Ups and Downs

Posting hasn't been as easy as we thought it would be. Finding places where we have intenet access has proven to be difficult now that we're out west and things are a little more spread out. Things have been good though for us. We had a couple down days, but mostly positive days. We've discovered that we're alot farther ahead of schedule then we thought we were. We're planning on taking the train home from Portland and in order to do that we had to order our tickets well in advance. So we purchased them several weeks ago for a departure date of Sept 2 hoping that would be a good date. We just calculated our remaining miles and it looks like we only need to average about 50 miles a day from here on out in order to get to Portland by Aug 30 which is what when we were hoping to get there. So thats cheered us all up. We were hoping to push hard at the beginning/middle of our trip so that we could relax and enjoy the last couple weeks, particularly when we're riding down the coast. And it looks like that shouldn't be a problem.

Our last week has had some beautiful scenery. We spent 2 days riding through Yellowstone National Park which was a great experience. The traffic in the park was a little nerve racking at times but everyone was going slow so it didn't prove to be too much of a problem. We didn't see any bears, which was kinda good but also disappointing, but we did see alot of bison. We rode with 50 feet of at least 7 of them. One was walking right down the road towards us, but fortunately there was a bunch of cars lined up watching it and we hid behind one of them as it passed us. We had to choose between going around the northern or southern side of Yellowstone, so we avoided Old Faithful and went North. The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone and the Upper and Lower Falls were both worth the ride. They were gorgeous.

After leaving Yellowstone we hopped back on Adventure Cycling maps, which we hadnt used since Niagra Falls. In the last 2 days of riding on the trail we've 17 other bike tourers. We'll always stop and talk to them, its always interesting to hear their stories and see how their tour is going. We're discovering that everyone tours differently, some do long days, some short. Some stay in hotels while others just pitch a tent in the woods along the side of the road. So its been interesting to talk to them. We've also talked to alot of other people as well. Alot of tourists at Yellowstone came up to us and asked us about our trip, other campers will strike up a conversation with us at the camp. We've all really enjoyed the different types of people that we've gotten to meet, it's definitely a highlight of our trip.

Speaking of people we've enjoyed meeting, I think a highlight of the trip for all of us was Rapid City, SD. Thats where we met the Gareys. We had decided to spend the morning biking to Rapid City (about 80 miles away) and then use the city for internet and purchase a couple things we needed. Once we were done with that we were gonna continue on our trip for about 15 miles or so. While Bruce and Evie were at a camping store Mrs. Garey and her children came up to them and asked if we would like to stay with them. So we eagerly agreed. It turned out to be a great evening. We learned so much through their hospitality and our conversations with them and had a great time. We expected great scenery but we never expected the kindness and generousity we've experienced on this trip.

My time is up so i gotta go. Enjoy the pics and thanks for the comments