Geo: 39.7566, -105.225Dejo & I left the house in separate vehicles, for reasons that will be clear shortly. We headed up to Golden, and stashed the Durango in a government office parking lot (they wouldn't need the spaces on a Saturday, correct?) and carpooled into Golden.We wandered about a bit, stopping to talk to one of the photo motorcycle drivers. He was very friendly, and gave us a little insight as to the logistics of the race. A tiny part of the logistics -- my head swims, thinking of all that has to go into putting this event on.After a quick turn about the festival grounds, we headed over to find the team buses. Again, we decided to divide & conquer. It worked this time. I got autographs from Taylor Phinney and Mathias Frank from BMC ... read more

Geo: 39.4817, -106.038We were able to have a leisurely morning, as our stop for the day was the feed zone. We'd seen a finish (Telluride), a KOM (Cottonwood), we'd have 2 starts (Breckenridge and Golden), and a mountaintop finish (Flagstaff), so we thought this would be a good chance to catch our first ever feed zone.Dejo had talked to the guys setting up the KOM arch the day before, and learned where the feed zone would be. When we found it, there was a large pullout, which made sense to us. We found a spot,and settled in to listen to the race coverage.I managed to get enough spray chalk out of the cans to write "Nom Nom", but no more.Dejo noticed some cars parked at the curve, just up the road, but we thought nothing of ... read more

Geo: 38.8279, -106.409(Thank goodness there's no C.W. McCall song about this one.)Since we saw Independence Pass last year, we decided to take on Cottonwood this time, even though it meant missing a stage of the race (Montrose->Crested Butte).If you'd told us we would end up oversleeping, while sleeping in the back of the Durango on an air mattress, I'd have laughed.But that's what happened. We woke up at about 8:30 or so, and we'd kinda' planned to be on the road by then. We packed up, decided to forego the hot beverages and just nosh a bar on the way, and hit the road.In Gunnison, McDonald's was our target, as they have a) breakfast and b) wi-fi. I had some travel arrangements to make for my clients, before we went off-grid again. After a McMuffin, we ... read more

Geo: 37.2737, -107.879Our volunteer assignment wasn't until noon, so we had a leisurely morning. A breakfast of oatmeal started us out, then we took a stroll along the shore of the lake -- just gorgeous. Such a beautiful morning.We packed up, and made our way up to the resort early. We gave ourselves time to go buy some sandwiches for lunch (which we planned to put in the cooler), though we decided to just eat lunch early.Our assignment was as course marshalls for the amateur ride, from Durango to the resort and back. Keep the riders from crossing the highway until the nice state trooper says it's safe.Back at the car, as we were applying sunscreen prior to standing in the sun for 3 hours, we saw a Nissan official race vehicle pull in, stop, and ... read more

Geo: 51.3727, 6.17237We drove down to Venlo, to see the Delta Waterwerk. On the way down, we got separate from Joop & Andrew, so we pulled off at a gas station to wait for them. While we were waiting, I found that there was a geocache nearby, so I sent Dejo, Jerome & Ans off to search for it. It turned out to be a bucket, hanging under a bridge (Jerome found it).The WaterWerk is a ginormous dam/gate, but is part of a whole system of water control mechanisms. They had a pretty comprehensive display of the flood of 1953, and the history of the area, as it relates to water.Then we drove to Klundert, to see the house where Dejo's mom grew up. We went to Ron & Elian's for dinner. It was a nice ... read more