I woke up feeling existential and tired. After reading Life After God I couldn't say if I felt things differently. But I took a picture of the sunset, believing the one for that particular morning meant something more than any of the others thus far. We left and it basically flattened out completely, but not completely. First, there was passing through by the reservoir and then what looked like an expanse of unnaturally green and perfectly in-place gold which you assume are those amber waves of grain they rave about. In reality, it's all rolling, and cut through by channels and irrigation canals, and somewhere in the distance is a rise, which you assume is the last mountain you'll see for a while, but really it's just an ellipsis before the next series of geological features. The road was a lengthy camel humpback over deep washes and atop these expansive fields. At the water stop we spotted a fan man, someone piloting an enourmous fan strapped to his back attached to a parachute. In the last town before leaving Colorado, we spoke to a man and his wife who raised horses. We missed the town's relay for life by a day, but he was a cyclist and was enthusiastic about what we were doing. I made it a point to stop at the state line, and we did. It was a sign advertising all that Utah had to offer: red rock arches, skijumper from the 2002 winter olympics, and fresh white powder. Nick and Alex climbed the sign and we documented it.
Utah was welcoming, the stretch of highway we were on was tree-lined, like a parkway for at least a part of it, with a view of a single mountain rising in the distance, and the town we were heading towards, looming invitingly ahead. And there was also the road construction. And the truck traffic. I willingly went off-roading to avoid colliding with them. I wish the best of luck to anyone riding that stretch of the Western Express before they finish up construction, it was not fun. The day's ride, like the week of rides before, was a relatively short 60 miles, so we go to the stayover church before services were out. The parishoners were welcoming and one lady offered to let us use her shower. She told us about how the Mormons basically ran the state and were exclusionary to those who weren't. And she railed against the environmental protections that were placed on the public lands around the community, the Clinton administration, and how negatively the media portrays the war on Iraq. And for however much I disagreed with what she said, I still listened with respect. This was really my first taste of exactly how conservative folks in the midsection of this country are. Everything she said was fascinating because it gave me some idea of how people different from me think. The church was starting vacation bible school the next day, so we helped out by blowing up oversized, inflatable sports paraphenalia. It was a good test of lung capacity and the benefits thereto that we had gained since May 25th. I missed my chance to have ice cream by blogging in the church's radio station. Being in that studio made me miss listening to NPR.
I woke up and rode out to this.
I could never climb something like this Utah sign
I gathered that their bible school was sports-themed. These took about ten minutes to inflate
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