Today we rode from a dispersed campsite at the Salty River to another dispersed campsite 15km north of Young. The day started with blue skies, later clouds, sometimes dark clouds in the mountains, and some rain in the evening. The road surfaces was about 50/50 paved vs non-paved.
Riding statistics: on Thursday May 16, 2024, the 8th day on the Western Wildlands Route route, it took 10:47h (08:36h moving time), between 06:54 and 17:41, to cover 90 km (56 miles), including 2341 m (7681 ft) elevation gain, with an average speed of 10 km/h (6 mph). During today's ride the average temperature was 25 °C (80 °F) with a minimum of 17 °C (64 °F) and a maximum of 33 °C (96 °F).
Totals: So far, it took 2 days, 10 hours, 34 minutes and 40 seconds of cycling time to cover 784 km (487 miles), including 10697 m (35097 ft) elevation gain, with an average speed of 13.8 km/h (8.6 mph).
We got up in the morning a little after 5am. Sun already rising. Steve also got up and left the camping site. 45 minutes later, Fons and I left as well. Dee was still sleeping.
We had a 10km ride to the start of a climb, all paved fortunately. The climb had a distance of 20km and an elevation gain of 1km. Thanks to the clouds and trees, it was not as hot as previous days. Trees were present above 1400m. While cycling to the top of the pass, clouds got darker and darker at the edge of the mountain. We even saw rainshowers in the distance. Besides a few sprinkles, we had no rain.
At the top of the climb (almost 2000m above sea level) it was not that warm. The road surface changed to a nice wide gravel road. We stayed around 2000m for about an hour.
After riding the ridge for a while, we could start the downhill into the small settlement of Young. The downhill was fabulous because of the good road.
young does not seem to be more than some buildings next to a curved road. Fortunately they do have a general store where we could buy some snacks and water. While sitting outside enjoying our snap KS, several people came by the shop and told us they have seen us cycling in the mountains that morning. They were impressed that we were already there. After chilling for a while, we decide to move on. We followed the road out of town, which was very quit. After about an hour this road changed into a very wide gravel road. Not perfect, it had quite some rough washboarding all over the road. When we saw a suitable campspot around 5, we decided to stop. Have dinner and go to bed. While having dinner in the tent, it started to rain, with again wind gusts, but also sunshine. Fortunately we’re a bit more covered from the elements tonight.
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