day 9

4 June 2008



We rode to Baker, NV today. Baker is right next to Lehman Caves, and we wanted to go take a tour, so we started earlier than normal so we could get there in time. The weather forcast said it might rain, so we took all our rain gear, and it was a good thing. Going up the last pass we were racing the storm. The wind was at our backs, which was good, but the storm caught us right after we started downhill. We started getting hailed on, and the van was close, so we had them pull over and we got inside for a bit to see if the hail would stop. I leaned my bike against the van and crawled inside. Either it shifted, or I just set it too close to the door, but when I shut the door it hit my back tire and knocked my bike over. When we started out after the hail turned back into rain, my back tire went flat. I had somehow gotten a large slice through my tire, probably from the van door hitting it. So we had to change the tire and the tube. I was glad we could change it in the van for warmth. We rode the rest of the way in to town in the pouring rain. My toes and fingers were freezing.

It was snowing hard, with an inch of snow on the ground when we got into the campground. We left the trailer in the snow and went to the caves. The cave tour was awesome. I took my camera, but got so caught up that I forgot to take any pictures inside. So I snapped one of the family at the visitor center.

We rode 59 miles today.