Day 6 - last Day of Bike Tour

Ooops, guess I've been avoiding writing about the last day of the tour. Maybe I'm holding on subconciously?

We were scheduled to do a 26 mile bike ride on our last day. In theory, it sounded great. It wasn't until we realized check-out was a 11:00am and we had a plane to catch that it sounded a little tricky. Hmmm...we either need to get done early or get on a plane stinky. Early definately sounded better.

We had another fine breakfast prepared by Linda and Patty at 7am. After breakfast everyone was kind of milling around and I thought... "hmmm... if I leave earlier, then it will take that much longer for everyone to pass me." I shared my thought with Judy and she said she was ready to go too...so we were off....

It was a beautiful morning! Cool and crisp. I even saw a moose! About 5 miles into the ride we saw Ann and Deb heading back. (They left before breakfast.) Ann said she had to turn back a couple of miles before the end of the ride because a herd of cattle were in the road.

The beginning of the ride was flat, flat, flat. Then we had a few rolling hills before it started a long slow incline. It wasn't "hard." I just had to find a comfortable gear and pedal along...slowly... At some point Jane, Michelle and Claudine passed us (of course, haha). A little while later the three of them came zooming back down the hill. Ahhh...we must be close to the top!

Just after we started flying down the hill, my cell phone started ringing. I didn't see Judy right behind me so I thought I'd better stop in case she was having trouble. Turns out it was Linda and she couldn't figure out where we were. Everyone who was behind us, had already passed her. How could that be? Ummm because they didn't ride all the way to the top! I think they heard the rumors about the cows. :-) We never saw any cows!!

Judy and I may have been "last," but at least we can say we rode all the way. It was just us and the "big guys." (Jane, Michelle and Claudine.) After missing a few miles the first day, I would've had to be dead to skip any more miles.

We got back in plenty of time to take a nice hot bath. I'm sure the people on the plane were probably grateful for that. We had a wonderful picnic lunch, waited for our shuttles and then headed off to the airport. And then the fun really began....

Waiting for the shuttles

We hung out for a couple of hours and then Judy's flight left. Jane and I hung out at the cafeteria. I played on the internet. She read. About an hour or so later I looked up and saw Judy. Jane said I looked like I saw a ghost. Turns out the Denver airport was closed and they had been sitting on their plane the whole time. Finally the airline decided to let them get off for a few minutes to grab something to eat.

Hmmm....what does that mean about our flight? By the time we were getting ready to leave, Denver was open again, but Jackson was in danger of closing. It was raining and I was already hurrying to the plane when the flight attendant leaned out the door and told me to run. Me? Run? Must've been a funny sight, but I ran... or attempted to run.... As I climbed into the plane, the flight attendant started doing her little speech in super fast mode. Only problem was, we were still getting fuel. I was seated and ready to go, but the plane was not.

And then... Jackson closed....but only for about 15 minutes. All said and done, we arrived at Denver ontime... but guess what?! Our next plane was delayed! We finally landed in San Diego around midnight and I think we spent about 5 hours hanging out in airports. I was more exhausted by the trip home than I was by any of the days of cycling!

Bike Tour Posts

Day 1 Day 2 Day 3 Day 4 Day 5 Day 6