Day 2 - July 1

The sun came up early and so I was up also (part of this is also because I’m one time zone ahead of my body). As I was waking up, I heard the snorts of a white tail deer and then saw his white flag waving at me. It must not have been happy with the location of my camp site. I was on the road by 6:30. I started out west across more of Nebraska and the Sand Hills. I decided to take a little detour and see “Carhenge” which is a recreation of the “Stonehenge” in Europe but this one is created with cars. This little side trip was about 60 miles each way but worth the trip (once!). Along the way I also say people learning to climb power poles (see photos). After my detour I got back on track and rode through some more of the Sand Hills. Here I had my second encounter with wildlife, once again a bird was the fatality. I’m considering putting loud pipes on the bike so I don’t leave so much “road kill” behind me – they say “loud pipes saves lives” – they mean the birds right? Now it was time to continue westward toward Colorado. My route included about the last 200 miles to Denver on the slab “freeway”. This was a tough stretch as the wind began to pick up, the air temperature was at 95 for part of the ride. Fluid and stretch breaks were required about every hour. I arrived in Denver about mid afternoon. I plan to visit some relation this evening in the Denver area. Since I had a little spare time, I found a car wash to get one layer of “guts” of the bike – when you can’t see through the windshield you know it is time to get it washed.

My route for the day is the yellow line on the map photo: 458 miles