Day 9: hardest recovery day ever

Talk about a deep sleep. I don't remember going to sleep, and we woke up ready to eat everything we had in sight (including spoonfuls of peanut butter). Stiff and laughing about the fact that we had to yet back on the road after yesterday, we clamored on our bikes, only to remember that we had a mountain to climb, first thing. No warm up. Straight up to 7484 feet because they had the build this town on a hill. (we did see the first cactus of the desert... For inches tall next to a garden gnome outside of the cafe by day, bar by night building, built in 1863, with few attempts at up keep).  Our warm up was treacherous, and hot. What a way to not ease into the 70 miles we had before us. And when we done with that, we had a little ride downhill and then right back up to 7200 feet. They didn't even have a sign for that one.  Not to mention we had gone 5 miles and we were already starving again. At the end of that lovely  wake up, we thought we were golden, but we had forgotten about the 3rd pass of the day, and we were met by a very strong wind. (towards us) At this point we were running on empty and, only at mile 25, we say down and had some lunch on the side of the road: tuna with lemon and avocado, and ramen.

Or elevation map looked life out would be a fairly easy day after the third pass, but there were a lot of stretches that felt up hill and the wind was fighting us the whole time. We were struggling.  There is nothing like a good head wind to ruin the party. I am trying to make small adjustments to my bike as we go as i am finding that nerves in my left hand are getting compressed. Once we make it to Cedar City i can go to a bike shop. For now it is my own adjustments to my body and my bike. Roll with the punches, take breaks, laugh, eat, sleep.

We were surrounded by rain clouds at mile 50, and i am pretty sure both us us thought that we wouldn't get caught in the rain. Boy were we wrong, the headwind gave into a tailwind in the eye of the storm, which turned into a crosswind that conveniently blew hail at us. Miraculously there was a bunch of tailors and small house s in a field, 5 miles outside of Eureka, our destination for the day. We found refuge at the side of an old garage next top a stack of tractor tires. We stayed there out of the rain for the next 30 minutes.  We laughed our butts off.  Truthfully we had the whole day.  One of my favorite quotes of all times is "the most wasted of all days is one without laughter." - e.e. Cummings. I can't think of a day, let alone an hour that Lindsay and i didn't find something to laugh or giggle about on this trip... Sometimes to a point where i loose strength to pedal.

We let the rain pass and climbed the last 5 miles to Eureka (seriously what is with the towns on the desert?) We finished the day with a double cheese burger.  Tomorrow we will head 77 miles to Ely. It will be another tough day with climbs, but we'll make it, i know.