vacation

Just a heads up to everybody, I left Pittsburgh a bit over 2 weeks ago to try and ride the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route with a long time friend Matt Ruscigno (justin rode across Mexico with him). So far it has been pretty brutal. We started at the canadian border and intend to go the whole 2400 miles to the Mexican border. It is 90% offroad. Montana and Idaho are out of the way. Glacier park was beautiful. We saw moose and elk and had 38 degreee water out of springs when it was 90 degrees o utside. We camped in really remote areas, away from everything, went 2 days without being inside of a building, or being able to. Went a day without seeing anybody else, other than 2 forest workers. Pretty gnarly. We rolled through the home of the unabomber and went right into the high desert of Idaho. 20 degree nights and 85 degree days. 7000 foot being the standard elevation and 9000 being the passes. brutal.

We cross over Tohgatee pass the other day and crossed into Wyomnig. It was a 9700 foot pass that was 16 miles long. That is a big uphill. The people hav been great to us, most slowing down on the dirt roads to not dust us too much. It is really dry and there are forest fires...
I am currently in pinedale wyoming, a stranger just bough Matt and I breakfast. We are headed out for the Great Divide Basin, which is a 135 mile stretch of nothingness... just desert, no water comes into or goes out of it, it is some sort of natural weirdness. There is no water for 135 miles.. we will have to filter it out of the barrels that the cows drink out of. Then we will be in Colorado. Awesome.

We are averaging somewhere in the 70's as far as miles per day. Our slowest day was 8 hours on the bike going 60 miles. brutal singletrack and quad trails slowed us to the point of walking. Our longest day so far was 90 miles, most of which was offroad on a single road. We will climb over the Continental divide 3 times today, all around 9000 feet. Crazy.