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Saturday, 6-28-08, Hickison Summit, Nevada
Originally, we were planning to rest today, but we decided to pedal 25 miles to Hickison Summit, to a campground at a Petroglyph site on the way to Eureka. That morning, Gloria and I did the laundry. I decided to walk through the town on the way. Austin is a sleepy town of about 200 residents; a lot of businesses were closed or out of business. I went from shop to shop inquiring about the condition of the Hickison Campground, and the general concensus was there was no water but there were toilets. The Austin laundrymat is a great place to sit and do nothing but ponder life and watch a car go by every few minutes, so I took time to reflect and take personal inventory. Finally the clothes were dry and we managed to restock the van with supplies. It was too hot to ride, over 100 degrees, so after eating tuna sandwiches and the rest of the pickles, we sat down in the shade at the park by the pool and had our Bible time. Later I worked on my bike and made the necessary adjustment. Becky went running (believe it or not) with John (who didn't tell anybody so Mama was in a near panic looking for him). My bike ran smoothly, such a relief. I was worried it would give me trouble over the long mountain range. It had cooled down but the climb out of Austin was steep. We made it though. So far we haven't had to walk the bike anywhere on the trip. Of course, the downhill ride is thrilling - something to look forward to after the hard climbs. The wind was slightly against us though, so we didn't set a new downhill record, only 43 mph. Maybe tomorrow. It was pretty pedaling through the vast open country - green hills. desert vegetation, quiet with only an occasional car passing every every 5-10 minutes. Yes, it probably is America's lonliest highway. It made the riding pleasant, low stress. we played our word game we used to play on our long runs when we lived in Nevada. I won. When we arrived at Hickison Campground, Mama already had the tent set up. It was about 8 pm, not much daylight left, so we walked around and saw the petroglyphs. Beautiful area with nice views, so we took lots of pictures and video. Later we cooked up the spagetti. Ummm good! 25 miles.