Day 44: Spokes vs the Continental Divide

Sunday, July 7th, 2024

Buena Vista CO -> Gunnison CO

68.6 Miles, 4,642 ft elevation

Everyone grumbled as our alarms went off this morning. The night before we were forsaken by the Colorado monsoon season. We came back from our dinner with Stanford Spokes to displaced and flipped over tents (perhaps we should have followed the advice of our host and staked them down...). As a result, Cleo and Varsha slept in the van due to wet gear, and the rest of us were kept up by gale-force winds. The next morning, Amulya said that she was worried that Jess would fly away in her tent because she is the smallest on the team and the only person sleeping in there!

Thankfully our tents (and us) survived the night

The morning proceeded as usual with me dumping a scoop of protein powder, a scoop of milk powder, and a scoop of peanut powder into a solo cup followed by water and a healthy serving of Raisin Bran cereal. Truly a breakfast of champions.

I saw today as a test of how far I have progressed as a biker. Going over the continental divide is no joke, and the last time I saw elevation like this was in Shenandoah, which nearly killed me and left me sore for the next week.

We all left from Buena Vista near the same time but became quite stratified as we fought the 20-mile continuous uphill. I could definitely feel the air becoming thin and my calves burning from the attempted 14er Hank, Cleo, and I decided to do yesterday on our 'rest day.' However, I soon found a comfortable pace and "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" by Daft Punk played over my headphones. While I do not think I truly went into the flow state, this was the closest I've been on the trip so far. I could feel the progress I'd made since Shenandoah.

The final push to the top of the divide was a nasty high-grade switchback that I just had to mash my pedals on the lowest gear to summit. When I got to the top, I found Hank talking to a hiker about deep-dish pizza.

My prize for climbing the hill was a little patch of snow that I built a snowman in.

Off in the distance, a mean storm was brewing over the mountains and sent cold gusts of wind our way. I just hoped that it wouldn't come our way.

Being this high up meant that it was COLD. We were all utterly unprepared for this temperature after baking in the sun for the first part of the trip. The hiker Hank was talking to called us crazy for not bringing a jacket and said that we would either die or be really uncomfortable if the storm came our way. I agreed with him through chattering teeth as I stood in front of a newly parked van, warming myself from the engine.

Thankfully, Amulya, our support driver for the day, came 30 minutes after I summited. I ran to the car to grab a jacket and sweatpants, and all was right in the world again. The storm was diverted away from us and Amulya even bought key lime Chobani! (Hank was right, it is really good!)

After the rest of us made it to the divide, we all took some celebratory pictures.

The great thing about being at the top of the continental divide was that it was nothing but downhill from here. The bike ride down was one of the fastest 5 miles of Spokes so far, with us averaging just under 30 mph. Cleo even claims to have scraped her knee on the ground as she took the hairpin turns so fast!

It wasn't long before we made it to the lunch stop for the day at a beautiful reservoir in the mountains.

The ride from here was downhill and followed the Taylor River. Many of us agreed that this was one of the best Spokes rides so far!

When we arrived in Gunnison, our lovely hosts for the night, Thalia and Jeff, warmly welcomed us. Finding accommodation in Gunnison was a stroke of luck, as Thalia and Jeff were friends of Maud and David from Denver. They had cold drinks waiting for us in a cooler, and the dinner they prepared was just what we needed after fighting the elevation today. Both Thalia and Jeff are active in the League of Women Voters, which led to some interesting conversations about politics and the upcoming election.

That night we spent some time doing some last-minute planning for our learning festival, but by this point in the trip, we have a schedule that we stick with, so there wasn't much to discuss. Going to sleep, I kept thinking about how we conquered the continental divide, and it wasn't even that hard. It is empowering to think about all the miles that we have done so far, and how much we have all grown as cyclists from when we began. I hope to take this as a lesson after Spokes ends. If you throw yourself in the deep end with no choice but to swim, it's pretty difficult not to see growth in yourself.