October 23rd, 2015
It’s uphill all the way from Laramie to the Colorado border, although never steep. Then it’s a fantastically fun roller-coaster ride all the way down to Fort Collins many miles later.
Cycling Stats
Start Point: Laramie, Wyoming, United States of America
Destination: Fort Collins, Colorado, United States of America
106.39 km trip, 4:58 time, 61.7 km/h maximum speed, 21.4 km/h average speed
What happened…
Andrew writes: We waved goodbye to Laurel, Rob and Guy today, but not before enjoying some dumpster-dived breakfast, and accepting a free pound of cheese. Laurel also showed off the tiny home she is building in her driveway, which, when complete, she hopes to move around for a bit until she decides where she wants to live. And then, with fresh snow on the surrounding mountains, we were off and out of Laramie!
I think that the plan for today was to ride to the rest area at the WY-CO border, except that’s where we got by lunchtime. We could see that it would be downhill for quite awhile, and there was a strong tail wind behind us also, so we decided to keep going all the way to Fort Collins. It’s these really long downhills that seem so rewarding; as though being a payoff for all of the constant uphill ever since we left Jackson, WY however long ago. Gosh, it seems like forever, and in reality it’s not even been two weeks! Amanda was having some trouble shifting, and it ended up requiring me to replace her shifter cable. Fortunately I carry a backup, and even then, we were only stopped for maybe 15 minutes to fix it. Despite this “setback” everything conspired to help us today, and blow us into Fort Collins.
Forrest and Savannah were our Warmshowers hosts tonight, and their sharp wit and sense of humour were really fun to play with tonight around the dinner table. I mentioned to Forrest that I had been looking for a pipe, and even though they were still “moving in” to their new home, he was able to dig out a pipe and some tobacco for me to have. It was such a nice gesture even if it did make Amanda a little surly towards me; smokers are jokers she says.
Amanda writes:
I was a bit tentative leaving Laramie when we spotted fresh snow on the mountains around us. I know we’re prepared for the cold weather, but sometimes it’s not much fun. The ride up into Colorado was pretty uneventful and relatively easy. It seemed a no brainer to continue riding down the other side of the climb.
It was weird, the moment we entered Colorado the landscape was peppered with trees. It was almost like they planted a bunch just at the border of the two states. It was downhill and with a tailwind and we took advantage of the situation. We hauled ass into Fort Collins and our hosts were able to welcome us a day earlier.
Turns out we were even earlier for our arrival with our hosts and decided to stop at a gas station and buy a beer and a pop along with a snack and read for an hour before their arrival. We were settled in on a picnic table at the back of the parking lot of the gas station and store and just enjoyed the sun for awhile. As we were leaving on our bikes one of the employees came around the corner and looked at us funny. We said hello and she shook her head and said “weird … some guys said there were two people hanging around that looked like they were going to set up their tent – have you seen them?” We said nope, haven’t seen anyone. As we left we figured they were probably talking about us because our bikes are so loaded. I’m not sure how I feel about this scenario. On one hand clearly someone thought we looked homeless and like we were going to set up, yet the employee didn’t think for a moment it was us. Clearly everyone has a different perspective. After thinking about it, I just knew that clearly I needed to have a shower.