3 Kaboom's, 3 Dudes, and a Chick ride Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, Idaho, Montana

[Bazi]

Great Report ,Nice to read and dream

Greetings from Germany

[Bronco3738]

Great report. The pics of the areas are awesome. Thanks for taking the time to post. I can't wait for the rest of the trip

[byways]

It's good that you mention the heat. Folks need to be aware that even here, it does get hot. And because of cattle, I wouldn't count on drinking the water of the Sweetwater.

[zeegman]

Well, after a summer riding break I decided to try and finish this report so here is Day 8 Aug 28




Day 8 would see us riding across more big vast emptiness of Wyoming through oil and gas fields, chasing more Pronghorn and wild horses, our first flat in Wamsutter, visiting Aspen Alley, torrential rains and hail on Battle Pass, and ending up mercifully in Encampment, Wyoming. The distance was just over 200 miles.

After rising and shining near South Pass/Atlantic City, we headed further East on the big open empty plains.

This is the Big empty – no trees, or water, just vast open desert.


The roads were fast so we made good time. Here is a sample video of the fast roads

This is also oil and gas country and we saw numerous oil pumps extracting the black juice in their slow head bobbing rhythms.

This looked like a giant balloon – so it must be filled with gas!

Jeremy on the open road ahead!

Then Jeremy spots a bunch of wild horses racing around

Meanwhile Paul and Jill meet up with some racing Pronghorn – lots of fast animals in this area – I guess you need to be fast if there are no trees for cover

We were fast too – as you can see from the dust tails

Mike and Jeremy in the distance taking a short break

At about noon time we reach Wamsutter,

and our first flat – on Paul/Jills rear tire. Lucky we were at a gas station which is a good place to have a flat if you get one.

Boy, for a guy who has to fix a flat Paul sure seems happy!
We found the puncture – he picked up a rusty old nail.




After we fixed the flat we checked out Jeremy’s arm – he had this nasty swollen bump from an insect bite – yikes! Visions of Ewen MacGregor on the Long Way Round.

It was time for food so we went to the local Mexican restaurant next door.



It was pretty good plus it was nice and cool inside after sweating fixing that tire. Just ask Paul what he thought!


One last trip to the restroom for a pit-stop and to restock the Horny Goat Weed.

After lunch we came outside and noticed a few drops of rain – hmm could be a sign of things to come.

So we hit the road which was a bit of pavement between Wamsutter and Rawlins.

Highway roads are boring so we took some action shots on the road.
It took several tries to get a few good ones of Paul/Jill


Jeremy

And Mike

Hmm more rain headed our way

But as our luck turned out we just had light sprinkles as we reached the town of Rawlins

Some interesting rock formations in the middle of town
After a brief stop we headed on a dirt road South into the Medince Bow forest


We had this huge vista while riding on the edge of a big hill.

Eventually we reach a famous spot on the Continental Divide trail – Aspen Alley

Paul and Jill, Watch out for the leaned over tree!

Looking up through the tree tops

On the other side

Once we got through it was looking mighty dark and ominous!

We had to get to Encampment and it was in the direction of the darkest part of the sky.

So we headed out and hoped for the best.But the best it would not be as we had to gain elevation to reach Encampment and the skys opened up with rain.

At first it wasn’t too bad but we could see lightning in the hillsides and as we continued to climb the rain turned to hail.
By the time we reached the top of Battle Pass the hail was pelting us really hard to the point of wanting to jump off the bikes.
Our clothes were soaked, it was pretty cold, we could hardly see where we were going, and the hail actually hurt as it nailed us on our exposed arms and thighs.
I took a quick pic at the top of Battle Pass but we just wanted to get the heck out of there!


We finally reached Encampment and tried to find a hotel as soon as possible to get out of the foul weather.
We found one called Vachers Big Horn Lodge



Paul was mighty happy we weren’t camping that night!

There was a whole lot of water coming out of my boots

It was awesome to take the cold wet clothes off and get into dry ones. The hotel people really helped us out but letting us use their dryer and hair dryers to dry out clothes and boots.

We had a nice home cooked meal of pasta in sauce thanks to Paul and Jill, and talked about the days adventures and passed out pretty quickly after that.
Preview to Day 9 - nice forests, a big detour, entering Colourful Colorado, and an awesome campground.

[Tijuana_Taxi]

Thank you for coming back to finish this ride report! I really enjoyed the first part and looking forward to the rest!

[DARKRYDER]

Some more pics from that long hot day of riding that ended in a hail storm in Encampment

[DARKRYDER]

[DARKRYDER]

[DARKRYDER]

[DARKRYDER]

[DARKRYDER]

[DARKRYDER]

[DARKRYDER]

[DARKRYDER]

[DARKRYDER]