After about freezing to death the night before and riding in very cool Temps all day, I was in a glorious warm motel room last night. Walked in, turned up the heat, took a warm shower, dressed for winter, and brought my body temp back up to normal. The room was very sparse. No kleenex, no glass to drink out of, three of the four light bulbs were dead or missing, no coffee pot, but IT WAS WARM and had an outlet to charge my battery. I really didn’t care.

Woke up to clear blue skies and COLD. But I couldn’t get coffee til 8, so I stayed in my nice warm bed and didn’t head out of town til 9. I only rode 20 miles to the next town because tomorrow is 2 more mtn passes, and I just don’t know yet how to guage my battery. So I’m using this as a partial rest day. Yeah, you say three 40 mile days and I need a rest? Not really, but I don’t want to stress my knees early in the trip. I hate the T word and do not train for rides. I just get on and go and take it easy the first week or so. I did ride some before I left home to get used to my bike, but nothing that would count for training. That’s just my style.

The route today was beautiful. Gradual up most of the way, and just heavenly. Went through the Big Hole River Valley. Very similar to Teton Valley but longer and I think more beautiful. It is known as the valley of 10,000 hay stacks, although I didn’t see any.

Maybe the wrong time of year. But, interesting fact, our Big Hole Mtns are actually an extension of these mountains, depending on what map you look at.

Can’t help but mention a cool flower I saw today. Looked it up, and it is part of the geum family.

Only saw three plants and one had a very pretty little yellow flower. What intrigued me the most were all the red tendrils emanating from the center of the plant and lying on the ground like arms. The picture doesn’t do it justice, but, believe me, it was cool.

I spent an hour or more talking to the owner of the local antique store while killing time today, and he was a most delightful person full of all kinds of info. He is a retired dentist and has his own mill and trees on his property, which allowed him to build his own shop totally paid for. Very interesting guy who also travels horseback on long rides. He was very familiar with the Driggs area, so we had lots to talk about.