The morning was quite slow as predicted. We woke up nice and early at 3:30, had breakfast at our family hosts, and made our way back to the community center. We all arrived around 4:30 and the. Spent the next 3.5 hours sorting all of the laundry as we hadn't used our loops, re-packing our bins, and packing the trailer up which had a lot more stuff and therefore took a ton of extra time.
We finally hit the road around 8:00, when it was already 77 degrees outside. Our intent was to stop at mile 7ish which we'd been told was the state line and have a large large group photo with everyone. However when we got there it wasn't the state line so everyone kept riding. The ride was up a pretty small inxline or flat for the most part.
Around mile 28 we finally hit the state line and a few groups got together to take a nice California Stateline photo. The sign though was only a green county sign so wasn't as exciting as we had hoped, but still great since we are now in California.
From there we made it a few more miles to 31/32 where we had our lung stop as were able to refill on water & ice which was great. I can explain how nice ice water tasted. I also passed a bit of water on the way there and had to stop to make sure I wasn't seeing mirages.
Right after lunch I checked out a little art exhibit gallery installation type shed that Stacy, one of our hosts had told us about last night. You couldn't enter the shed but there were 4 large photographs inside.
I had been soloing all day, but after lunch I found myself with Steph M for a a bit and we ended up realizing it's been awhile since we rode together. Together we made it over the last hill of the day and decided to continue down the 4000 ft decent to Furnace Creek Death Valley together.
We stopped for the national park sign, a few vantage points, and then to get some refreshments and snacks right before arriving. I don't know how she did it but Steph had two by coffees in this heat, she is crazy some times.
We then finished our ride at the Furnace Creek visitors center where we napped, enjoyed AC, and charged our phones. It was a little before 1:00 when we arrived and I didn't leave until closing at 6:00. I spent he whole time just napping and then relaxing with some time searching for housing in DC. The good news is thanks to my friend Emily Sobel, I may have finally found a place to live, fingers crossed it works out.
We will spent the rest of the day at a nearby general store and anywhere cool as it'll only break 100 around 10:00 and be a low of 75 maybe at 6:00 am which will be after we've started riding again. Tomorrow we will be starting at first light as we have a 6000 ft climb and 3000 ft decent over 5ish miles and it'll be hot again to.