Aug 10-11; Durango to Chama to Espanola

I'm writing today in Espanola, a town in the greater Santa Fe area. we'll be going through Santa Fe tomorrow. The trip is really starting to feel long, there is stuff going on at home that I'm missing being a part of. when I got in today I called both BR and Ronni and got up to date a bit. I still love riding my bike, though. Amazing but true. Five days left to ride, then this all will be a memory. That said, its far from a memory now. I still am prety tired, today was a very slow day. I settled in on the bike and pedalled either slowly, slower or not at all, the exception being the hills when I would spin up in a gear at least two cogs lighter than I ordinarily would use. Yesterday morning, when I woke up in Durango I felt just as tired as I had the night before when I wrote my last post. I had no idea how I was going to make it through a 122 mile day that had over 6500 ft of up to it. So from the beginning I set a high cadence, higher than I usually do and whenever I fet any stress in my legs, I would shift to a higher cog. This method worked. I stayed in the saddle a lot longer than usual, and I felt pretty good all the way to lunch. The morning's route was the only stretch of this ride that followed the same route as the cross country ride in 2005. I didn't enjoy it then, but it is really pretty nice, on highways 172 & 151 through beautiful rolling pasture land, then national forest past Chimney Rock, until we we rejoined the busy hwy 160 for the last few miles into Pagosa Springs for lunch (grilled cheese & tomato sandwiches)., The afternoon we rode long gentle rollers for the rest of the afternoon, into New Mexico and to the town of Chama. Vicious headwindfs at the end, and a bit of rain as well. Chama seems to be a dying town, but we had a real good dinner at the lone restaurant in Chama. I had an interesting chatwith rider Ruth's husband Jim, who is not riding but is enjoying the National Parks and the various other beautiful things aroudn here that I am unable to, being stuck on the bike, or resting up for tomorrow. He's a prefessor of International Conservation at Cornell, and I talked with him about both EA and CEMAR.

This morning breakfast was at the luxurious hour of 7:30, as we had a short, 80 mile day, a straight shot down route 84. I woke up at 5 anyway, finished yesterday's post, the read yhe New York Times om my PDA. That was prety cool. Susan made eggs this morning; I age thrm and my usual breakfast too !

It turned out to be a good day to be cooked, as I couldn't really ride too slow to miss anything. We started out in woodsy rollers like yesterday, but gradually descending until we hit a long, ten mile descent that brought us decidedly into mesa country. Stopped off at the beautiful arch amphitheater, and spent the rest of day in New Mexico looking scenery. I had my first flat of the trip about a mile before lunch. There were only 20 miles after lunch, and about half of them had gone by before John Lake, a strong and fast rider, passed me and I decided to see if I could stay on his wheel. I could; hopefully that bodes well for tomorrow, a 90 mile 5000 foot affair. I've been off my feet as much as possible since getting in. Dinner was at Sonic, the fast food place directly next door. a chicken sandwich, a chicken salad and fries. I may rouse myself to get get a sundae in a little bit.

Soemthing I did not share with all of you right away is that one our riders had a fairly serious accident the morning we were leaving Grand Junction. Diane was riding the wrong way in a bike lane with the rising sun directly at her back, and a car turning right hit her. She has been in the hospital with a fractured cervical vertebrae, and surgery was scheduled for today. It also ended her partner Barry's vacation. So take it from me, everyone, when you are on your bike, assume you are invisible, and do all you can to be noticed. Four other riders have also left the tour, for exhaustion or illness; Kerin leaves after tomorrow's ride for family reasons. Generally, though, this is a strong group; I've been migrating backwards, though!