Charlie's Bike Tour 2014: Days 1-2, Suburban Front Range and Desolate Eastern CO

With much help from my host and launch partner Jon Falk, I commenced the trip Sunday morning with cool temps and slightly overcast skies. Jon and Judith's son Adam joined me for the first 25 miles through farm country and tract housing on the outskirts of Boulder. They departed around 10:30 in Erie, an old coal mining town, and I was on my own! It wasn't until I got east of I-25 that I broke free of the endless subdivisions of the booming Front Range and got into Farm Country: gently rolling prairie with corn, wheat, sunflowers, and hayfields as far as the eye can see. I rolled into Strasburg some 85 miles after leaving Jon's and camped on the high school football field after refusing to pay KOA's confiscatory Labor Day rates (though I did buy a shower for $4). The lush green grass turned out to be too good to be true, as at 11 PM the irrigation sprinklers came on for an hour, rhythmically drenching my tent for over an hour. But it stood the test and I stayed dry!

Next morning I set out to reach Flagler via a Google Maps bike route through very remote eastern CO. All was well until the pavement ended, and the route got progressively worse as the day progressed. Ended up biking about 30 miles on gravel, much of it washed out and unmaintained for long stretches. When I finally hit pavement I abandoned hopes of reaching Flagler and instead headed for Limon, passing through a massive wind farm with what seemed like well over a thousand towers. The sun was hot and I was wiped after battling the gravel. Pulled into Limon and settled for KOA at a much more reasonable $25. Tomorrow shoot for Eads on paved roads (no more gambling with Google Maps bike route feature), and then own to Kansas the next day via the Trans Am route.

Fully loaded