Thermopolis --> Casper, Riding with the Tiger

So as mentioned, Aaron, above, has dropped out for a bit to give his hurting knee a rest. He's been applying ice and Tylenol, but needs to just not bike for a bit. We'll meet up again in Casper at the BearTrap Festival. We're sorry to see him go as it was fun to have a official Posse on the BBT, but that's cycle touring for you.
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The road from Thermopolis to Casper begins with 25 miles though the Wind River Canyon with was some stunning scenery. We get to Shoshoni after that and this appears to be more ghost town than real town. Most store fronts are boarded up and aside from the gas station, there is not much going on. Fine with us though as what is going on involves a counter to sit at and a fountain drink machine to refill our sodas with. I'm a little concerned with how much soda I can consume while I'm bike touring. Speaking of concerns, did I mention that I had ice cream 3 times yesterday? Oh yea, and speaking of yesterday, I met this 86-year old WWII vet that was just as nice as can be. He gave us a good run down of the history of Worland (where we were eating breakfast ice cream #1). But he did say one thing that was sorta odd. He was talking about Ten Sleep, the town, says, "Well once there's these hippies came to town and the locals just sheared 'em (guffaw!)." Now I'm not sure if he was refering to a physical shearing or a metaphorical shearing, but all the same I wasn't sure that it was a P.C. thing to say, then again, I'm not sure that he gave a damn. Still, a super nice old guy who I would have loved to chat with for weeks on end.
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OK, back to the travels. We're now heading from Shoshoni to Casper on a road, Hwy 20/26, that one local describes, I'm not making this up, as "100 miles but it feels like 300". Now if that doesn't get you amped up to ride, I don't know what will. Below is a sample of that "300" miles. Nice shoulder though and we did have a wicked tailwind so we weren't complaining.

About 1/3 way to Casper, with no shade in sight, we get to the hamlet of Moneta (2 buildings). OK, time to do a little begging. We ask some guys drilling for water if we can take refuge in an old abandoned barn near them. They say "Sure, just watch out for rattlers". Hey, man, anywhere would have been better then in the sun and wind. So after kicking some dead rabbits from the barn that was giving the area a rather foul odor, we hunkered down for a couple hours in the shade. The drilling men came in after a while (and woke us) and we chatted about drilling. Actually, we bombarded them with all the questions one gets while cycling past all the oil and gas works in Wyoming. They we really nice. One called his Dad "his old man". Smoked Camels. And drank 2 Bud Lights each for break. Now this was "real Wyoming". Below is a pic of us in our pitiful break spot, you can't see all the rat turds, but they are there believe me.

At 1/2 way to Casper, we arrive to Hiland. This place was CLASSIC. Let me tell you, I did not say the O-word here (Obama). In fact I'm pretty sure I did everything I could to appear like a local oil-rigging roughneck who just happened to be on bicycle tour to 6 bluegrass festivals between assignments (I put my gum inside my lip to make it appear like I was chewing). Hiland is in the absolute center Wyoming on the map. We were elated to find out that they served Hamburgers and Fries. And tried not to pay too much attention to some of the wall decorations, like the one picture below or the photo of Hitler that said something to the effect of "Hitler registered firearms in 1935 for the betterment of the population", or something like that.

This gas station was sooo cool though and even had two lazy boys for us to relax in after our burgers and fries, which, by the way, only cost $5 each!

Today was really panning out to be the classic bike touring day, that is you never knew what was going to happen, it just kept happening. And that's when Aaron stolled in. We're like, "What! How did you get here?" He had hitched a ride with a couple Shoshoni Indians who were heading to Casper. His bike was thrown on the back of a big pile of luggage so that it was higher than the cab of the truck. All three of them squished into the cab of the small mini truck. We wished him well and will see him again in a couple days and can't wait to see what stories he'll have to tell.

So the wind is just howling and it's going in our favor. This makes for great biking, both because you can fly (15 mph vs. normally going 11mph) and you can speak normally because you don't have the wind in your ears. It really gives you a "rider's high" to cycle with the wind. We call it "Riding with the Tiger" as in Tiger Woods, as in TW, as in Tail Wind. We go thru all this code because we don't want to jinx the wind. Sorta like when someone is pitching a no hitter. Just ignore it and hope things don't change.

Did I tell you this place, Hiland gas stop, was the real deal? 50 miles from the next town? With a rifle sitting by the cashier (loaded I'm sure). I'm serious, right there, leaning on the counter, just begging some to drive off without paying for their gas. There were so many things I could have snapped picures of.

So the wind is just howling and it's going in our favor. This makes for great biking, both because you can fly (15 mph vs. normally going 11mph) and you can speak normally because you don't have the wind in your ears. It really gives you a riders high to cycle with the wind. We call it "Riding with the Tiger" as in Tiger Woods, as in TW, as in Tail Wind. We go thru all this code because we don't want to jinx the wind. Sorta like when someone is pitching a no hitter. Just ignore it. That's what we do too, just ignore the wind, don't mention it, and maybe it'll just stay the way it is. As we pulled into camp this evening, I realize we have just eclipsed 2000 miles. Yee-haw. A great ending to a wonderful day.