Day 6: recovery, and the end of Western Express Map 1

75 big ones today.. On our recovery day!! It put our mileage at 325, and with the ferry we are at a trip total of 358.  We woke up late, took our time and got on the road by 10. It was beautiful. It was mainly straight aways surrounded by desert mountains and the valley. Our first stop was Carson City, where we met some interesting folk as we checked out the local McDonalds. (yes, we were starving after 10 miles). We had a good stretch of about 4 mills in Nevada's capital city where there were fast food after fast food after fast food places, with a casino or car dealership every now and then. In fact, the only whole food places we saw was out of business. Thus was some what frightening to me. We east as much as we can because we burn so many calories, but you can feel the difference between an egg Mcmuffin and a sandwich. You can feel it a on the bike. I'm really learning a lot about fuel effectiveness on this trip. Apparently i don't belong in Carson city because b of that. The actual downtown district was pretty cool, very old wild west looking. There was obviously so much history there.  I haven't had experience with a lot of western movies, but it was fun to try to imagine these places years and years ago!

We made it to Dayton, next, home of Nevada's first gold discovery. We only had a few hills and they felt so easy compared to what we had been doing. The hills are definitely getting easier as we find our legs.  It felt like they were hardly at any incline at some point, and it was the heat that gave them their difficulty. I'm sure, however, if we had started out on these hills on Day 1, we would have thought they were absolutely horrendous.

We were thinking of stopping our morning ride at Stagecoach, a good half way point. When we got there, we realized that it would be better to keep going to silver springs. The only gas station we could see had gone out of business, and the buildings surrounding it were just as dilapidated. It was really sad. We stopped at a store to replenish our water, and the shelves were stocked full with liquor and cigarettes and the candy aisle and some of the grocery section had boxes of certain items like Snickers and kit Kats that were emptied and upside down because it seemed like no one was buying them and / or the local economy could not support it.  The next store in the complex was a bar, with cigarette smoke wafting out of the doors.

At silver springs, we celebrated as our trip odometer hit the 300 mile mark (minus the ferry) and we saw a laundromat.  It feels so good to have clean clothes. What perfect timing as we were about to hit the desert!

The owner gave us fresh water and let us pick out a movie as we unpacked our bags and had our smelly belongings sprawled everywhere. It was paradise (AC, too, which felt great coming from the 101 degree heat). We looked at our next map which begins in Fallon and ends in Cedar City, UT. We were all excited because we naively thought that the "desert" would be flat and we would be Smooth sailing, especially street the Sierras. Oh my were we wrong and unpleasantly surprised by the elevation map. There are so many climbs  ahead of us (many back up to the 7000 range) and there is little shade and service stations. We will have to be very prepared with food and water and each bring an extra 2 gallons on to of our water bottles, which will add some serious weight, but it is necessity. We will do early morning rides and rest during the heat wave. This will be a new challenge, for sure. Luckily there was a trucker sorting close to us who had been listening to our disappointment and anxieties and reassured us that if we could do the Sierras, these next 400 miles were totally  Do able. One pedal at time. I am confident that while thus next pass is rather daunting, we will most definitely make it, and face the rockies. We get get stinger everyday.

Or last 26 miles tonight were incredible. We had a brilliant sunset behind us, one of many I'm sure, and an incredible headwind. It was a blast. The wind was coming at us from the South West add we were headed East and it was fun to try to play with body and bike position to try to really catch the"surf". At one point we were cruising along at a steady 22.5 mph, which is great for a full load (we will find a higher avg than that at some points during this trip). Pedaling was so effortless as gained distance so quickly. It felt like i was floating. At other points i found myself pushing back against the wind as i felt it was going to push me over. What a rush!