For some time I’ve wanted to do a longer bike packing trip. An opportunity for just such a trip arose when it became apparent that I’d have some time between two jobs this September. The route I settled on was going to take me from Denver to Seattle. From my home in Broomfield via Laramie, Rawlins, and Lander to the Yellowstone and Grand Teton area. From there I’d take a more Southerly route via Boise, Idaho or a more Northerly route via Western Montana and Eastern Washington depending on conditions. All in all about 1400 to 1500 miles.

There were difficulties before the tour began. For one thing, my job change requires me to relocate from Colorado to Washington. Therefore there were many things to organize and to take care of. By the time I had things in good enough shape where I felt comfortable with being mostly off the grid for an extended period of time I had a mere 11 days left for the ride. This meant a daunting 130 to 140 miles per day. Every day. No rest days. Come rain or come shine. Head wind or tail wind.

In addition, I would be starting my journey rather late in mid September and temperatures higher up and further North could be unpleasantly cold.

Nevertheless I decided to give it a go. Worst case scenario I’d have to bail from somewhere along the way but I’d still have a fun adventure.

So things were intense leading up to the trip. Lots of phone calls with property managers in Colorado and Washington, orchestrating the transportation of my belongings, meeting with many good friends to say my farewells in case there wouldn’t be an opportunity after the trip, and getting my gear in order for the trip.

Monday, September 17, I finally was able to gather all the parts needed to build a front wheel with dynohub along with head and tail light. This required some frantic bike rides to several shops to source the right length spokes. Community Cycles wasn’t open that day. Hence no access to a truing stand or spoke tensionometer. So I laced the wheel in my kitchen, trued it on the bike with a bush league ruler setup, adjusted spoke tension by ear, and hoped for the best.

Between trips to shops, building the wheel, installing the lighting system, packing, and having Dinner with Sarah it got pretty late that night.

Gear

My gear selection was founded on the theory that in order to have any chance of making it on the aggressive schedule I’d have to go as fast and light as possible. There was no point in bringing significant camping equipment, such as a tent, because if that was needed, e.g. to wait out a bad weather day, I’d be dead in the water anyways. There would be virtually no margin for error or delays.

The center of my setup was the 1987 Bianchi Volpe frame I’d previously used for a section of the Colorado Route. This bike is best described as a light-tourer-with-some-cross-capability-do-everything-bike. Compared to the Colorado Route trip I was hoping to need less capacity for water. Therefore I would be able to use the front fork cargo cages for camping gear (thermarest, sleeping bag, and bivy sack) and some spare clothes. For a sleeping bag I went with the Summerlite by Western Mountaineering to save weight and bulk. I used the 9l Revelate Designs frame bag that has worked well for me on several previous trips.

Other modifications to the bike since the Colorado Route trip include:

• Shutter Precision PD 8 dynohub with Busch and Muller head and tail lights. I needed to be able to cover some miles in the dark.
• Wald basked on Nitto M12 front rack for items that I needed frequent access to and food and snacks.
• SKS P45 Fenders. I needed to be able to ride on days with less than ideal weather.

Overall I was pretty happy with my gear choices.

Day 1

I left my house at 6:30am on Tuesday, September 18. My goal was to make it to a point along US 287 somewhere past Laramie towards Rawlins. It was mostly an uneventful ride. Brutally hot though. Consumed about 1.5 gallons of water. I stopped at JAX in Fort Collins to grab some last minute gear items and at Safeway in Laramie to refuel. Reached a camp spot off the highway around 8:30pm. The dyno powered lights worked very well. There were lots of mice that kept me from getting much sleep.

Day 2

Left camp around 5:30am. Ran out of paved road at Walcott where US 287 reconnects with I-80. Took a dirt road to the North West through some hogbacks that shortly turned to gravel, then to sand, then to desert before reaching the ghost town of Fort Steel. Some tedious biking and time consuming hiking along this stretch. The following picture shows some of the terrain between Walcott and Fort Steele:

From Fort Steele I took I-80 past Sinclair to Rawlins and arrived there around 12:30pm. Talked to a couple of chaps that were on day 28 of their tour on the Great Divide Trail. Had just finished the Great Basin and were going South. From Rawlins I headed North using US 287 through the gas station of Muddy Gap, about 40 miles from Rawlins, and then another 80 miles to Lander.

By the time I got to Muddy Gap around 4pm the weather was changing and I was getting worried. Over the Wind River Range to the West it was looking windy with dark snowy clouds. It was getting noticeably colder. It felt like a late fall day in the dessert where temperatures are nice in the sun but as soon as you’re in the shade or there is a breeze it gets cold quickly. I resolved to push on to Lander where I’d be able to check the weather forecast and to decide how to proceed once I was there. With a good tailwind I covered the 80 miles in 5 hours and crashed at the City Park in Lander (legal free camping!) around 9:30pm. I managed around 220 miles that day.

Day 3

The forecast looked not great from here on out. Sub freezing nighttime temperatures with wide spread frost in the mornings and consistent West winds (head wind) of more than 20mph. In fact, the wind was apparently bad enough that NOAA showed red hazardous conditions warnings for the next 2.5 days.

I was intimidated but felt good physically so I decided to keep going and to just see what happens. The first 40 miles went reasonably well albeit with a stiff side wind straight from the West. As soon as I turned onto US 26 to head West towards Dubois and ultimately Yellowstone, this wind became a real problem. Consistent with the forecast, I’d guess that it was somewhere in the 20s mph range. But there were extended stretches where the wind was squeezing through gaps in the Canyon leading up to the Continental Divide where the wind speeds were higher.

