Day 13: Burley to Blackfoot,
Idaho
July 3, 2004
Miles: 110
Another long day, the fifth longest on our schedule. We started
out with breakfast at 5:30, loaded our luggage into the box, and hit
the road. The rest of the Clydesdales took off ahead of me.
I caught up with them after a few miles.
Here is one of the farms to the northeast of Burley:
After a while, we rode through some BLM lands, used in a few spots for
grazing. There were cattle guards every two miles or so, which
rattled us as we crossed over them; I've decided that taking them
slowly is best for the bike. You reach a point on this read where
you truly are in the middle of nowhere. While taking photos, I
was leap-frogging several riders, including Ian, shown here in this
panorama (click the picture for a larger version):
After about 20 miles of this, we passed back under the
interstate. We rode I-86 for a few miles. It was concrete,
even on the shoulder and quite clean. The bridges were full of
bird nests, the road with evidence that they were occupied:
We started to work our way northeast. After American Falls, we
came upon the American Falls Reservoir, which we passed around on the
west and then headed northeast to Burley:
This shot was taken in the farming country about 20 miles from
Burley. Clouds don't often show this well in a photo.
We were tired when we got in, but not as tired as in John Day, which
had more climbing. Also, the weather cooperated. So long as
we were moving, the breeze cooled us off. We did have a pretty
strong headwind at times, however.
Dinner was planned as an outdoor barbecue but thunderstorms arrived
right at the appointed time. A serving line was set up in the
lobby and we ate in our rooms. The food was really good, probably
the best so far. Breakfast in Burley, on the other hand, was
among the worst. The only choices were french toast, oatmeal (an
oatmeal lover did tell me it was pretty good) and danish, not much
variety and no protein. We did find excellent Mexican food for
lunch in Aberdeen.
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