Colorado Springs and heading for the flat lands

The highest point on our trip across the country.

I thought I should put out a quick update since we continue to have issues with phone and internet access, even on the outskirts of Colorado Springs.

We did our last Rocky Mountain stage yesterday, riding from Breckenridge to Colorado Springs, CO.  We also did our last crossing of the Continental Divide at our highest point of the trip at Hoosier Pass, 11,539'.  It was a 101 mile day with 3 climbs, but a massive descent over the course of the day.  We climbed 4900', but dropped a total of 7900', so a lot of good downhill riding.  Link to the ride.  Nicholas rode the first 57 miles with me and Beth and I rode the tandem into Colorado Springs around the foothills of Pikes Peak.

Nicholas' family met up with us in Colorado Springs as well.  We toured the Garden of the Gods park in the morning.  Then they all drove up to the top of Pikes Peak while I did the planning for the rest of today and tomorrow and Beth restocked the groceries.

April, Curt, Beth, Emily, Nicolas, Ruth, & Barbara

The Royal Gorge was our original stop for today, but with the fires there and limited access to the park, we diverted to Colorado Springs.  That has forced some replanning.  Tomorrow we will join our originally planned route at Eads, CO, the "half-way" point of our trip.

I rode across Colorado Springs at 5:30AM this morning.  While it is a very bike friendly town, the bike paths and routes don't connect very well or at least not as far as I could see.  Also, Colorado Springs may have the worst maintained streets I have seen.  So anyway I rode to the junction of highway 94 that will take us east into the prairie.  We'll do a 30-40 mile ride this evening and finish up tomorrow in Eads.

Here are a few stats after 4 complete weeks on the road (5 if you count the drive to Oregon):

27 unique RV parks and campgrounds (includes our drive to Oregon)

RV average gas mileage:  16.1 mpg (impressive for with the mountains and wind)

9 crossings of the Continental Divide (we're done with that)