Day 18: Casper, WY to Kimball, NE

217 miles

I popped out of bed at 7 o’clock and hurriedly got my stuff together. As nice as the motel room had been, the morning hours are the easiest riding of the day between the cool temperature and light winds. I had needed to sleep though since I hadn’t gone to bed until well after 12. Even though I hadn’t gotten to the motel until 11:30, there were some things that I really wanted to do before I go another couple days of camping. My kit desperately needed to be washed. I haven’t washed anything this entire trip so it had built up quite a collection of stains and filth. It never felt that dirty when I was riding in Alaska or Canada because I usually had outer layers on and it wasn’t hot enough for me to be sweating. It had rain pretty much every day too, that helped wash away some of the visible stains. Nonetheless, my wine colored kit had taken a much darker tone and my jersey was covered in food, sweat, and a bit of blood. I’d had a bloody nose for a couple days in a row in the Yukon and it had gotten all over my kit a couple of times. I threw my clothes in the sink and used bar soap to try to get them down to an acceptable level of filth. After my third round of washing and rinsing, the water still ran dark putrid brown so I kind of gave up and hung them up to dry. At least everything looked a lot cleaner and it certainly smelled better. I wanted to see if there was anything I could do about my growing beard. Calling it a beard might be a little generous, more like out of control scruff. I’d gone long enough without shaving that when I tried to shave last week, the razor hadn’t really been able to get through all the scruff. I’d resigned myself to the fact that perhaps I would ride all the way to Argentina without shaving. But the last few days it’s been hot and my facial expression was a a hair has been a pain to deal with. Little bugs get caught in it, sunscreen doesn’t rub in well, and crumbs of food cling on, telling tales of what I had to eaten days ago. My facial hair was becoming a collection basin, an anthropological record of the things I have done, eaten, and seen. I found a pair of safety scissors and attempted to go to work on my beard. While I had hopes that it would grow into a nice full beard,  it was thin and disheveled and it kind of looked like I had found a dead squirrel on the side of the road and decided to tape it to my face. It took me about 20 minutes of chopping and shaving, but I eventually managed to get a clean shave. I looked at myself in the mirror for the first unobstructed view of my face since leaving Prudhoe Bay. I was little bit shocked by the face that was looking back at me. I’ve definitely lost a bit of weight. Probably about 8 pounds, and it really shows on my face. Unlike my arms when have only been in the sun the past couple days as it’s gotten warmer, my face has been exposed to the elements this entire trip. I expected myself to look weathered and haggard, but was pleasantly surprised to see that I just looked tanned and a little bit skinnier. The subject of my rapid weight loss and its implications, is one which I will return to in the near future in a different blog because I find it quite interesting and there’s a lot of thought that’s gone into it. It felt so incredibly nice to get into bed cleaned up. Even though I only got about 6 1/2 hours of sleep, it was quality sleep. When I started biking I was interested to see how my legs would feel. Yesterday was a pretty big day after 16 days of days in a row, so I wasn’t really sure how my body was going to feel. Initially there was a little bit of protest from my ankle and my knees, but no different than any other day. It took about 30 minutes for my joints to warm up and then everything was back to normal. I felt really great on the bike actually. Mentally, I was prepared for a pretty miserable day. I had woken up to a high wind alert, and the hourly forecast was calling for 25 mile an hour headwinds by noon and 35 mile an hour headwind by the evening with gusts up to 60. At 35 miles an hour it’s kind of borderline whether you can even ride your bike. At 40 miles an hour usually you have to hop off and start walking. With that in mind, I attacked the first couple hours of the day because I knew that it was incredibly important to get a couple miles under my belt before potentially being stopped in my tracks. I turned my phone off and rode in complete silence. I needed a little break and I knew it be good to have some time alone with only my thoughts and