Diary

Mileage:  110 miles (178.2 kms)

Elevation Change:  1876 feet (572 meters)

Weather:  sunny and warm, 87 degrees

Morale:  Super!  Allez les bleus!

Incidents:  First place into the hotel.

Daily Summary:

Up bright and early and rolling by 6:15.  We had 110 fairly flat miles to do, but we had a hard deadline—the France/Brazil game was to start at 1pm.  It was doable, but we would need a miracle ride.  The first 30 miles or so were the most desolate country we have seen so far.  We literally rode for almost 20 miles without seeing any sign of civilization other than the ribbon of asphalt we were on and a single telephone strand next to it.  It could have been 2006 or 1906.  Not  even a curve in the road to change the scenery.  Amazing and beautiful.  Christopher was at the first SAG stop, monitoring a litter of kittens that was hanging out on the roof of a shed.  He had quite an animal spotting day.  Here is what he saw:  kittins, dead rattlesnake, hawks, jackrabbits, sheep, cows, horses, donkeys, llama, little birds,  a rooster, and road kill.   After the SAG, we were back in relative civilization—deep in agricultural Idaho.  We have seen miles and miles and miles of potatoes today.  We didn’t know there were this many potatoes in the world!  The ones with white flowers are white russets, the one with purple flowers are purple russets.  All are fed with fabulous irrigation from the snake river and various canals.  We followed the Snake River to where it is dammed, then followed the 30 mile lake behind the dam.  We put our heads down and rode hard for six hours, and got to the hotel just in time for the game.  What fun that France won!

 

We are all getting more sun on our right side than our left side because we keep heading east and the sun is to the south.  We might have to start putting 40 spf on one side and 20 on the other!

 

Last night the History Channel did a special on Evel Knievel, which certainly was fun to see while we were still in the Snake River Valley.

 

Not a great picture selection today; we were too busy riding hard to pause.  Here you see the one long desolate stretch I talk about above.