Day 17 – Fruita, CO to Montrose, CO via US-50, 17 Jun 2014

Map and Pics:  Click Here for Map and Pics.

Miles 1151 to 1226, 75 miles, 3130 feet of climb, max speed: 33 mph, avg speed 8 mph



Dominguez Canyon seen from US 50



We crossed two extremely swift rivers today, first the Colorado in Grand Junction, and then the Gunnison in Delta CO. Most of the ride today was uphill except for swooping down into canyons along the mesa walls and then climbing back up the other side. Around 8 AM the wind started, and everything turned ‘uphill’ from that point on. A truly amazing surprise was the Dominguez Canyon. It just happened along the side of the road where once it was miles of mesa table top on the right and left. What a sight! Another interesting thing that happened was that we stopped to help a broken down motorist today. He was a doctoral student at U of CO at Denver and had just come back from a sedimentary rock study in Utah in land where we had just ridden through. He had decided to take the scenic route back home and found out scenic routes don’t have cell phone towers. Today we also got to see our future – and the snow on those hills started at the base, not just dust the top. We can expect to start seeing snow at 9,000 feet of elevation. Al always wears a great smile for pictures.





Al, and our first good view of the Rockies

Mirria. This was the windiest day in remembrance for all the riders. NOAA officially reported sustained winds between 29 and 35 with gusts to 59 mph. Yup. Here are the rules of thumb: 10 mph is like adding 2 percent climb to the ride, can glide downhill. 20 mph is like adding 4 percent climb to the ride, must pedal downhill. 30 mph is when dust and grime from the highway is picked up and starts to sting your legs. 35 mph is when dust and grime from the desert starts to sting your face. 40 mph is when the desert hovers about ten feet above the surface and everything goes dusty. 45 mph is when bikers ride on the sidewalls of their tires trying to maintain balance, eyes get full of grit no matter how good the protection is. 50 mph is when you steer into the wind and everything is push with the feet and reacting with the hands. 55 mph is where you see rocks rolling up hill. 60 mph is really bad, almost un-ridable except when facing the wind directly head on, and bikes and riders can be picked up and tossed a few feet down wind sliding over the pavement (especially the skinny-minis). 70 mph is what happened to almost all of us as we descended into Montrose today along a cut in the ridge. Not only did the wind stop forward progress, but before I could get my feet out of the stirrups the wind stopped me and pushed me back up the hill. Two of us got off the bikes safely, but Al ended up in a ditch. We collectively thought the wind would stop but it did not, and after two minutes of being spanked with dust, we pushed our bikes out of the cut (about 300 feet) to where we could look up again. Other than that, today’s ride was another day in paradise. This ride should have taken 4 hours, it took us 9, some 12 hours. Brutal.

Everybody’s spirits are still quite high. This will be a day we tell everybody about when we return home. Even the Dutch thought it breezy today, and they train in the winds that come off the North Sea. (They call their wind “Dutch Mountains”.) Most of their country in under sea level, so elevation is not available – but the wind sure is, and salt spray along the dikes.

Bottom Line: Circle this day. I can’t believe we all made it in safely.