no other distractions at all. I was still riding on interstate 25, and the shoulder was nice and big so it kind of felt like I had my own lane, which left me with plenty of room to think. I had a 10 mile an hour headwind, but I honestly didn’t even notice it. I felt really good and was happy with where I got my mind to. By lunch I’d racked up almost 80 miles in five hours. At that point, I knew that even when the wind came, if I could just manage 80 more miles in the next 10 hours, the day would be a success. I took some time to enjoy my lunch because the weather was really nice. The sun was out, but I had a nice table in the shade and for the second day in a row, the wind that would eventually scour me was gifting me a pleasant breeze while I ate. I hopped back on the bike and continued south. The winds came as expected, but I honestly was able to block them out. I somehow managed to do a great job of resetting after last night. In a way, my ability to ignore the wind was a bit of a disguise. I kind of just shut off my mind as a way to cope with it. If I couldn’t think about anything besides the wind then I just wouldn’t think about anything at all. I just turned up the music really loud so I couldn’t hear anything and just pedaled along. There were lots of beautiful horses along the road and vast colonies of prairie dogs. The rolling hills were similar to the past couple of days, but the grasses that grew on them seemed to be a little different. Instead of waving gold in the breeze, these grasses were shorter and stood up straight in defiance of the wind. The grass looked like a sea of soldiers, battered and beaten by their long battle with the wind and sun, but still standing. Baked under many months of Wyoming heat and feeling the effects of the arid weather, the brown blades of grass told tales of hardship from the summer past. A sign above the freeway blinked out “winter is coming, be prepared” the rest of the world might not yet be ready for winter, but these grasses seem to have fought their war, they were ready for a little bit of a break. Prairie dogs popped up and scampered among the grasses. They called out in utter alarm at my presence. It’s not every day a cyclist passes them on the side of the interstate. I must’ve seen several thousand of the little fellows today and each one cried out to let my presence be known. They sound a bit like a bird when they chirp. I find them quite entertaining to watch. In a sad way it’s a bit ironic that they’re scared of my presence but not the cars. Many of them have dug their holes just feet away from the interstate. They are completely desensitized to cars. On the shoulder I was weaving in and out of their corpses all day. Where one body lay, there was always at least one other. I don’t know if they like to walk across the interstate together, or perhaps after one of their friends is hit they go out to investigate and end up meeting the same fate. I hope they like to cross together because it’s really sad to think of them venturing out to mourn for their friend, only to join them in death. The many horses along the interstate and the occasional dilapidated wooden house emanated Wyoming vibes. There’s a lot of empty space in Wyoming, and I crossed a lot of that today. As I got further south, things became much more arid, which I wasn’t fully expecting. Many of the hills were more barren with rocks protruding through the grasses that seemed to be just barely clinging onto life in the heat. Tumbleweeds were a common site throughout the day. I enjoyed watching the weeds roll with the wind. It’s a pretty cool nomadic life, that of a tumbleweed. When I see tumbleweeds, it always reminds me of the great depression and Steinbeck‘s Grapes of Wrath, not just because of the Dust Bowl, but the exodus to famed greener pastures that may or may not exist. Perhaps humans aren’t so much different than tumbleweed. We stay happy and green when the times are easy, but when life gets hard, we have the remarkable ability to uproot and move on in search of greener pastures. When I see tumbleweeds it’s fun to give them back stories. Tumbleweed is like a man in a tattered suit, rolling into town on his last dollar. You might offer him a drink and ask him to sit and talk a while. You can tell from the scars and the rips in his clothes that the man has had a hard life. It’s fun to imagine where a tumbleweed has come and where it might go. Perhaps I have little more direction than a tumbleweed, rolling along this way in that in search of my greener pasture, Argentina.

