Kremmling, CO

Now in Kremmling, at the library. I've never appreciated the value of libraries as much as I have on this trip.

The ride here from Steamboat has been lovely. Good dirt road conditions, beautiful mountains.

We've had our first encounter with "weather". It rained lightly yesterday morning for a few hours, and then started again in the evening about five minutes after we got the tent set up and everything in it - we were racing against the inbound rain. It stormed off and on all night, heavy rain, huge thunderclaps, lightning - the whole thing. We had a nice campsite in grass in a valley (right next to the creek ford, for those familiar with the route) so the lightning was not troublesome. Fortunately for us, the rain stopped before we started riding this morning.

Yesterday morning, while it was raining lightly, we were ready to stop for lunch but didn't want to spread our food out in the rain. I rode up a driveway to a rural house to ask permission to sit under their eave. As is often the case in rural areas when traveling by bike, the couple at the house was very kind and allowed us to sit on their deck, out of the wind and drizzle. In addition to being dry, it had hummingbird feeders and Gray Jays (coming in for daily bread).

We met our first motorcycle GDR riders yesterday. A couple of gents from Laramie WY. They started last year in Roosville MT, but abandoned when one lost a battle with the dreaded chasing dogs. He said he was watching a couple dogs coming out from the left side of the road and was caught by surprise by a dog coming in from the right side. The collision with the dog left him with a broken shoulder and a damaged motorcycle. Jim was chased and bitten by a dog early in our trip, but fortunately the dog took a bite out of the Ortlieb pannier instead of taking a bite out of Jim's leg. Last year my friend Martin got a pretty good bite in the leg. Dogs are probably the most unavoidable problem for bicycles, but I didn't know they caused grief for motorcycle tourists as well.

We've only met one other pair of cyclists who are riding Roosville->Antelope Wells. We've met a few other cyclists riding short stretches of the route this year. We've heard that there are a couple other parties several days ahead, and another party a few days behind.

We've just ridden through the Gore Range of mountains, near the Colorado River. This is fun for me because my first high mountain backpacking experience was in the Mt Zirkel Wilderness in the Gore Range back in 1971, when my good brother Steve took most of my family up into the high country. We rode just west of that wilderness area a day or two ago.

The folks at Orange Peel Bicycles in Steamboat Springs were fantastic - every GDR rider should stop in there just to say hello.

All is well, and we'll post again when we can. Amy & Jim