Day Forty-Nine - First Mountain.

Today was a slow start like a Monday morning, a headache didn't help matters. It didn't help that I had a heavy-footed, 5am rising door slammer upstairs from me. I eventuallu got going at around 9:30.

It took me ages to get through and out of Pueblo, the town is full of one way roads. After a few detours including dodging a marching band, I was out into the wilderness. The first part of my riding today was through scenery that was a lot more interesting than that from the east of Pueblo. It was very desert-like, with open rock faces and Mountains as a backdrop. It was along here that I noticed that part of my front rack has snapped, meaning my front left pannier was clinging on by one hook. I taped that up as best I could (so not very well) and continued on.

It wasn't long before the tape came back out again, my right Achilles gradually bacame painful the more the incline of the road increased. I taped my ancle up, which seemed to do the trick. I had a long climb in the afternoon, so I stopped for a break at a store in a small village for a bit. It wasn't particularly steep (steep enough to need to be in my lowest gear), but at around 15-16 miles long it took ages to climb to the top. The highest point was about 9200ft, over twice the height of Ben Nevis, and you could definitely tell that the air was thinner. It's quite a weird feeling, breathing in was somehow less satisfying than before, making you need to stop to catch your breath frequently.

I arrived at the top, looking forward to my nice long downhill to Westcliffe. The wind had other plans, and gave me a strong headwind that stopped me going downhill faster than 15mph. Eventually I arrived to a very windy Main St. and went to look for the campsite. I discovered that it was 1.5 miles out of town, which is fairly inconvenient when you don't have a stove. After much umming and ahhing, I reluctantly decided to get a room, based upon the howling winds and black clouds coming over the mountains.

Tomorrow I'm heading to one of three places - Salida, Poncha Springs or Maysville. Salida is meant to be a nice place to stay, but the campsite is 3 miles out, Maysville has only a grocery store for food and Poncha Springs has only a Motel. I'll decide closer to the time, but Salida is probably the best choice. They also have two bike shops there, I might have a look at front racks. I found a long piece of rope at the side of the road, so perhaps that'll do. Any advice?