I exited the interstate at Dwyer Junction and said goodbye to America’s network of expensive limited access freeways. I won’t be riding on the interstate again this trip, or at least I’m not planning on it and I shouldn’t plan on it because after I leave Nebraska it will be illegal. Who knows if I’ll ever ride on interstate again in my life. If today was the last time I’ll ever ride on an interstate I’m not gonna lose any sleep over it. That being said, the interstate actually felt like a safer place to ride than some of the county roads that I was on two days ago. I was only honked that two or three times throughout the day today and nobody buzzed me. I had a nice big shoulder the whole time and the road was quiet in the first place. From Dwyer I turned due east. The wind was chugging along at about 25 miles an hour, almost directly in my face, but I stay in the bars and kept blocking the wind out. About 15 miles after getting off the interstate I stopped in a small town at a convenience store for a quick break. Mentally I’d been doing it incredibly well with the wind, so I was hesitant to check the forecast because I was almost certain it was just going to reconfirm my fears that I had another six hours of fighting. However, when I opened up the weather app I almost couldn’t believe my eyes. I thought the app was completely wrong for a second because it said I should have a 25 mile an hour tailwind. That couldn’t be true, I had just been outside and I promise you I had a 25 mph headwind. I got my food and went back outside to sit on the curb and eat for a minute. I realized that the weather app actually was right. All afternoon a huge storm system had been brewing off to the west. It had been making ground on me as it was moving about 30 miles an hour and I was only moving 15 miles an hour. I’m not sure how it was moving directly against the prevailing winds, but it was. When I looked at the forecast closely, I realized that as soon as the storm got to me, the wind was going to flip 180° and I would be instantly given an incredible tailwind instead of a demoralizing headwind. I sat with excitement as the storm got closer by the minute. It was one of the most incredible moments of weather I’ve ever witnessed. In about 10 seconds the wind did a complete 180. The temperature dropped about 10° in less than a minute And the trees that just been bent almost horizontal by the winds from the east were now struggling to stay upright against the winds from the west. It felt like a scene from my own personal action movie. My time had come. I was ready to ride the storm. The wind was ripping. Dust was picked up and thrown through the air as billboards groaned in protest at the growing wind and political yard signs bent down to touch the Earth. I jumped on my bike and without even peddling the wind carry me up to 15 miles an hour. Over the next 135 minutes I travelled over 65 miles. The wind was so incredible to have at my back that I was absolutely exuberant with excitement. The wall of rain marched towards me from the west, moving at 30 miles an hour. There existed about a 2 mile sweet spot in front of the storm. The system was pushing a wall of wind in front of it, and I hopped on it like a wave. The trick was to stay in the sweet spot, not in the rain, but also not too far out in front where the wind would change back to headwind. I found myself absolutely smashing the pedals. I didn’t really need to, I could easily have averaged 25 miles an hour going easy, but I was so happy to have a tailwind I couldn’t help but ride with all my heart. On flat sections I was hauling at about 33 miles an hour. The wind was so strong it almost felt a little dangerous to be going that fast. Every now and then a gust would come from the side and send me into speed wobbles. I didn’t dare go into my aero bars where I have less control over my bike, but even staying in the hoods and the drops I absolutely sliced through the air. It was so much fun and it did wonders for my spirit. The wall of rain behind me advanced and the 90° air in front of me gave rise to pop up, thunderstorms across the horizon. The rain came sideways, falling in sheets. The dusty fields turned to mud and runoff turned brown by the loose sediment, resulting in tumults of sludge and waterfalls all around. The road ran slick with oil brought out by the first rain in who knows how long and soon pools of standing water arose along the roadway. The rain did little to slow my progress as the wind continued to hammer my back. It was now about 25° colder than it had been an hour before hand. The temperature had dropped from 85 down to 60. I wasn’t cold, but I knew in the driving ran if I stopped for some reason, I would quickly become uncomfortable. I had no reason to stop though as the clouds morphed above me in ever changing blossoms of deep purples and dark grays and temperamental blues. Every now and then a gap would open up in the cloud