him that the only water until Arco was at a rest stop 40 miles ahead. He gave us a spare bottle just in case. Soon after this, our route shifted, now we were directly into the wind. The wind also began to pick up, surpassing 30 miles per hour. As mentioned before, wind is either a cylsist best friend or enemy. This began hours upon hours of moving what felt like only inches. Watching my speed, we were lucky to get above 8 mph . Even down hill we managed only 9mph. Our stomachs were the first to complain. We purposefully had a light breakfast, a pastry and shared quart of chocolate milk, expecting to get something later. However, there was no “somethings” later. Our food until we would reach Arco would be bread and water. I must say, after hours of fighting a headwind that bread and water tasted more like steak and wine than anything else.

Even if we ran out of bread the body fat would eventually kick in providing energy. Unfortuetly however, I am not a camal and cannot store water. The gallon or so of water we had each was beginning to dwindle. What used to last all day was lasting only a couple hours. My body was telling me to drink the whole bottle to quench my thirst, but my mind understood I did not know how much further more water was. Every five miles I allowed myself a half bottle, savoring every drop, allowing it to linger in my mouth seemingly extending its quenching effects. We pulled into the rest area with barely a few drops left. Both Sauder and I stood at the fountain for what seemed like an eternity, drinking the lukewarm water to our fill. We had 18 miles left until Alco. The wind was still blowing hard and the sun was setting. I had seen a warm-showers host offering camping the day prior and had been in contact. I contacted him to say that we would arrive after dark. He said not to bother because he was on his way to pick us up. This was blessing, the wind was not slowing down, the sun was setting and storm clouds had been forming in the sky.

So here we are, staying at a disabled veterans house, chatting about guns, the army, food, and more guns. I tried offer the man dinner for helping us out, but he declined, he did however accept my thanks through beer. Tomorrow we are hoping to get to another host home, around 88 miles away, we hope to get an early start. Here are some pictures of today and the past few days, sorry about them being lopsided, can't fix it right now.. Just turn your head! :)