Saturday, May 22, 2010

Wading through shit again

Today was basically the same as yesterday. We travelled 60 miles
against brutal head winds yet again. However, at times the winds were
much stronger than the past couple days.

Firstly I will mention that it is very hard to sleep when the wind is
pummeling your tent all night long. Shit is loud and at times
worrisome that your tent is going to get blown away. I was even scared
we were about to be caught in a tornado at some point as the winds
were that strong. Besides all that, we woke up at 6am only to find
that it was raining. Luckily it let up after about an hour so we began
to mobilize around 7. We ate some chips and pretzels for breakfast, as
they were all we had, before heading out against severely strong winds
and 100% humidity. The humidity was almost as bad as the wind. It was
sort of like riding through jello. Everything was wet and my hair was
just dripping all over the damn place.

We miserably struggled through this shit for about 12 miles. After
about 4 of those I was more exhausted than any other point in the
entire trip. Since we both felt like dying we decided to try to hitch
a ride. No one would bite and we weren't exactly trying very hard to
look desperate. That is until the bolts holding my rear rack broke
off. I guess with all the weight and the strong ass winds pushing on
my panniers the bolts couldn't take it. So here we were with a
legitimate reason to hitch as I could no longer carry my shit. Lucky
for us it wasn't long before an old man named Melvin picked us up and
drove us 15 miles to the next town, comstock, where he lived. He had a
huge tool shed and helped me get my rack back in order with some wire
and a new bolt. Thanks Melvin! Thanks to weiner dog too!

We were now ahead of schedule so we chilled and had some shitty lunch
at a small restaraunt in comstock. The food was basically freezer
food, bet it wad better than what we had been eating. From this point
we had 30 more miles to our destination of del rio. We decided the
best way to handle it was to straight kill it and ride as hard as we
could to get it over with. I suppose you could say it was like
removing a band aid. It is either over quick and sort of painful, or
slow and sort of torturous.

Our method worked out fairly well. We both pushed hard as shit and
knocked out the 30 miles in about 3.5 hours. I must say, those were
the most intense 30 miles I have ever ridden. We were both completely
spent by the time we were finished. Fortunately, del rio has a super
cheap motel six for $30 and we were stoked to chillax in it. We both
needed to get out of the wind so we could actually sleep tonight.

So now our new pickle is that tomorrow the winds are supposed to be at
their strongest and we are both physically drained. We feel like
taking a day off to rest might help with upcoming days, however, the
wind may not go away by monday and if we don't ride tomorrow we will
basically be gambling and could easily screw ourselves. Oof!

On a brighter note! Tomorrow is the series finale of lost! We will
HAVE to get another hotel to watch it.

2 comments:

  1. hope you fools got some sleep and something decent to eat. Yesterday I picked up a tourist that was getting pummeled with rain, wind and groppel in a lovely 34 degrees. my girl and i took him to some sweet ass hotsprings complete with beer and food

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  2. Feel free to come do the same or us. We have at least 2 more days of this shit

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