The next few rides through Colorado, we have mountain passes daily which is intense. Today's climb was Hoosier Pass where we hit 11, 539 feet! Not too shabby! I rode most of the climb with Zach and it was great. Hoosier Pass with Zach, best climb of the
trip so far. Seemingly each day that goes by I think, there is no way it can get better than this, and then it does. It’s unreal.
Our view leaving Breckenridge!
Kristie’s brother Scott did the first part of the ride with us, it’s so great to have B&B alumni on the ride! Everyone who has ever done Bike & Build understands what an amazing experience this is, it’s really cool.
While the climb up Hoosier pass was one of my favorites so far, the descent was pretty crappy. There was a lot of construction going on and only one lane was open for traffic. I started the ride down behind Kristie and Zach and we were pretty spaced out for safety reasons. The people controlling the lane traffic did not have walkie talkies and had let oncoming traffic come up the mountain despite us coming down. It's terrifying to be coming down at fast speeds and have oncoming traffic in your lane. Finally, a guy in a tractor trailer informed the traffic controller and stopped traffic until a few of us had come down.
Molly, me, Zach, Kristie and Heather at the summit!
We met everyone in a cafe after the descent to warm up and chill out for a few minutes. Its tough having a really challenging morning and then still having a majority of the mileage left to do. We had a great second half of the day however. We were riding in relatively flat valleys with the mountain views all around us. The sun was shining and we were happy campers!
That is until after lunch...haha. The winds picked up big time in the last 20 miles and we tried to paceline the whole way into Salida. I will climb mountains, ride in hail, be ok with intense heat, but god, nothing makes you want to quit more than terrible headwinds. At first you try and tell yourself, ok, 20 miles of headwinds, we can do this...then 20 minutes later when you have gone something absurd like 4 miles, you get really ticked off and frustrated and then you hit a wall where you become so exhausted and frustrated, that you just laugh because it is so ridiculous. This is pretty much what happened today. When we finally got to the host, we were all pretty slap happy and cracked out.
Zach -still happy and without headwinds here...beautiful, beautiful ride!
I headed straight to a bike shop (Absolute Bikes - it was awesome!) for some minor tune ups and then immediately to the hose shower in the parking lot of the church. Then a few of us headed out to a bar to relax and catch our breath.
Salida is such a cute, small town. It is certainly worth visiting if you're ever in the area. Really cool artsy and eclectic shops, and everyone we met was awesome. We are all slowly but surely falling in love with Colorado. I think 6 of us have decided that we will someday come out here to live. It is truly exceeding my expectations in the best way!
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