Tour Divide Day 1 Part 1

Started the day with a breakfast sandwich at the same bakery Tori and I ate at last year. Unlike last year I was actually able to eat and enjoy this time! Super excited!  Town is funny - bikes loaded up everywhere - outside every shop and restaurant - people all over the place.  Looks like there are going to be a lot of people out on the trail.    So I headed on up to the Y.  There were people everywhere - every sort of bike you could think of - some with tons of stuff and some with not very much.  There was a guy with a trailer, a couple on a tandem - it was great!  Guy called Larry who set us off last year took a photograph ( who was that who stood up in front of me just as it was taken??) He rode us out last year but seems his bike is broken so someone else had the honour.  We left early at about 10 to 8.  Me on my brand new bike - which I haven't had a chance to try out! Almost immediately I am aware the gears do not sound quite right. The day before I had concentrated on setting up my lights and USB phone charger and all sorts of other stuff.  When I rode a little it was in the higher gears which were fine so I didn't even consider there might be a problem.  Of course it is the lower gears which are grinding like crazy.  Probably at this point I should have returned and got it sorted but of course I didn't - I carried on.

I felt great and had a good first day - felt really happy.  It was a tough day however - raining as soon as we got a little higher.  Good trail down to the rest stop though. I had forgotten where it was - thought it was earlier  then thought I had missed it so stopped to fill my bottle from a tap only to find the stop just round the corner.  Didn't really matter - by this time it was pouring with rain - I stopped in the washroom to put on my waterproofs.  It was pretty miserable.   Made it to Elkford - last year I stopped at a restaurant here - this time I carried on past to the garage to buy some snacks.  There was a crowd at the garage trying to decide whether to carry on or not. We were told it was snowing up at the Pass - I carried on.  I don't remember the hill out of Elkford being anywhere near as  long - seemed to take forever.  And then on to dirt - a long dirt road down to Scarwood - probably about an hour ahead of last year at this point.  Did push pretty hard though as I was trying to keep to 10 mph - but feel I probably pushed a little too hard and suffered later.  When I arrived at Scarwood I really wanted to find some food but there was nothing open and that's where I suffered.   So I found a hotel room and went to bed!!