The start of the day looked amazing:
The guy in the center is John Dobbs; he started riding with us in the mornings to start his ride. He typically stays with us until we start to climb and then he falls behind.
On the ride, we stopped to take the pic of the Boysen Reservoir, and he kept going.
We passed him once we got started riding again and we did not see him the rest of the day, but heard he got in earlier than us. Funny thing is, we never saw him pass us; never thinking he got a ride in. Well, low and behold, we found out he got a van ride from the 2nd to the 3rd rest stop, about a 30 mile hop. It just made that much sense once I found that out; I knew we were a bit stronger than him and I just could not figure it out.
The day started out really nice, seemed to be going really well. Around mile 20 we stopped at the Reservoir and then when we got back on the bikes, the headwind hit us. It was a really strong head wind that just really took our pace down from 14 mph to 16 mph to something like 10 mph, ugh, the day just got a whole lot longer.
Right after we stopped at the first rest stop of the day, we ran into a couple of guys named Dave and Evin. We decided to ride together. We pretty much stayed at a pace of a steady 12 mph, rotating every half mile, and it just worked out really well. They were like life savers. So now instead of having to pull for a half mile every mile, I only had to pull once every two miles. The ride truly got a lot easier. We rode together with them like that from about mile 35 to about mile 109. I had another flat and they even waited for me to change the flat. (Gonna put a new tire on the bike) Really upstanding guys!!!
At mile 104, there were a lot of grey skies, but to the south, and Karen, one of the ride leaders said Casper was dry, that we could keep riding. At 109, they scooped us up saying the storms were coming our way. I will say we saw lightning, but never heard the thunder, so that means we were never in danger. And it was raining pretty good when we were picked up.
Proof of a small town:
Hunters herded the bison and drove them over the cliff, breaking their legs and rendering them immobile. Tribe members waiting below closed in with spears and bows to finish the kills. The Blackfoot Indians called the buffalo jumps "pishkun", which loosely translates as "deep blood kettle". This type of hunting was a communal event which occurred as early as 12,000 years ago and lasted until at least 1500 AD, around the time of the introduction of horses. The broader term game jumps includes buffalo jumps and cliffs used for similarly hunting other herding animals, such as reindeer. The Indians believed that if any buffalo escaped these killings then the rest of the buffalo would learn to avoid humans, which would make hunting even harder.
Love all the video footage and lessons being taught.
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