Ridin' a tailwind.......

Up early again to beat the heat.  Can't say that I'm a fan of such early starts but I must admit it is nice to get in before the worst heat of the day.  We're kind of out here in the middle of nowhere so in order to find a hotel last night we had to start the day today with about 9 miles of backtracking.  Then we turned north and began to enjoy the tailwind from the south.  I think it probably got a bit stronger as the day went on.  With the wind, the minimal climbing, and the less-steep-than-usual grades it was a pretty easy day.  Even the directions were easy.  Pretty much 60 miles straight north on Highway 395.  Mostly a 4 lane divided highway with wide shoulders.  Not a lot of traffic but lots of shredded tire debris to dodge; note to self - remember to check my tires for tire shards tonight.  I'm guessing we were riding through the Owens Valley today, at least for the last part of our ride.  To steal from Wikipedia:  "US 395 traverses the entire length of the Owens Valley, entering the valley near the former site of the Owens Lake......  Formerly a fertile lake and valley, Owens Lake and the southern portion of the valley are now dry.  Water from the valley is channeled for use by the City of Los Angeles, via the Los Angeles Aqueduct, in what is commonly called the California Water Wars."  Something to read up on......  We are on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevadas and the Panamint Mountains were on our right all day.  Lone Pine, where we're staying tonight, is an access point for both Mount Whitney (highest point in the lower 48) and Death Valley (lowest point in the US at 282 feet below sea level).  As the crow flies it is only about 70 miles between them.  The scenery was pretty but very stark.  The landscape is so vast that it is hard to capture anything in a picture.  Below are a few of my feeble attempts.

As we got closer to Lone Pine we started to see some snow on top of the Sierra Nevada mountains and we could also see Mount Whitney.  I was on top of it last year, but I had to stop in to the visitor centre to verify just which peak it is.  It looks different from this angle!

Overall, one of our easiest days so far.  The forecast shows the wind turning around overnight to be coming from the north tomorrow.  Ugh!  Let's hope they're wrong.......

Since I don't  have a lot of pictures from today I thought  I would show you our typical dinner setup.

The kitchen, which occupies the back half of the trailer

Chef Emily in her kitchen, performing daily miracles on her two-burner stove. Note the road rash on her leg, the bandaged burn on her arm, and the sunburn.  Oh - and the ever-present smile!

Here's a typical spread for dinner.

And here are the troops ready to eat.

And in the front half of the trailer we carry the  luggage and the beer fridge. Ann is our strongest rider and first to the beer supply every  day.

Stats for the day:
127 km / 79 miles from Ridgecrest CA to Lone Pine CA
2830 feet up
1314 feet down
Weather:  Bright sunshine and cloudless sky again.  Started out at 6:30 at about 18C and we got the first 20 miles in before it hit 20C.  Then the temp rose steadily.  I got in shortly after 1 and I had already seen up to 38C, although a bit less in Lone Pine at the end.  We enjoyed tailwinds for pretty much the whole day except for the first 10 miles.  Woohoo!