Bike Across America – Day 12

Friday, June 30, 2017

Start: Twin Falls, Idaho
End: Burley, Idaho
Mileage today/cumulative: 46 / 837
Elevation Ascended: 1,824
Weather: Sunny, 60° at start; sunny, 78° at finish
3D Video

Today’s ride was oddly short due to the fact that we’re riding in the middle of nowhere and there are a limited number of towns with hotels. We could have avoided this by signing up with a tour company that pitches tents for you anywhere but that wasn’t gonna happen. We love having a hot shower and comfortable bed every night – and always a place to get a cold beer!

We’d become accustomed to nice tailwinds the past few days and were hoping for more of the same today. Alas, it was not meant to be. Yesterday we had a few five-mile splits averaging around 25mph+ on flat roads. Today we were lucky to maintain 15mph on similar terrain due to strong headwinds for the entire ride. The only thing to do is make yourself as small as possible and spin faster in a lower gear.

Our planned route was only 39 miles with the option of adding seven miles with side trips to Shoshone Falls and the Twin Falls that the city is named for. We went to both (they’re the parts on the video where it appears that we’re riding into the Snake River Canyon). The Shoshone Falls were, by far, the most impressive, and we even caught a double rainbow over them. From there, we were about a mile upstream from Evel Knievel’s jump site. Each person in our riding group could remember his failed attempt to jump the gorge in a steam-powered rocket (1974) and for a few of them, Evel Knievel was their childhood hero. We were all disappointed that the jump site itself was not accessible by bicycle but it didn’t keep us from staring at the gorge in disbelief and wondering what it must have been like to witness the attempt. Evel Knievel was a brilliant self-promoter and one fearless dude.

After leaving Shoshone Falls, we continued on to the Twin Falls, which turned out to be a misnomer because one of the “twins” has been permanently dammed up and there is really only one fall at Twin Falls and it’s not particularly impressive. They should be required to rename the city of Twin Falls to Solo Fall.

From there, it was headwinds through miles of barley, corn, hay, alfalfa, and potatos. The alfalfa had been freshly cut and made my allergies miserable. It’s no wonder I’ve never been a fan of the stuff. The wheat fields are beautiful and each time we ride by them, someone starts singing “amber waves of grain” from America The Beautiful. We’re riding from sea to shining sea, we’ve begun to see spacious skies, the purple mountain majesty are only a few days away, and the fruited plain lies beyond them. We’re basically experiencing the entire famous first verse of the song from the seats of our bicycles.

Finally, we encountered our first “rural traffic jam” when a cow got loose and was running down the county road we were on. She kept successfully evading the two ranchers and a large SUV that were trying to corral her but we were eventually able to continue on after she ran down another road. It was a comical scene because that cow tasted freedom and wasn’t going to be fenced in again without a fight.  Two ranchers, a loose cow, and five bicycle riders in Lycra shorts on an Idaho road… there must be a joke in there.

Tomorrow we ride on to Pocatello and resume our typical mileage. We slowly increase our elevation over the next few days before we conquer the Tetons.