Jeremiah Watt

Its Monday, Sept 4th and the final day of the long weekend. Like I said I am very cautious about riding on this day. Got up late for me, and the bike is reading 61 degrees at 8am.

Hit the frontage road and a couple of different bike paths to make my way into Idaho Springs which is west of Denver a few miles. My biggest concern is getting around Denver. I decide to stop for a cup of coffee at the Exit 240 Coffee and Bike Shop.

It was a very opportune stop for me, and I don;t think it was one that happened by mere accident. I walked in behind a young couple, of which the fella had a quite a pair of cycling legs. Not taking too looking at other mens legs mind you, but you get to a place where you can spot horsepower in a pair of calves. OI order up an extra stout cup of Mericano, and start a conversation with the couple, I find they are riding for a morning trip and headed back towards Denver. I also meet two older fellas whom are out for a day ride on their mountain bikes and they offre up a lot of help with roads etc.

I ask the young couple if I can tag along with them for as long as I can keep up, since they are riding on race bikes and I am lugging the trailer I didn't think I would last long. It turns out there final destination is Evergreen, and thats quite along ways towards where I am bound, so I have a real need to keep iup in this case. As it turns out, the young fellows name is Cody and his wife is Maleek. Cody is a cycling and Tri-athalon trainer, so no wonder he had a pair of calves on him. Matter of fact, Cody is going to the "Exterra Finals" over in Hawaii this fall, I am not exactly sure what it all is other than a Iron Man version done on mountain bikes. We hit one particular steep climb of plus 7% and I finally fell behind at that point. I can remember at that point that I would sure like to get the horsepower to catch up and get a little closer to Denver and the roads I needed.

From someplace, I found the strenght to cover the gap and I was on the tail once again. Thanks Lord.

We finally parted company, and Cody gave me a set of directions that worked out great. Thanks Cody and Maleek for all the help.

The road has many turns in getting down out of the hills, the traffic is hectic in most places, but the Colorado drivers are really some of the best that I have rode around so far. While I was riding I spotted the sign leading to Buffaloe BIll's Grave and Museum.

SO I make an executive decision to ride the 8 miles over/up on Lookout Mountain and take it in. It was a fun ride, amongst the Pinmes and the winding roads that lead to the Grave site. I spend a good hour going thru the Museum and meet some folks from Florida who are totally amazed that a guy my age can make it all the way from California. So I took my teeth out of my travel cup, so I could speak a little clearer and told'em "shoot I'am going to ride the rest of the way as well"!

Time to hit the roiads again and I was off. For the most part I skirted Denver to the south along the C-470 loop road, there is a bike path that follows along, but there are so many paths that you spend a lot of time asking where the right path is. My final destination for the day was Parker, which is to the southeast of Denver. Boy howdy is it ever getting late, and I need a few things to keep my camp working.........like a lighter to start my stove, and some water becasue I am right out. I am looking for Hill-Top road and finally find it. I ride it for about 3 miles and see a grove of Pine trees and make for it. It wasa great spot for a camp, no one around, and on enough of a hill that I can see the city lights below with a full moon to top it off it could have been right out of a movie.
I got stopped real late, 8:15 and its dark when I am trying to cook and set up camp. So it was a bit of a struggle, but I managed a Spanish Rice dish and some tes, it all went down good and the bed felt even better that night. As it turned out we had an 84.5 mile day
Good Night and God Bless