Boy, it’s hot!!

Hello from Ellensburg, MT. Today was a shorter distance ride, just under 60 miles, but had a couple tough climbs. The first one was a 4,000 foot climb up to the top of the pass, on Hwy 97. The second climb was shorter in terms of elevation change, but was pretty steep and the temperature got really hot after we lost altitude from the first climb. By the time we reached Ellensburg, it was 101 degrees (but a dry heat!!). The landscape changed drastically today and we are now in high plateau desert, with very few trees and a lot of sagebrush. The town of Ellensburg is larger than I thought it might be and is a nice clean town with trees and greenery in this valley. The high school we are using to camp at is very new and nice. We are using their showers and a lot of us have our computers plugged into wall outlets in the school, which is air conditioned by the way. I might put our mattress in the school for tonight!

On a typical day, everyone starts rousing at 5:00 – 5:30. Breakfast is at 7:00 and everyone packs a lunch for the day to take on the bike. Some people start as early as 7:30 on their ride. Every 10 days or some we are assigned to a “sweep” team. On those days, the team assigned for that day needs to help set up for dinner and cleanup at night, and then the next day gets up early to help serve breakfast and cleanup after breakfast. The team needs to be the last group out of camp and must make sure all riders along the route are accounted for and not left behind. When we arrive at the night’s camp, we need to sign in so they know who is and is not accounted for.

Dinner is at 6:00 p.m. After cleanup, we have what we call a peleton meeting and recap the day and experiences. We usually find out how many flats there were that day, yesterday was 11 with the same person having 6!! Apparently there was something poking through the tire that they did not see and it kept making flats. I have not had amboi flat yet, but let’s not bring that up. We have had a couple incidents….one lady hit a post on the bike path the first day and had a slight concussion and took a couple days off. One young man could not get his cleats released in time and twisted his ankle pretty bad and took today off.

After the peleton meeting, we break into assigned small groups of 5-6 and discuss the meditation for the day from the “Shifting Gears” devotional book, and have prayer time together. Everyone is pretty eager to hit the sack by 9:00 for the night.

Tomorrow is a shorter day and not much elevation climbing. We should arrive in Yakima pretty early in the afternoon. A short day will be good for everyone, considering the last 2 days. There is opportunity for a limited number of volunteers to help at an agency relating to helping those in need and poverty. This will happen at various cities along the tour route.

Love to all, P & J.