A day cut short

When I rode away from the homestay in the late morning, the wind and rain were still blasting over the landscape. I could tell it was going to be a crazy day.

After an hour of struggling I looked at my map and realized I was only about a mile outside of town. Visibility was bad, traffic was bad, and I was already soaked. I was wearing waterproof pants and socks and gloves, a big sweater and a shirt underneath a waterproof jacket, plus a wool cap and a balaclava, and sunglasses to keep the rain from blinding me. It had been working pretty well … until now. I was not going to go 30 miles today.

Just a few more miles ahead was a hotel specializing in horseback rides and ranching, so I put my head down and aimed for that. Perhaps the weather would improve tomorrow.

They had a room available in a shared apartment, so I grabbed it.

The apartment didn’t have any space for my bike, but there was enough space in the room for me to lay out all my wet clothing and crank up the radiator. By the end of the day everything would be dry.

The decor had some adorable touches. Cut-out horse art like you might see on the walls of a teenage girl’s bedroom. Kitschy reading material.

But really, I was here for the hot shower, the buffet meals, and the dry bed.

The season was moving on, and the 24-hour-sunlight was now pretty weak.  Like pre-dawn light but all the time.  After drying my clothes next to the radiator for 6 hours I opened the window to the room.  The humid air was slowly being replaced by dry, cool air.  Outside I could hear the wind – the same wind I struggled against earlier – still clawing around at the grassland and shrubs around the hotel building.  It sounded like the ocean, except instead of a long rolling tempo, it was more like a tumbling wave that never stopped breaking.