Day 18 - 25 miles east of Cody to the base of the bighorn mountains at Ten Sleep

The team camped last two nights in Cody. Last night we got some rain with thunder and lightening but slept well. We woke to clearing skies. Packed up camp and headed out for our 18th consecutive day of riding. Our ride today could be described as rolling desert terrain with a modest amount of ascent as we approached the town of Ten Sleep. We climbed about 2,000 feet over the 75 mile ride.

Overall, it was a low key ride. Some headwind but nothing too challenging. (We are looking forward to some tail winds though….when we see them we don’t know!) Temperatures stayed on the pleasant side.

We were at about the 55 mile mark when we started to get chased by a rain storm to the south of our route. We’d seen storms all around us all day but this storm seemed to be overtaking us. With about 15 miles to go it caught us! High straight line winds, small hail and buckets of rain fell. We actually had our SAG vehicle nearby as Jenny could see the weather was getting sketchy. Once the thunder and lightening were seen and heard simultaneously, we thought it wise to sit the storm out in the truck.

Within 15 minutes, the sky brightened and the storm psssed. We finished our planned route and then racked the bikes for a three hour ride up to Billings Montana to swap out our driver! Jenny heads home in the morning and our good friend Rick Chapman arrives. Tomorrow will be our first rest day of the trip. Well deserved in this writer’s opinion!

Tomorrow we will focus on organizing gear and getting ready to return to Wyoming to climb the bighorn mountains on Saturday!