Safe Return Doubtful

83 miles (133 km) – Total so far: 933 miles (1,501 km)

There are pros and cons of staying at an RV park. There’s a shower, a picnic table, security, wifi and usually a few people to chat to. This disadvantage is that the last two nights in particular they have been close to the highway and the noise is extreme, and last night until midnight. You can have the best intentions to get to bed at 8:30 and and up at 6, but the noise can change things if it’s not possible to sleep. The prices are sneaking up also, and I really don’t know why. The best places I have stayed have been the cheapest. Tonight is $25. Motels would be $60 upwards so it’s a good saving. I will need the odd motel I expect, in bigger towns and when the nights are more humid, but some of the cheaper motels have paper-thin walls and air-conditioning that doesn’t work.

Just before heading off I grabbed a coffee at the gas station, and by chance the Sheriff was in there also. I asked about the route ahead, I knew it went up and then down, and he said:
“Up, down, big curves, straight, flat, lots more hills, and some time in the day that wind’s gonna get you.”
A bit exaggerated I thought, and perhaps he didn’t know the road that well. It turned out he was pretty accurate.

This is a great ride, especially leaving early as there is very little traffic until midday. It is a steady climb, 600 metres in 25 miles, with just a couple of sections where the gradient is 6%. There was no wind, there had been quite a bit of rain in the night and that made it a clear morning, and cooler than usual, early 20s C. I was at the summit at 10:45, but the downhill isn’t as straight-forward as usual. The Sheriff of Custer County said lots more ups and downs and he was spot on. I got to Mackay for some lunch later than expected at after 1, then just as the Sheriff said, the wind got up. My last 25 miles were into a strong southerly, a tough finish to a long day.

I’m at the Mountain View RV Park which is out by the city park in Arco, a town of population just under a thousand. Close to here is the World’s first Nuclear Power Plant, and really the reason the place exists. 25 miles away if the Craters of the Moon National Monument, I was going to head this way but was put off in Missoula by a fellow cyclist. It is a great expanse of lava, but the visitors’ centre only allows to see small portion, and it is quite a bleak highway otherwise.

Breakfast with the Sheriff….

The highlight of the climb, heading through Grand View Canyon – this range of mountains is called the Lost River Range

At Willow Summit in the Lost River Range at 10:45 am – very little traffic and a wonderful scenic ride, one of the best yet on this tour

View to the south, where I was headed

Mount Brora, the highest mountain in Idaho, the sun never really got trough today for more than a few minutes – perfect riding conditions until the wind got up..

Storytime:

University Days – At Sheffield Sith Joe

Today a guest piece from Joe Wilson. Joe and Nigel played cricket together at Park since they were mid-teens, then they ended up at University together.

Nigel had already been at Sheffield Hallam University for 2 years when I managed to secure a place there as a “mature” student. Despite having a tremendous amount of friends at University nobody wanted to share an accommodation with Nigel. I wondered why! I was soon to find out why as I agreed to share a flat with him in Sheffield for what would be my first year at Sheffield and Nigel’s third and final year.
I have only been stopped by the police on 3 occasions. On all of these 3 occasions I was with Nigel! The first occasion he ran and left me hanging, 12 feet up in the air, trying to “borrow” a large plant for our new flat. With a shout of “it’s the pigs” he was gone! The second time was walking home from the Leadmill club and the police caught me urinating in someone’s garden. Nigel thought this was hilarious and tried all he could to get them to arrest me and take me down to the station. The third time was walking back to the Weston family home in Hoylake after a particularly drunken night. When I say “walking” I mean pushing Nigel all over the road in a shopping trolley we had “found” on the way back. The police car pulled over with Nigel sitting there in the trolley. I can still see him sitting there and hearing his shout of joy when he realised that the policeman was actually an old school friend of mine- “You know him Joe. Yeah!!!!!”
We went up to Sheffield together before term started to secure some deluxe accommodation- a falling down, two bedroom flat next door to the “Athena Sauna”- which was actually a brothel. Nigel thought that this would be perfect for our needs! Nigel’s bedroom overlooked the door for the “Sauna” and he would often shout across to me to come and look at the various comings and goings in and out of the Sauna.
I would have happily stayed there with him to watch if it wasn’t for the dreadful sounds of Japan, The Pet Shop Boys and Dr Robert coming out of his sound system. Nigel and I had a lot in common: we loved to laugh, watch and play sport, get drunk, watch the fall and rise of Reginald Perrin on television, and look at women. But we could never agree on music: he hated my soft rock of “Reo Foreigner” as he used to call it.
Nigel had a tough final year at Sheffield! He had no lectures on Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday. All he had to do was attend classes for 2 hours on Thursday afternoon and 2 hours at 9am on a Friday morning. The Thursday afternoons lectures were ideal for Nigel as he would just go straight to the pub when they finished and then onto the Leadmill club until the early hours. As for the Friday morning lectures; I doubt if Nigel made it to these lectures on more than a couple of occasions.
The Ledamill club was an amazing place where Nigel and I spent most of our grant. We would get drunk and dance all night long to songs such as Nigel’s favourite at the time (Steve Harley- Come Up and See Me Make Me Smile).
I was keen to make a good impression at my first class night out at Sheffield in the local pub. There were a number of good looking girls on my course and I was keen to get to know some of them a little better. I was confident that I would do well (most unlike me to be honest) and thinking what could possibly go wrong? Nigel of course could go wrong! Nigel had been in the pub most of the day with his friends. I walked in the pub sober to see Nigel trying his luck with one girl after another from my course. I tried to keep out of his way (not easy if you know Nigel) but bumped into him in the toilet. “All the girls on your course are dead fit Joe” were the only words that I could understand. Eventually a few of the girls came up to me and asked if I knew who the annoying bloke was that had been harassing all the girls. I claimed never to have set my eyes on him before but had nowhere to go when this response was met with “Well, someone has told us that you actually live with him and that you have known him for years!” I was guilty by association. Thanks Nigel!
I think it was the year before we lived together in Sheffield that Nigel was playing cricket for Birkenhead Park first team. Nigel was a very enthusiastic cricketer and could bat, bowl and field very well. On one occasion at Birkenhead Park, he went out to bat against Seftons opening fast bowler, John Kelly. At the time Kelly was probably the quickest bowler in the Liverpool competition. Nigel therefore thought that it was a good idea to try and hook the first ball he faced from Kelly. Unfortunately Nigels nose bore the brunt of his poor decision making as Nigel failed to connect with his bat and the ball smashed into his face at upwards of 80 miles per hour. Apparently there was a lot of blood and there was some longstanding damage to his good looks! In our Sheffield flat he would often come into the kitchen in the morning with his nose flat against the side of his face that he had been sleeping on. I would have to tell him to go into the toilet, look into the mirror and put his nose back to where it should be.