The morning was pleasant enough. We had our breakfast at a nearby hotel and stopped at a gas station to fill up our water bottles.
Unfortunately, it was cold and the sky was ominous.
It got colder and colder as the morning progressed. And the sky got darker and darker. What was unfortunate was that we were descending a huge hill, that I knew we would just have to make up for to reach our destination at 9,000 feet.
The view of the mountains from our perspective was absolutely breathtaking.
It was shortly after I took the picture above that I got a flat tire. My tubes had been able to handle a large fish hook through them the day before, thanks to the Stan's, but for some reason a thorn was much to much for the tubes to handle.
It started to snow as I was replacing the tube. I turned around to find Brian all bundles up.
We finally turned onto the road that would wind us into Cloudcroft.
Apparently they were doing road work on the entire road, all the way to Cloudcroft.
It was a beautiful ride with a lot of scenery.
We were making pretty good time for a good portion of it - mostly due to the incredibly long descent we had to make after climbing up to 8,500 ft.
We made it into Lincoln National Forest!
With 10 miles to go, we finally began to ascend to Cloudcroft. The wind was blowing strong right in our faces. I wasn't going anywhere fast.
With 3 miles to go before we reached the end of the road, I was beat. The climb had kicked my butt, but there was still more to do!
We made it! we had a nice descent into the town.
Cloudcroft turned out to be a very nice town. It's apparently somewhat of a destination town because of all the outdoor activities.
We were fortunate enough to find this bike shop perched high in the town. I was in desperate need of some tubes. We were also given some great advise as to what we should do with the remainder of our day while in town.
We had some tea and pie, then out out into the wilderness for a hike - and to find a place where we can set up camp.
We found a place to camp. Very exciting.
We laced up our running shoes and went out for a 4 mile run through some beautiful trails.
I was loving the leaves. They were pretty and crunchy and amazing.
At such a high altitude (9,000 ft) I could feel my lungs burning a bit.
We found this spectacular area and really wanted to set up camp here - unfortunately there was absolutely no way we could get our bikes down the trail with all the weight we were packing.
Cool stump. Also, nice pose Brian.
I love the leaves!
It is difficult to see just how spectacular this area is.
A lot of it reminded me of the northeast.
After our excursion into the woods, we strolled back into town to be somewhat social. I was served a large cup of coffee in just about the best mug ever.
We returned to set up camp and get cooking. We had to be careful with our food because of the animals around us. I wish I got a picture of Brian's bear bag set-up. It certainly would keep our food safe, assuming that bears grow no taller than a foot high.
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