Moved on

Last Monday was my 75th birthday. I was held in Hailey, ID waiting for alternator etc parts to arrive then installed. Shop told me parts would arrive on Mon or Tues and that they would be installed same day. Over promise and under deliver. Parts arrived Tues but install was to be Wed. Previously I made a plan to drive ride and camp on way thru Yellowstone to make a Thurs night campground reservation East of the park. I lost ride days because of late repair. More later.

Wed morn I drove out of camp spot on Democrat Gulch. Maybe 25 antelope watched me go by, most were on hillside silhouetted against the sky. Turned onto paved Croy road were a moose cow and calf paced me a short distance on the other side of the fence.

Arrived at shop. I expected about 2 hours shop time. Van wasn’t finished until 2 for my departure heading east. Maybe the noise I heard came from the worn bearings in the alternator and the tensioner. For sure parts were replaced before failure.

Windy day. Drove US 20 thru Craters of the Moon lava fields. Sage brush vegetation then acres of tilled land. Racing against darkness to make Driggs for the night. Rain started to fall with darkness. Seems my headlights lack brilliance to shine thru newer headlights. Made Driggs in the dark. Shopped at large grocery store for Happy Camper bread that is gluten free for my diet. Bought 3 loaves, put 2 in freezer and 1 in fridge. Too late for restaurant food. I drove out of town to destination Big Eddy dispersed campsite on the river. I struggled navigating to the spot in the dark and map confusion. Made the spot.

Thurs morn I got after it early as my route would take me thru Yellowstone NP. I chose the northern route entering at West Yellowstone instead of going over Teton Pass and thru Jackson Hole. Rural farmed land. Many vehicles entering the park with me. Traffic flowed until a back up occurred. Miles of brake lights. Why there are first gears in transmissions. WTF? road work? accident? Finally I arrived at cause of backup: a lone buffalo was grazing that drivers were slowing down to view. WTF?  That was the only buffalo I saw during my trip thru the park.

That day was Thursday, my laundry day. I had visions of doing it on Friday at Cody, WY. Route went thru Fishing Bridge village. I stopped and checked out general store looking for a laundromat, none among all the tourist trinkets. Back at the van I read the park paper and saw that a laundromat was at the RV park nearby. I asked if non campground visitor could use the facility. I was in the laundromat. I have clean clothes done on Thurs. The machines were housed in the same building as the campground registration function for the only hard sided campers, meaning rvs only. I noticed that there was an awful lot of gray on the staff: people my age. I visited with a man in gray. He said this season is known as near dead or newly wed. I walked into the campground: rigs were packed close together separated by mere feet. No way for me.

Evening destination was Wapiti XG which is outside the park on USFS land. No openings in the few opened XGs in the park. More driving. Stormy. Road went along the north shore of Yellowstone Lake. I stopped at a turnout and took this pic:

Very windy moving my van around. How fast was wind? I held my wind speed device which never reached 20mph. I over estimated the speed. I thought higher but had no idea what. Sheesh.

Drive continued and climbed up to 8,xxx’ with snow flurries, none stayed on the road like higher up the mountain sides. Dropped down and exited the park. I passed several other XGs. Wapati XG is well outside the park. I had made a reservation for an assured spot. The XG had many open spots but I did not know that ahead of time. Peace of mind knowing that a spot had my name on it.

During bfast fixings the heater shut down. Oh no. I could not clear the fault, the led went solid red. WTF? I fired up the cat infrared heater for warmth. I pulled the fuse which triggered flashing led and I was able to clear the fault which allowed the heater to fire up. Whew. I put a double layer of cheese cloth over the intake grate to block fuzzies entering the heater which caused the demise of the last heater. I removed the cloth and saw the fuzz build up which restricted air flow which overheated a motor which caused it to shut down. I haven’t figured out the source of the fuzzies. Happy that I figured out how to enjoy the functioning heater. I will turn it on now. It fired up.

Completed the drive into Cody. Filled propane. Drove to Funhoggin bike shop seeing that it was still open. The owner was absent whom I met on previous visit.

There are 2 trail systems in town. The Outlaw trails are outside of town that I have ridden 2 times. The other one is on the city property line which I decided to check out. Weather forecast was for gusts to 20 mph. I parked exposed to the wind. Do or am I able to ride in such strong winds. Again I checked the velocity: a gust hit 16 mph. I decided to give a ride a go.

windy. I came upon a rock move with the wind full on broadside. I walked the move as I was concerned wind would alter my line.

Short duration ride. I looked up wind speed at the nearby airport, a gust of 21 mph, otherwise in the teens.

Drove out of town towards the Outlaw trails. Anchored at different spot as spots close to that trail have been shut down because of past abuse. Everything is exposed.

So tomorrow I will continue towards Spearfish, SD making 2 days to drive the 300 miles across the state. I plan on riding Outlaw in the morning before leaving.

My shoulder is barking big time from this typing. Enough.

Sat morn typing on my phone.

I can be where I want to be etc. Bend’s air quality suffered from heavy forest fire smoke from 30 plus lightning started fires up near Bachelor. Heavy fuel load. Swampy would have been breathing chunks. Fires were on the other side of the road. Climate change sending precip elsewhere and the fuel load continues to build with less retained water. Some day when I’m anchored at La Pine I’ll be faced with fire smoke.

Tuesday night I watched the debate between Harris and dump. He never looked at her. He is such a threat to democracy and is a blow hard w/ no substance. He’s bad but his cult followers enable him. Those who believe absurdities can commit atrocities. My goal in life now, as it has been for each election that he has been on ballot, is to live long enough to cast my ballot for the other person. To me watching the entire debate, which was a struggle, listening to his blather gave me the denominator to compare to the various news coverages.