Day 21 and start of Day 22

A fine day! I'm sitting at the first rest stop in Colorado, typing this up and will post it when I get internet access next. After all of my rest yesterday and a good night's sleep, I was up fairly early. Taking my time to get ready, I had a large continental breakfast, chatting with a couple who had driven into the area to pick up a small hay bailer (they sell farm equipment) and was finally ready to go, with the time still quite early. The weather was sunny and pleasant, with scattered thunderstorms supposed to roll in as the day progressed. Getting onto US-50/US-400, I found a great shoulder and pedaled along in calm weather, enjoying myself immensely.

A few miles down the road, I stopped to get something to eat at a gas station, noticing a guy sitting with a big backpack in the food court, checking out a map. After eating, I went over to talk to him. His name is Ryan, from Ohio and he is apparently hiking from the Pacific to the Atlantic in a wandering, relaxed style and largely "depending on the kindness of strangers" to make it through, using signs telling what he is doing to get free food from passersby and other support - more daring than I would attempt, but it's good to know that there are so many friendly people out there that you can do that to get by just fine!

Ryan had largely traveled from the way I was heading, so we sat discussing the route I had ahead (along with life, road experiences and many other topics) for a while. While we were chatting, another man came in and asked who had the bicycle outside. It turned out that he was biking from the Pacific to Washington D.C. to raise support for a Constitutional amendment to balance the national budget with his parents riding an RV in support, carrying pamphlets and other stuff for his campaign. His website is www.saveamericasfuture.org. At this point, I haven't looked at it, but the next time I have internet, I'll be checking it out. He didn't stay long before hitting the road again, and soon I was off myself.

Getting a few more miles down the road, I saw another bicyclist heading in the opposite direction with a trailer attached and plenty of gear. This was perhaps my favorite meeting so far. The biker was an older man named Lauren Brown. How much older - he was 67 years old, if I recall correctly. Apparently he had joined the Peace Corps a few years back, ended up in India and liked it so much he stayed on an extra year beyond his contracted time. Once he came back to the states, he decided to do this bike trip to try to rainse scholarship funds for Village Children in India! I think what really made him stand out to me was that most riders I have met, especially those with causes, have support vehicles. Not Lauren! He carries not only all of the gear he needs for the trip, but also all of the papers and pamphlets he needs for his cause with him! You can check out his website at www.bfki.us. I'm sure planning to when I can!

We only chatted for a bit, as there was a storm looming to our south and drifting slowly in our direction. Soon we were off on our separate ways. One more meeting capped off the day. Stopping at a Subway for lunch/dinner, two motorcyclists pulled up and got to chatting with me. They were doing a ride across the country from East to West and were happy to chat for a bit about my experiences on the trip as well as what areas of the country they had liked most. Once again, I set off, hoping to make it to the state line before too long.

Sure enough, with the bad weather having missed me all day long, but with some cloud cover to protect me, I pulled across the state line, finding the rest stop that hiker Ryan had suggested to me to be nice, and setting up for the evening despite the sun still being up for a few hours (see, I can take it easy if I really work at it!) The bathrooms here have running water, no warning about the water being non-potable, and best of all, and electric outlet, so I can read some ebooks without worrying about battery life! I've also discovered just how prolific prarie dogs are in some areas! They were all over the place as I went along on the last bit. Grasslands have finally started to give way to scrubland as I'm heading farther west. The two pictures I'll hopefully be able to upload when I get to internet should be Ryan the hiker and Lauren the biker from today. I did get one warning as I was setting up my tent - apparently there's supposed to be hail tonight - my first of the trip! If so, I plan to retreat to the shelter of the bathrooms or one of the picnic shelters, so it shouldn't be a big deal! I'll probably add onto this with tomorrow's experiences before I put it up on the net. Life is good!

Day 22 begins

I managed to miss any hail that fell last night, although it did rain a bit. I woke up partway through the night and could see the incoming storm front, so I moved my tent under one of the picnic shelters, staying dry the whole time. Next morning, it was packing up and off on the road again. Hopefully I'll make it to La Junta by this evening. For now, I'm sitting outside of a gas station in Lamar, CO mooching internet off of a nearby hotel. A few wispy clouds are in the sky, and there has been a light breeze all day, mainly against me, but not too bad. For now, I'm still in the flat part of Colorado, although I have been gaining elevation for the last few days, and am now over 3000 ft above sea level. It will be interesting to see what kind of mileage I get over the mountains! I'll post again when I can!