The remaining 30 miles to Dubois were very painful. It took me about five hours and most of that time I was in the drops, working very hard to achieve barely more than hiking speed. Gearing never higher than 38/18 and long stretches of 38/24. It was also cold. I was wind chilled the entire time while wearing almost all my clothes except for a down jacket.

After a 30 minute lunch break at Super Foods in Dubois I decided to point my bike East and head back to Lander. It was a bit of a spur of the moment decision. I’m sure the pain and exhaustion of that day played a big part in it. But the bigger picture was objectively not looking good either. I could not hope to make more than another 30 miles of progress that day. And probably significantly less than 100 miles on the following two days. At that point I’d be in a pretty big hole time and distance wise. And I’d have to really exert myself to even make it that far. A couple of tourers coming down from Moran told me that it had been storming up there the last couple of days with good amounts of precipitation. Rain during the day and snow during the night. Frost in the morning.

So while I’m sure that some people would have been able to press on and some would have been able to finish on my schedule I believe that I made the right decision for myself and I’m happy with it. Of course it was very disappointing and upsetting at the time.

It was remarkable to observe the changes that the decision to turn around brought within me. Up until that point the whole ride had been a rather desperate race against the clock. Any delays were painful and I was unable to notice much of the landscape that was floating past me much less enjoy it. Now I was able to soak in the amazing views of the Northern Wind River region and to truly enjoy riding. I was looking forward to the rest of my journey back. The road no longer consisted just of an endless stream of mile markers that had to be passed as efficiently as possible.

I got back to Lander around 8 pm and camped again at the City Park. I was happy.

Day 4

This morning was very cold. Frost on the grass everywhere. It was difficult to get motivated to peel myself out of the sleeping bag, put on bike shorts, get on my bike and get going. I finally hit the road around 7am. I didn’t take off my down jacket until around 10:30 despite pedalling hard.

It was a long way to Muddy Gap. 80 miles with consistent side wind that required leaning into. Then another 40 odd miles to Rawlins. I checked in at the Econolodge to dry out my sleeping bag and to do some laundry in the sink.

Day 5

I decided to return home via Walden and Poudre Canyon. It was a very scenic ride from Wyoming into the North Park area in Colorado. There were beautiful fall colors. A couple of significant looking wild fires were raging West of Walden.

I continued about 20 miles past Walden on Highway 14 to make the rest of the return trip feasible in one more day. At this point I was struggling to cover the distance I had done on the first two days on the way out in three days. It was close to 400 miles from Lander to Broomfield via this route. I was hungry most of the time and was not feeling very strong.

I had the worst dinner of the trip. Half a loaf of Hostess Classic Wheat “bread” with eight servings of Oscar Meyer salami. That stuff is made of 98% pink slime with a few specks of pig hoof I’m sure. But it’s got a few hundred percent of your daily sodium! So works for me. Also it was unpleasantly cold that night probably because my camp was slightly above 8000ft.

Day 6

Next morning I climbed the remaining 2000ft to the top of Cameron pass. Then 70 or so miles of descending Poudre Canyon to Laporte. Most of it without a shoulder. Scary amount of traffic with lots of trailers and lots of noobs who think it’s perfectly fine to coast alongside you for a minute or two down a narrow, winding canyon road. Most terrifying part of the ride by far.

I felt rather tired for the remainder of the trip from Fort Collins back home to Broomfield. I stopped at a couple of gas stations to jolt some highly processed sugars into my system and that helped a bit. The gas station hot dogs thrown in for good measure felt like health food in comparison.

I got home around 6pm.

Lessons learned

• On a trip of this length I’d prefer to have room for rest days. Either to wait out bad weather or to just recover mentally or physically. Not having any breathing room makes for a very stressful trip.
• I might have to go heavier for trips that cover a lot of North/South distance or a lot of different elevations. Temperature variations can be significant.
• Might need a tent, especially if you’re planning to wait out some weather.
• Four weeks earlier might have been better.
• Wyoming is windy and sparse. Most of the towns shown on the map are no longer inhabited.
• I might have to research more sustainable food options for a trip of this length. Just carbs and highly processed ones at that did not feel good after three days. This, too, would probably make for more weight.
• The Brooks Champion Flyer is a great saddle.
• The Nitto B135 is a good touring handlebar. I especially liked it when I had to spend a lot of time in the drops due to head wind. I think there is room for improvement though. Mine is only 42cm wide and I feel that’s too narrow. Not much room on the flats at all but I haven’t been able to find it in any wider options. I think I’d like to give the Nitto Noodle a try, perhaps 46cm wide.
• Schwalbe Marathon Green Guard is an amazing tire. Rolls well, feels supple and comfortable, and is tough as nails. I pulled a thread of a steel cable out of the rear tire. No idea how deep it was in there but it was in there. No puncture. Rolling over about a hundred miles of sharp loose gravel, sometimes at very high speed. Never any problems.
• Dynohub with lights worked very well. Big improvement over battery powered lights in terms of beam shape, useful brightness, and visibility. Didn’t notice any increase in rolling resistance and was running the lights at all times even during the day.

Stats

Day 1: 147 miles, 5,121 feet of gain
Day 2: 221 miles, 5,820 feet of gain
Day 3: 154 miles, 4,500 feet of gain
Day 4: 126 miles, 5,115 feet of gain
Day 5: 118 miles, 4,275 feet of gain
Day 6: 150 miles, 3,809 feet of gain
Total: 916 miles, 28,640 feet of gain