| 36 miles from the southwest christian camp near buckhorn to the comfort Inn in silver city, NM |
| it was very chilly as we started stirring this morning, which made the usual early-morning visit to the bathroom more invigatoring. |
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here's donna stepping quickly on her way from the shower room. i'm guessing it was in the 30's, as i found a thin layer of frost on the top of my trunk bag. |
| the gatorade i drank last night & continued drinking this morning, along with a couple of glasses of orange juice before breakfast, seem to have thrown my electrolytes back into kilter. after feeling so horrible last night that i thot i wouldn't be doing any more biking anytime soon, i took off biking this morning & was soon feeling fine. jane rode today, too, so she's better. sandy, however, rode into silver city on the van & was able to see a doctor. she's now on antibiotics for bronchitis & will take a few days off from biking. |
| astrid & lawrence churchill are the directors of the camp where we stayed last night. here they are in the dining hall, with all of us sitting at the tables behind them eagerly consuming the breakfast lawrence had just fixed for us: scrambled eggs, sausage, potato patties, orange sections, & lawrence's special coffee cake. |  |
| we got a slow start this morning, with most leaving probably around 7:30-7:45. it was a very easy ride compared to yesterday's, with some uphills, but none difficult. flat tires were a problem, tho'. |
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when i happened by, caroline had just fixed a flat (as her black hand will attest) with help from lennis (today's sag driver) & kathy grubb. roma had 2 flats today, 3 if you count the one that happened as she replaced the back wheel on her bike after she thot she'd fixed it. |
| at mi 31 we came to the high point of today's route, the continental divide at 6230 ft. when i first got there, only 2 or 3 were stopped, but little by little, more rode up the hill, so by the time i took this last picture, we had quite a group, including lennis, who'd stopped with the subaru. |
| from left in the front are marilyn boger, rita, & roma. in back from left are lennis, anne, mary from boston, kathy grubb, cynthia (peeking between kathy & becky), becky, & elaine. you can see what a pretty day it is, but you can also see that we're dressed pretty warmly. |  |
| from here it was a 4-mi ride downhill into silver city & our motel. several made a dash to the motel's laundry facilities, while others were as eager to jump into the swimming pool or hot tub, some of the nicest on our trip so far. |
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here are anne & karen relaxing in the hot tub. anne knows that many of you web-watchers are very interested to know how she's doing this year (her 3rd attempt to get all the way to st. augustine), & she says "i'm doing great; tell them i'm really cookin'." |
| michelle cooked another fantastic dinner this evening....ravioli with pesto sauce, homemade (or should i say galleymade) spring rolls (shrimp or vegetarian), an absolutely wonderful salad concocted with a variety of fresh dark greens, & chunks of fresh pineapple. it was so chilly in the parking lot that we took our plates into the motel's breakfast room to eat dinner. after dinner, michelle & catherine brot in a birthday cake for gay. |
| here's the birthday girl--in the center, with kathleen holding the festive headpiece. looking on, from left, are jane, carolyn, &, on the right, sandy. notice that sandy is smiling, despite her current bout with bronchitis. |  |
| catherine brot 2 bags of water bottles from the local "twin sisters" bike shop, one bottle for each woman in our group, compliments of the shop. thank you, twin sisters. |
| one of the reasons we have another layover day so soon is so that we can get acclimated to the altitude, in preparation for our climb over emory pass on saturday. we'll have our map meeting (or, as michelle calls it, "route rap") at 5 pm tomorrow, but before that, several have plans to visit the Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument that is some 1-1/2 hours north by car. roma has rented a van; i'll go with that group. others have family visiting & will go with them. others in our group have a variety of plans for tomorrow--bike cleaning, visits to the bike shop, movies, shopping, extra sleep...i'm not sure what all. we make the most of our layover days. |
| If you would like copies of the original, full-size photos, feel free to e-mail me with your request, and I'll save your note and get back to you after the ride. Stay tuned.... |