Howdy blog! It’s Tubb…we’re nearly halfway through Kansas now, but our loyal readers deserve updates about the two awesome rest days we spent in Colorado Springs, CO. Springs, as many of the people we met there call it, was about 50 miles north of our planned route, so we biked from Cañon City, CO to Boone, CO and piled in the van for a rainy drive north.
En route
Eventually, we reached the hills of Manitou Springs, where my Baba and his wife CB were so generous to host us. After much-needed showers, we enjoyed a scrumptious array of several of my favorite CB recipes, like Texas chili and wonderfully crispy cornbread. Sleep deprived from the previous days of biking and teaching, we conked out quickly afterwards.
Grubbin’
The next morning, we caught up on some much-needed rest, ate a delicious breakfast, and headed east to explore both the new and old downtowns of Colorado Springs. We found several quirky stores, including a totally strange witches shop selling a variety of wand-making, crystal-enchanting, and spell-casting supplies. Once we got hungry, Eva, Will, and I located the nearest spot to grab coffee, where we also discovered great avocado toast. From there, we split off. I went back to the house to see my dad, who’d just flown in, while the rest of the team bought groceries and some long-craved boba. That night, we ate tasty braised beef tacos, hot-tubbed, greeted my mom and sister Kathryn when they arrived, and slept early…we had an early (and absolutely insane) morning ahead.
Alarms (and my grandfather) blared at 3:15am. My teammates let me, my sister, and our desire to make the most of the many opportunities we encounter this summer persuade them into hiking Pikes Peak on our last real “rest” day for almost two weeks. On a 14,115 foot mountain, starting any later than 5am puts hikers at undue risk of thunderstorm, hail, and lightning strike. We had 14 miles of continuous uphill ahead of us, so Will, Eva, Hunter, Kathryn, and I wasted no time layering up, filling water bottles, and stuffing snacks into our hiking backpacks. Thanks to an early ride from my dad, we were headlighted and powering up the Barr trail at 4:30, which gave us the rare opportunity to see the sunrise from start to finish.
The pre-sunrise horizon was absolutely breathtaking
As an aside, Spokes has been one of the busiest, most jam-packed experiences of my entire life. We’re constantly biking, planning, cooking, eating, sleeping, or doing something insane like waking up at 3:15am to climb a 14er. And I love that 99% of the time. But when I’m super busy, I occasionally need a moment of total or near-total serenity. And because I’m super busy, those moments, when they do unexpectedly pop up, are incredibly meaningful. As we took our first proper rest a few miles into our trek, I looked east over the still-twinkling lights of the city, several miles away. As I caught my breath, the sun began to crest the horizon below a beautiful mix of swirling reds, pinks, and oranges. If you looked carefully, you could still see the stars behind the colorfully brightening sky. I thought for a second about how we live our days largely without paying attention to or thinking about the slow changes in the color of the horizon, steady crawling of the sun across the sky, and gradual changes in position of the stars. But when the moment, your headspace, and mother nature all strike a perfect chord, it becomes effortless to be aware of the sublime changes that are always happening around us. Similarly, it’s easy to feel stuck in each mile, hill, or logistical hurdle of spokes, which can prevent us from experiencing the real change that occurs in us, our team, and the world around us as we bike. As I write this, we’re more than halfway into our journey — I hope to take zero of the next 34 days for granted.
Mid-sunrise pondering
Trekkin’ at the top
Ok…life reflection over. As we climbed, I enjoyed talking to my sister about her summer and our shared hiking, running, and biking goals. We stopped for coffee, a bathroom, and (most importantly to me) free apple walnut pancakes at Barr camp, the only campsite and primitive post along the trail. Eventually, we passed the treeline, where we were lucky to get beautiful views of nearby mountains and Colorado Springs, which at that point looked so far away. Our pace slowed as the trail steepened and thick fog rolled in, but we made it to the summit just minutes before a hailstorm began. I can’t be completely sure, but I’d be willing to bet we set the all-time spokes record for highest elevation reached by human power. We ate at the top and drove down with my parents, who expertly descended without overheating the breaks. That afternoon, we rested, logistics-ed, and ate juicy burgers courtesy of my grandparents. I spent as much time as possible with my family, which rejuvenated me before I’d bike 12 of the next 14 days.
Sometimes, sleep and planning are going on simultaneously
The next morning, we drove back to Boone and biked to Eads, CO, which is the Kansas border. Thank you so much to my entire family and especially my Baba and CB for all of their generosity, especially in culinary form!
The Tubb clan…thank you so much Baba, CB, Mom, Dad, and Kathryn!