Deby's catching up

August 30/09 - Randolf, Utah
Mileage: 109.1 km
Total mileage: 1503 km
Ride time: 5:20 hrs

South down Hwy 89 from Montpellier, Idaho. Large valley, agricultural and fairly flat. Made good time.

Deby was right behind me most of the day. I think she's almost ready to start carrying the tent and cook stove. Either that, or I will have to let some air out of her tires.

50 kms out we stopped at Merlin's Drive Inn restaurant for lunch. Had the best burgers in America. If you are ever by this way you have to check it out (It's in Garden City,Utah).

As we travelled south we skirted the west side of Bear Lake. Bear Lake is huge and is very unique in it's color. Although there are no glaciers around here it is that turquoise blue of a glacial lake. Heavily used for recreation; there were thousands of people on the shores and in the water enjoying it. We turned east around the south end of the lake and then made an 8 km ascent up a beautiful canyon. There is typical Utah red cliffs now starting to appear. In the canyon among the sage grew large junipers and what looked like split cone pines. The climb was lots of work, but there was no stopping for either of us. The reward, a 12 km decent to Sage Creek Junction.

All desert as we descended. At the junction we turned south on hwy 16 and into a massive headwind. This was where Deby fell behind. She took up drafting me and we continued on slowly to Randolf.

The valley here becomes like a wide plain. There is a stunning mountain range to the southeast that borders the valley with a continuous rock wall. Mostly hay land and cattle ranching here.

You know how you learn something new everyday, well, you also forget something everyday!! I know better by now, but I accepted campground information from a local, no questions asked. We ended up riding 2 miles west of town on a washboard gravel road to a run down campground in the middle of a field. Used mostly as a turn around point for other campers I'm sure. We were stuck here. You just can't back track that much when your riding a bike.

A good day anyway!