Tuesday June 18:  Fruita, Colorado to Montrose, Colorado
Distance:  74.2 miles
Total time:  7 hours 9 minutes
Riding time:  6 hours

We woke up to find a colony of prairie dogs living in the field next to our hotel.  It's not a great picture but they really are like cartoon characters, popping in and out of their holes.

It was chilly, in the 50s, as we got ourselves prepared to ride.  Here are Ray from Denver and Doug from Petaluma, ready to roll.

Before we get on the bikes, there are a couple of things we have to do.  First, load our luggage into the van.  Here are Jake and Mark, ready to load.  They and the two other America by Bicycle staff alternate assignments.  Generally they drive the vans one day, and cycle with us the next.

The last thing we do is ensure that our cycles are ready for the road.  Here's Leonard from Ohio pumping air into his tires.

Today was a relatively short day - 74 miles - punctuated by four steady climbs.  The wind was with us much of the way and the road conditions weren't bad.  We spent most of the day on U.S. Route 50.  We're officially done with the interstates.  It looked like it would rain all day long, but like yesterday the rain seemed to run parallel to our course.  Until we got creamed with about eight miles to go.  Here are Michael and Jamie taking a break with ominous clouds behind them.

The first half of the ride was as arid as Utah.  The rocks are different, with a lot of red rock, hence Colorado.  It looked like this for much of the day.

And this.

I was disappointed that we didn't see any UFOs in Nevada - Area 51 and all that - but we did spot this guy early in today's ride.

At the 50 mile mark we left desolation behind and entered the town of Delta, which was a pleasant surprise.  The downtown had a very western-movie aspect, and there was funkiness all around.  The town is known for its murals, and we saw at least a dozen as we rode through.

Jamie spotted an old penny farthing high-wheeler bike, and briefly considered continuing the journey with it.  Cooler heads prevailed.

Delta was also full of old cars.  I imagine the arid climate is easy on old cars so they tend to last longer than in, say, New Hampshire.  We passed two dealers who each had dozens of vintage cars for sale.

After Delta, the landscape began to change, and we saw the first hints of greenery since California.  There were even patches of wild flowers...

... and scrubby stunted trees.

As I mentioned, we felt like we were in a race with the rain all day.  We could see showers and lightning off to the south for most of the ride.  Eventually we could tell that our paths would cross and sure enough about a half hour from the hotel we hit a downpour.  We had all carried rain jackets with us, so we stopped, put them on, and cycled as fast as we could for the hotel.  It stopped as we entered the town of Montrose, our destination.  In retrospect it was amazing that we'd cycled for 16 days without getting wet.

Michael captured this nice image of our hotel crowned by a rainbow.

This evening, at our daily meeting to discuss the next day's route, the Brits presented Leonard with this shirt, which has a built-in beard measuring device.  They've been impressed with his beard since the beginning.

So, I had thought that the climb through the Rockies began today, but today's almost 4,000 feet of climbing was just taking us higher up the plateau.  We hit the real mountains tomorrow, and tomorrow is reputed to be the toughest or second-toughest day of the ride, with an elevation gain of over 5,000 feet.  Most of it comes in the first 30 miles with grades of 6 to 8 percent.  I'll let you know how it goes.