Mile 1092.45 - I give us a day off

Seeing as I had broken 1000 miles the day before and that I had crossed three states and most importantly, that it was raining/snowing most of the day to the east of me, I decided to take a day off. I went to the office to tell the them of my intention to stay another night. VJ, the owner, talked to me for about a half an hour, in the process offering to sell me the motel. Don't think I didn't think about that too for several miles.

Anyway, I went back to the room and relaxed for a couple hours. Then, when it seemed that the rain was pretty much all to the east of me, I decided to take a day trip. 11 miles west of Kemmerer is Fossil Butte National Monument. 50,000,000 years ago, that part of the state was the all under a large freshwater lake. Because of the periodic expanding and retracting of the shoreline and the nature of the rock that formed the lake bed, there are hundreds of thousands of fossils in the area's mountains. 35 years ago, a large swath was turned into national park, but for decades before that, people used to carry off fossils by the truckload.

Highway 30 getting there was typically hilly western Wyoming terrain. There was a good long downhill going west, but because of the headwind, I was only able to get up to 36.5mph, the same high speed I had the day before. Because I had a place to leave all my stuff, I had only a couple bottles of water on the bike. I'm so used to the extra weight on the front tire, I forgot how lightly she handles without the ballast. We were wobbly for the first bit as it really has been over 1000 miles since we've ridden without the weight. Quickly enough we figured each other out, and then Penny reminded me of how quick and spry she is under all my luggage. We were about 75% faster than with the weight. There were several hills I climbed that I never dropped my front gear out of third. With all the weight in third gear I'd be taking those hills at about 4.5mph.

Anyway. The visitor's center for the national monument is 4 miles off the highway. Halfway along, I noticed a grey rock on the side of the road that seemed shinier than the other rocks around. As I got up to it, I saw it was someone's camera. Anyone in a car going 35mph would never have seen it. I took it up to the visitor's center and gave it to the ranger. Apparently someone had been asking if anyone found a camera earlier that morning. I hope it eventually gets back to it's owner.

I looked at the displays at the center, then asked the ranger about the couple hikes around the park. She told me that one of them was closed at the moment because storms had knocked down trees in the last couple weeks. But, since I was on my bike and not in a car, I could go around the gate and at least ride up to the trailhead. So that's cool, I always like the perks of not having a car. I ended up riding up to the gate, trying for several minutes to get a good picture of a bluejay that was flitting around, and then decided that I didn't want to take the climb up to the top of the bluff. The ranger also told me of the old US 30, which parallels the current (paved) 30 back into town. She said there were a couple old mining tunnels to explore along the road, which is something that I would totally poke my nose into.

Right by where Old 30 starts is the Ulrichs Fossil Gallery. Curious as always, I stopped in. Penny, the woman working in the gallery, started talking to me about everything from transcontinental cycling to the process of excavating and processing the fossils. Because it is state land, they have to give the state anything rare that they find (pretty much everything other than fish) but they have lots of very nicely framed fish fossils for sale. The one I really wanted was $420, but I really couldn't justify the purchase at the moment. Maybe next time I go back. I was invited back to go dig in the quarry, because it had been too rainy the last several days to go up this afternoon. As I was talking to Penny (gallery worker, not bike) four other tourists came in, and soon we were all talking about intricacies of riding one's bike across a country.

I started onto Old 30, but very quickly two things were obvious: this is not a good road when wet and the heavy trucks driven by the crew working on the Union-Pacific rail line nearby really made things worse. At a couple points I had to stop to pull the thick sticky mud out of the brake calipers. After a couple miles I was able to get back to the paved 30 and took that back into town.

I went out to dinner at the Bootlegger, the restaurant VJ had recommended the day before, but had closed before I got there. I made sure to get there before 8 this time. The one completely ridiculous thing about Kemmerer is that at 8:05, the only restaurant in town that is open is the Taco Time, a little drive thru taco joint. Um, no. Anyway, soup, entree, dessert and two beers and it was $25. I love how much less expensive food is here than at home in New York. I have still been tipping by my new york standard, which I'm sure translates into gross over-tipping by local custom. Oh well, I havn't met a waiter who minds yet.

After dinner, I went to the bar next door and had two beers and two shots and it was $11.50. That's a beautiful thing. Also, the beer was Leinenkugel's which is rare to find outside the midwest.

I got back to the room with enough daylight left to clean all the mud off of Penny (the bike, not the employee). I probably got a good 6 ounces of mud off her frame. So yeah, I give us a day off and what do we do? Ride 32 miles worth of hills and get really muddy. Sounds like a good day off to me.

Day 15, Kemmerer WY - Fossil Butte Ntl Mnmt and back to Kemmerer
32.0 miles, 1092.45 total 2:58:37 today, 88:32:27 total, high speed 36.5