Brian Richardson
A hundred miles to the east of Cody, across a wide dry basin, are Wyoming’s Bighorn Mountains; this range presents our highest pass in the Rockies. Because of the sparsely placed towns in the Bighorn Basin, our options for today’s ride were to make it halfway across, leaving a monster climb for tomorrow afternoon, or to do a full century. Fueled by the best breakfast I’ve had all summer, the choice was clear to me.
Michael and Usher sit down to a delicious breakfast prepared by John and Brenda: waffles, scrambled eggs from the backyard chickens, fresh berries, homemade whipped cream, homemade rhubarb jam, …
Just a few minutes into the ride, we could already see the Bighorn range on the horizon. Its snowcapped peaks could almost be mistaken for stratus clouds. Throughout the day, the mountains would grow and come into focus, and we’d get a better picture of the climb in store for us tomorrow.
Friend heads out across the Bighorn Basin
According to John, when Buffalo Bill Cody laid out the plans for the town of Cody, he wanted the roads to be wide enough for horse-drawn wagons to be able to do a U-turn without waiting for a pullout. Today, these wide roads allow for excellent bike lanes. For most of the morning we had a six-foot shoulder—wide enough for us to comfortably ride in a 2x2 formation.
The wide shoulders around Cody were not entirely free of hazards
With generally flatter terrain than we’ve had so far this summer, we made good time for the first 40 miles, even after two flat tires. By midday, however, the UV index had reached a top-of-the-ear-blistering 11, and shade was hard to come by. We stopped frequently throughout the afternoon to drink water and apply and re-apply SPF 100 sunscreen.
Friend notices a flat in his rear tire
Friend hides in the only available shade while Usher addresses a flat tire
Throughout this trip, we’ll visit many well known areas that are destinations in and of themselves; last week we saw Yellowstone and soon we’ll see the Black Hills and Badlands. These sections are exciting to me and tend to live up to the hype, but I especially love seeing special places that I would never otherwise think to visit. The Bighorn Basin is one of these gems. Through the sweat and sunscreen, we made out some truly beautiful scenery and fauna today.
Scenes from the Bighorn Basin
We arrived at our destination of Ten Sleep, WY to find that the cheapest camping option is behind the Ten Sleep Brewery. In recent years, the surrounding area has become a mecca for summer rock climbing, and this brewery—like our Smith Rock campsite in Terrebone, OR— houses most of the climbers during the summer. Luckily for us, the brewery also had pizza and live music tonight. After setting up camp and taking some much needed showers, we enjoyed the bluegrass jam band “Shot in the Foot,” and met some lovely Wyoming people.
Shot in the Foot plays outside the Ten Sleep Brewery
In yesterday’s post, Friend discussed his bike and touring gear. I’ll do the same here for mine.
I’m riding a Surly Long Haul Trucker. As the name suggests, it’s built for the long haul, and it almost everywhere sacrifices being lightweight for being sturdy. It has a steel frame, low bottom bracket, long chainstay, and 26” wheels. I think of it as the cast iron skillet of bikes: heavy and old-fashioned, but with proper care and lubrication able to last a lifetime.
The bike is on its third trip across the country and has well over 10,000 miles on it. At this point most of the components have been replaced at least once.
My favorite additions and accessories include: Ortlieb rear panniers, a brooks saddle, aerobars, front and rear fenders, and most recently a small handlebar bag.
My trusty steed