It started out as a cool, beautiful day, the road was still a little downhill leaving the lodge, so the first ten miles went quick. Then the area opened up and the terrain became more rolling. We had an ok pace going with Keri leading, but then the road turned and we went into a strong headwind. I left Keri out there buckin’ the wind, (I certainly didn’t want to be there,) it was hard to keep the speed in the upper single digits. Then I got my first flat – a big thorn – we changed it in record time, but couldn’t get the pump to work properly. We tried my pump, then Keri’s pump, I thought, mine’s not great, but it has put air in the tube in the past. We finally figured it out – we had put the same punctured tube back in! How stupid! We changed the tube again and were finally on our way. Pierre was on his way to us with the van and we caught him a few miles down the road, he got a good laugh out of our folly.
I lead to midday in Hatch, NM – chilli capitol of the world – catching up to a bunch of people. In Hatch a group of us stopped for lunch at the Pepper Pot for some good mexican chow. The waitress asked if someone wanted onions with their burrito, I’m thinking “can you have mexican food without onions?” I said to Bob “That’s just wrong!”
After lunch I was riding solo and feeling really good, stomping on the pedals and passing a bunch of people (to the chagrin of some of the men). Pierrre had stopped his van next to a calf roping contest – a perfect excuse to stop. I stopped to watch, and asked some locals how it all worked, they were more than happy to explain it all to me.
Finally it was time to head on in to Las Cruses, the wind – flags flying straight out – was most of the time sort of a tailwind and sometimes to the side, I made it into town at a good pace. Rode awhile with Ann, trying to shield her when we had sidewinds, since she hadn’t been riding much because of medical problems.
I kept going straight to see some of Las Cruces instead of turning at the edge of town to go to our campground. Stopped at a DQ for some ice cream and postcard writing, then meandered back toward the campground, trying to find a brew pub one of the locals told me about. I finally made it to camp realizing I was very close to riding a hundred miles (a “bob”) so I toured the campground to get the required .4 miles to complete my “century”.
Our campground was fine, but the food lacked in quantity – our caterers insisted on serving our trough for the night and it was very skimpy. Katie, one of the staff, also agreed to do an alcohol run, so I put in my order for red wine, around $10, preferably local. It was undrinkable, I think it had been recorked or at least the cork was reused, it was poured out after the first whiff, a taste was not needed.
100 miles