Day 1 June 12, 2001

! know this gal who did a 5 month tour. She came back a wicked climber and
in her very first Time Trial (TT) she got the same time as ! did to the
second. The next 2 TT races ! set Personal Bests (PB) and she outran ME both
times. She started in late April and went to Durango to get snowed in for a
week. Duh. It always snows that week in Denver so of course Durango would get
hit. ! decided that ! was heading out onto the plains to go south. Well,
since ! was delayed by a month and a half ! thought to myself the chance of
snow is pretty slim. No snow so far. ! decided to along the West side of I-25
into the foothills. Those foothills go up high and !'m no climber especially
w/ 100 lbs. of gear in the trailer. Not only that but ! got lost going to
Roxborough state park and had to double back 5 miles over hills ! traveled @
a blistering 6 mph. Onto 85 for rush hour and then up into Pike national
forest to camp. 60 miles of brutal riding to get 30 miles from home. Argh. !
now have an idea why the federal government is so deep in debt. $11/night to
camp in a spot w/ no H2O or other facilities save for a recycling toilet. How
do you go broke charging $11/night for nothing w/ dozens of similar campsites
in just this one forest? Consider an average of 2 campers/day. $22 income.
They had a manager on the site to collect the ca$h. ! don't know what they
pay them, but ! bet it is far more than $22/day. He didn't even know ! was
there
'til the next morning.