cover on the horizon only to be replaced by the next thunderstorm. There didn’t seem to be a tornado risk, but I was a little bit worried about hail. Thankfully, I only got rain and wind. I blazed across Wyoming and soon found myself speeding across the Nebraska border. I flew through a couple of small towns before reaching outskirts of Scottsbluff, Nebraska. It was almost 6:30 and the storms were abating. The daylight was fading and the afternoon’s heat was quickly dissipating. A few storms clung on, but without the warmth of the sun to fuel their destruction, they slowly petered out. The flashes of lightning that had been so poignant and splintering softened into small cracks in the sky. The booming thunder which had rung in earsplitting cacophonous during the height of the storm quieted to a low rumble, echoing off the distant Scott’s Bluffs from which the town gets its namesake. The wind began to slow, revealing the destruction it had left in its wake. Billboards along the highway lay on the ground, snapped in two down the middle like match sticks. Flags flew in tatters and trash was scattered across the landscape after being brutalized by the shifting winds. I rolled into Scottsbluff and stopped at a store to get a little bit of food and put on my rain jacket. I packed my jacket deep in my bag thinking that perhaps I wouldn’t need it again until I got to the Andes, but it was almost 55° now and the light patter would continue for another couple of hours. I sat at the gas station for quite some time. If I took a 30 minute break, by the time I was ready to get going again the rain would supposedly be almost over. The rain slowly moved out and gaps in the clouds appeared on the horizon. The clouds slowly lifted to the west to reveal the last fading oranges, yellows, and blues of what had been a magnificent sunset obscured by the storms. I found myself cheering for the wind, urging it to blow away the clouds so clear sky might look down upon me as I turned south towards Colorado. Tonight was not only a full moon, it was harvest moon and there was a partial lunar eclipse. Shoutout to my friend Wynn for filling me in on the importance of tonight‘s night sky! On my way out of town I quickly came to understand how the town of Scottsbluff had gotten its name. Although it was hard to see the details in the dark sky, west of the city there lies a series of rock outcroppings. They were silhouetted in the evening sky and framed by the many colors of the disappearing sun behind. To be honest, I wasn’t expecting to find that much beauty in Nebraska, but these bluffs looked pretty cool.

I peddled into the night, heading to the south. To my west, the sky was clearing, but the moon was rising to the east. It was obscured behind the clouds of the afternoon thunderstorms, but the moon’s glow backlit the clouds and I could tell that if I rode for long enough, the moon would stick her head out and give me another beautiful night. At that point I didn’t really care what time it was when I stopped riding, I figured I would just ride until the moon came out and I’ve gotten my fill of its beauty. Light rain came down for the next hour has climbed out of Scottsbluff and back up to 5000 feet of elevation. The whole time the moon inched higher into the sky and the clouds ventured further and further east until finally at about 9:30 on the wispy tails of large cumulonimbus clouds, the moon poked her head out and lit up my world. I turned off my headlight and continued only guided by the soft white light emanating off the moon. The clouds, having spent all their energy, gifting me a magnificent tailwind and shower, rested in an easy glow under the lantern of the moon. The wind changed directions again, and I unsurprisingly saw myself pedaling into a light headwind, but I hardly even noticed. I managed another three hours past Scottsbluff before reaching Kimball. On the outskirts of town I found some junipers lining a gravel road off the main highway and lay down my bivvy under their boughs. I hung up my wet clothes in the green canopy and slinked off into my sleeping bag, after what had been a significantly better day than anticipated. I can only dream as to what the future holds. Every day presents unforeseen challenges and beauty continues to be found in places that I least expected. That being said, for the next 700 miles I’ll be in a bit of a doldrums in terms of scenery. I’ve been in grasslands the past five or six days, but I’ve had distant mountains to punctuate the boredom of it all. I’m now in Nebraska and will make my way to Eastern Colorado then the Oklahoma panhandle, then into the flats of Texas. There won’t be much to disrupt the incessant rolling hills and fields of grass. If the winds decide to be kind the next couple days could be big for me in terms of mileage. I expect I will face my first serious bout of boredom and the heat will begin to test me as I work my way to the southern border.