We biked from Clint (outskirts of El Paso) to Sierra Blanca, about 75 miles. Strava recorded 58 of those miles. My bike odometer recorded almost none of it and did not show speed, then it started working and stopped again. All the time fighting 10-15mph headwinds. My first flat was about 50 miles into the ride and I discovered the rim tape on my new rim was stuck to the tire, 30 minutes lost getting them apart and fixing the flat. 10 miles later flat number 2, a roofing nail, same rim tape issue… At this point I was not sure how far Sierra Blanca was down the road and for the first time on the trip I felt discouraged. A half hour later I was in town with a room at the Sierra Blanca historic motel, very cool looking place with friendly, helpful staff and clean rooms. We found dinner at a local diner along with 3 ice waters and I was feeling optimistic again.
Wanting a rest day and the next town (Van Horn) was only 30 miles down the road. We figured go to the bigger town and take two nights. I few calls to hotels and campgrounds found everything full. We also found out we could not stay another night where we were at, a cycling group had reserved most of the rooms and they were full.
It was about this time Jim found out that Blue Origin’s space port was just down the road and they were going to put William Shatner in space (something I am all for), but also try to return him to earth. This was planned for Tuesday, but moved to Wednesday because of the same wind issues we fought on our bikes. Having two motels in Sierra Blanca we found a room at the Americana motel, nice but not as interesting as the historic motel.
So for our rest day we cleaned the bikes and adjusted them and went over to the other motel and talked to a few of the cyclists.
I did manage to find a room in Van Horn for Wednesday, so tomorrow morning we wake up early and watch the launch (we are 35 miles southwest of the space port) and then bike to Van Horn and stay at the Day’s Inn.
Lunch
https://strava.app.link/W2IGrVeijkb
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