Mission Accomplished!

The final puzzle piece in our quest to ride our tandem in all of the lower 48 states is Wyoming. Coincidentally, it’s also the last state alphabetically. I can assure you it was not planned that way! Since we were just in Montana, it was an easy 220-mile drive to Wyoming.

We spend two nights in the city of Sheridan. It’s an all-cowboy theme in this town with lots of neon, hats and boots, and it works!

Tender bison short ribs
The meat sauce is elk

The night before our ride, we dine on bison short ribs with polenta and elk Bolognese. It’s a fabulous pre-ride meal that gets us ready for the perils we face the next day.

Perils? Is there anyone in our age group who didn’t grow up with a fear of quicksand planted by cartoons and too many Tarzan movies? It had rained overnight and everything was dry except for one of the unpaved roads in our 30-mile loop ride.

The early part of the route was perfect featuring wide roads, huge shoulders and hardly any cars.
The start of the unpaved part was innocent enough.
This area just looks a little wet. However, we are in for a big surprise.
Almost immediately, the concrete-like mud built up under the front fork, making it almost impossible to move forward.
We used a pointed stick to knock the mud off the rear wheel.

A “crick” had flooded and we thought we could walk around the questionable area.

Pushing the bike through the grass was equally difficult.

Wrong! After clomping through the slurry-like “quick-mud” for about a half mile, we made the (very smart) decision to turn back and make a route modification.

“Concrete Feet”! My shoes were so caked and heavy I could barely walk. My beautiful purple shoes may never be the same!

The alternate route back to our car was a bit shorter and mostly downhill and I was NOT complaining about the changes.

So the “final” state was a bit difficult, but the celebration was epic! YES, it included ice cream.

Here are the flavors. It is very hard to choose.
Yes, those scoops are as LARGE as they appear.

I’m not sure what we were thinking, but that is 22 dollars worth of sinfully good western ice cream. I gorged on the Pecos Pete Prickly Pear and the Green Pasture Mint Chocolate Chip (which I swore was just chocolate chip) and Roger indulged in the Yellowstone (ginger snap, banana, caramel chunks) and the Outlaw (chocolate chunks, cream cheese fudge and toasted coconut). Can you ever have too much ice cream? Perhaps we should have shared, but I’m almost embarrassed to confess that we ate it ALL!

We’re not done yet. After concluding our 48-state “mission”, the trip continues as we check off some bucket list items in South Dakota and Nebraska. Details in our next post!

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4 thoughts on “Mission Accomplished!”

  2. Congratulation on hitting your goal! 🏆 That finish line was crazy sticky, but the ice cream was a great celebration. Enjoy the rest of your trip.

  4. Congratulations! The hardest miles may be the ones you remember the most. Hopefully Eve’s shoes have fully recovered from their mud bath and are ready for the next adventure.

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