Day Six – Shadows Getting Longer

Daily Brief

Starting in Bliss, we made our way to Glenn’s Ferry for lunch. It was smooth riding until the wind and hills picked up, just about the time that we thought we couldn’t take any more. Thankfully the smooth asphalt of Boise provided a little relief as we finished up our longest run yet.

The Day

We woke up and said our finals goodbye’s to Carsten, our first driver. From here on out his mother (Bonnie) will be driving the support vehicle. We’ll miss his quirky antics and hook-ups, like getting random jelly beans from the guy who fixed the vans tire for only $14.00 (Day two). We left Bliss at about 10:30 AM and jumped onto highway 84. After awhile we got tired of 84. There was the usual traffic but the rumble strips (alert strips) were cutting across almost the entire shoulder where we were riding, so we only had about a foot between the rumble strips and the far right lane of the highway. We decided to hop back onto highway thirty.

Highway thirty proved to be painful. It was hot, hilly and windy, although we did enjoy some of the scenery. Green alfalfa fields made it look like we were somewhere with water, like Kentucky. Aside from that it was fairly barren. We crossed a lot of empty space, and decided to get back onto the 84. Before we got back onto the 84 we came to Mountain Home and took lunch. Everyone had McDonalds except Parry, who decided to try out Chandler’s suggestion and go for some cold soup. Not bad, not bad at all, just make sure not to do the condensed kind.

Heading out of Mountain Home Chandler caught sight of a bike shop, Tony’s bike shop. He turned off and told us to go ahead. We went a little further and waited, and waited, and Chris and Parry went back to the bike shop. When Chris and Parry arrived back at the bike shop Chandler was just in the middle of getting his bike fixed. He had lost the use of three of his gears because of a broken derailleur part. Tony fixed him up, spent an hour on his bike, and only charged Chandler the original $12.00 quote. Thanks Tony!

Meanwhile, Shaun and Kregg had gone ahead and started onto the 84 again. Chris, Parry, and Chandler jumped on the 84 and eventually caught up. The 84 was worse then before and shifty winds kept catching us from different sides. No drafting angle was perfect, or could keep us protected from the menacing winds.

At a random exit we met up with the support Van. Bonnie (Chandler’s mother and new Van driver) had already filled up the water jug with ice cold water which we all very much enjoyed. At the support Van we evaluated our progress and realized we had 29 miles to go. We were exhausted from the wind and the 70 or so miles we had already traveled. We ate doughnuts, and hit the road again.

As we took on 84 again the sun was getting lower, our shadows were getting longer. Whether we moved or not, our shadows would grow and grow until darkness took over the sky and made our ride dangerous if not impossible. Thankfully we found relief in Boise. Smooth asphalt, and a lack of headwind helped propel us forward to our destination, which was actually Meridian (a little past Boise itself by a few miles). In the last few miles the sun was low in the sky and started to blind us. We rode into the sun for about half an hour and made it to Meridian. We arrived at the Gwilliams house, the kind souls that were going to let 5 sweaty, dirty guys take over their attic. We crashed in front of their house as the sun was saying its final goodbyes and waited as the Gwilliams made it home. After some much needed showers, Shaun and Kregg went to Carabas and the rest of us ate some Mac N Cheese. We talked, watched the season finale of The Office and got some much needed sleep.

Daily Stats

Distance: 103.00 Miles
Time: 6:48
Avg. Speed: 15.1
Max Speed: 35.21

Total Distance: 453.37

P & C Pushups 125