08.03 Cedar City, UT

Wow - what an amazing day! Today was one of those days that reminds me why I am doing Bike & Build. We got off to a slow start (it took us a record 3.5 hours to leave this morning because we had to be shuttled 2 miles on a gravel road from our campsite to the main road). The first 23 miles were very difficult climbing, though the landscape was gorgeous - blue sky, white clouds, green meadows, pine trees, aspen trees...amazing. We reached our highest elevation of 9930 ft today (some people biked an extra 10 miles to reach 10,000 ft and see Cedar Breaks Park but I had absolutely no desire to do that). The last 20 miles was all downhill...we lost 4000 ft in those 20 miles and boy did we go FAST. I hit 37 mph going down the switchback. It's scary but I'm learning to love it. The temperature differences are amazing...I was freezing at the summit and sweating at the bottom. It's funny because it was hard to fully enjoy the views going up the hill because I was working so hard, and it was hard to enjoy the views going down because I was so scared! But the scenery really was spectacular and it was such an amazing feeling to descend that hill. We got in nice and early (around noon) and some of us ate lunch at the Main Street Grill and now we're at the library. This town, Cedar City, is so beautiful. It has a nice suburb feel to it and it's right at the foot of these gorgeous mountains. We're staying at a church finally (5 days of camping = not so fun).

Yesterday we were at Long Valley Junction, UT at Camp Lutherwood (back to my roots! I was born in Long Valley...New Jersey...). It was a similar 45 mile day to today with lots of climbing. Long Valley Junction isn't actually a town...it's literally a junction of two roads and a gas station. There just happens to be a campsite there also. We paid a little extra to sleep in bunks so we got a 'real' bed which was nice. A fabulous change from the night before when it poured and everything got soaked. Some people got a hotel room that night (in Kanab, UT) but thankfully my stuff was pretty dry. Anyway, last night we, dinner crew, made a wonderful concoction for dinner...basically a stew of all stuff we had lying around...potatoes, onions, carrots, spinach, beans, corn, broth, tomato soup...and it was sooooo good. We even had enough potatoes/onions left over to make hash browns this morning.

So overall, I'm in a great mood today and hopefully that will last to psych me up for our 95 mile ride tomorrow into Nevada. Lots of love.