Today was our last long day (65 miles) and it started beautifully cycling through the Big Hole Valley filled with rich pastures and hay land and surrounded by snow covered peaks. They had just just flooded the whole valley which produced our first contact with mosquitoes on the whole trip. Luckily they weren’t out yet on our early morning ride.

Had a delicious breakfast at the Jackson Hot Springs Lodge surrounded by a massive mounted grizzly bear, full bodied puma, and other assorted antlered specimens.

We then pedaled out of the valley over 7400 ft Big Hole Pass helped by a mostly gentle grade and following breeze. We continue to meet another group of cyclists with a sag wagon going in our direction. Their friendly driver Mary Ann stopped and let us use their pump while on the road today.

We dropped down into the Grasshopper valley and then headed back uphill over the Pioneer Mountain Range into a really strong headwind which made reaching the second pass, Badger Pass, way more difficult than the first.

The long 13 mile descent into Dillon was heavenly!

We met another angel today. We stopped at the Dillon emergency room to check out a tick bite on my head that I was a little worried about. A very friendly nurse came out to the lobby, checked to make sure there were no Lyme disease symptoms, and saved me a real visit to the ER. We have met so many friendly helpful people all along our journey!