Day Twenty-Four: Boulder - Torrey

We arrived at Burr Trail Outpost before the opening hour, and awkwardly greeted the owner as she arrived to set up shop. We weren’t the only ones passing through early in the morning; we were joined by young, hipster farmers and old-timer cowboys (Boulder had quite the interesting crowd considering its miniscule population). We chit-chatted with locals, ate homemade granola with raw honey, yogurt, and bananas, and of course sipped steaming mugs of coffee. We knew that our check-out time at the motel was quickly approaching, but since our bags were packed and ready to go, we waited out our last hour at the shop. The anal motel lady, however, was nipping at our heels to get out—in fact, she called us at 10:00 to tell us, “You know, you need to be out of that room at 10:30. Where are you? I need to clean the room.” FYI, we paid to be in that room until 10:30, so we will sit in that room until 10:29:59. We had had enough of her sass.

After checkout, we pedaled our way out of Boulder into yet another storm. The day’s ride included the infamous Boulder Mountain, where the 9,600 ft. summit loomed among threatening rain clouds and wispy fog. The climb began with a gradual uphill, then threw a curveball with a steep eight miles to the top. We were surprisingly dry at the summit, but then began the real downpour—and since we had dropped nearly 20 degrees in temperature, we were shakin’ in our booties. The downhill was horribly unenjoyable, as our hands were so freezing that it was difficult to grip the brakes, and our faces were being spattered with icy rain. To make matters worse, various limbs were falling asleep by the time we realized that the town at the bottom was actually ten miles further than we originally were told—so that was fun.

Thankfully, the decrease in elevation brought warmer winds, and we were able to thaw out a bit before finally rolling into Torrey, UT. The town wasn’t much to see, but it had just what we needed: a Subway and a motel. There was no camping in town, and being that our sleeping bags, tent, and bodies were soaking wet, we knew that it was time for a laundry session and a dry room. We checked into the Days Inn and devoured a foot-long sub (and later ate another one) while watching a movie called, “The Good Lie,” and spent about five minutes in the hot tub before our insides were boiling. The comfort of the hotel room put us to sleep early, and we dreamt of the next morning’s continental breakfast.