Attitude Adjustment

Sunday June 17.  Ely NV to Baker NV; 63 miles.  Total Trip Miles: About 470

Today was another tough day in the Nevada desert.  We got started at about 9:30, which I have grown to believe is way too late.  It was another very windy day, although for most of the day, at least the wind wasn't in our faces.  Just the same, it was coming in from 3 o'clock and that makes it a challenge to pedal in a straight line.  We drank a lot of water today, as we have been every day, and by the end of the day I concluded that we don't have enough capacity to make our next 83 mile jump without getting at least some more capacity - in the form of milk jugs, or half gallon juice bottles.  Did I mention that there is no water available along the way?

Revisiting our dilemma of a couple days ago, I must say that I, for one, experienced a shift in my attitude about the trip.  As I have mentioned earlier, for years I have been wanting to make this trip.  Riding my bike across the country.  It seemed evident to me that that meant starting out from home (as I have always lived within easy riding distance of the Pacific) and riding all the way to the Atlantic.  I never really gave any thought to any additional qualifiers such as riding the longest route, or the shortest, or the hardest, or any of the other est's that may be dreamt of.  As we rode in the back of Chad's truck, being whisked over perhaps 200 miles, I knew that we were not going to be riding coast to coast, every inch of the way.  Actually, that possibility was put to rest a few days earlier when we accepted a 20 mile lift from Darryl while we were struggling to climb the Sierras.  And I was profoundly OK with that.  As Riley and I were talking, while the scenery zipped by us at 70 miles mer hour, we both decided that even that development had turned the journey into much more of an adventure.  Hey, adventure is what I was hoping for!

Back to the notion of an est crossing.  I read somewhere, I believe on somebody's blog, about "stick bikes" and "baggage bikes", at least that's what I remember them being called.  A stick bike is a bare-bones bicycle, while a baggage bike is one with racks & bags.  What that means in the context of being out here on our journey, is that we have seen and met one baggage biker, our friend Denis.  He proved to be a great guy.  We have seen some stick bikers as well.  They are riding ultra-light, expensive bikes, and require the support of a "sag wagon"  which is a vehicle that carries literally everything that they will need for the trip.  One stick biker passed us today, in the same direction, and he didn't even say hi, much less slow down long enough to chat for even a minute.  This struck me as odd, perhaps even rude; there we were riding along Highway 50, the "Loneliest Road in America", 20 or so miles out from the last town with 40 or so miles to the next, and you don't even say hi?  The other stick bikers we met were only marginally more friendly, and that may be because we were not moving at the time.   I guess that if what's most important about a trip is to pedal every inch of the way, then I too, should be on a stick bike.  But it seems to me that the sag wagon, spare parts, spare bike, extra water, emergency ride home (if necessary), and reliable  housing (did I mention that sag wagons are usually RVs?) takes almost all of the adventure out of the journey.

I knew for the better part of the afternoon that we were on the road entirely too late in the day.  I could also tell by how weary we both were, and by how fatigued my legs felt while we were climbing our second pass of the day, that we could use a rest day.  What really sealed the deal was how much water we had drank that day and the fact that our next leg of the journey was 20 miles longer - 83 miles without any water available.  On today's leg from Ely to Baker, there actually was a place for us to get water, and consequently, we drank more water than we could carry.  We definitely needed to get additional containers, but by the time we arrived, Baker's only store was closed.  The need for an early departure, coupled with the need to wait for the store to open meant that we would definitely be making a tactical decision.

As we ate our dinner, we discussed our options.  Seeing as how the summer was no longer about riding coast to coast, every inch of the way, we thought about trying our hands at hitchhiking once again, just to get past one of the long, dry mountainous legs in the desert.  Did I mention that we have grown very weary of the desert?  But it just so happened that the town of Baker was holding its annual Snake Valley Festival and for the first time ever, but so surprising for a town of fewer than a hundred people, the carnival was in town!

Because we arrived pretty late in the day, the festival was over and the carnies were packing up.   After dinner, we went over and talked with them to ask where they would be heading next, and to explore the possibility of hitching a ride.  As you might imagine, for such a small town, you don't need a very large carnival.  We were told where we could find the boss and proceeded to go talk with him.  The long and the short of it is that he wasn't sure at that moment, where they would be bound, but Eagle Colorado was perhaps the most likely destination.  He also said that he should have a much clearer idea by the end of tomorrow.

Most of the heavy lifting of the tear-down will be done tomorrow, so depending on where they are bound, Riley and I just might be throwing our hats in for a day of work as carnies in exchange for a ride east.  How's that for an unforeseen and adventurous development?

Dale