At 4:30 am on July 5th, 2009 I left Evanston for Ft. Collins, CO. The trip through Illinois, Iowa, and Nebraska was a sunday drive. Once I crossed into Colorado the skies became ominous and threatening. Soon it began to rain and conditions became right for a tornado. The rain and hail came down so hard that most of the cars on Interstate 76 pulled off onto the shoulder to wait it out. On top of that a tornado warning was issued for the county I was in. After about half an hour the storm passed and the sun began to shine again. Rainbows emerged from the clouds and it was smooth sailing for the final 90 miles of a 17 hour car trip.
I arrived at the home of Felix Wong in Ft. Collins, CO at about 9:30. This was to be my first couchsurfing stop. What is couchsurfing? This question is best answered by visiting www.couchsurfing.com. I contacted Felix several weeks ago to arrange a stay with him in Ft. Collins. He's provided me a guest room, lots of good information about Ft. Collins, and even inivited me to join a group of his friends for a going away dinner for one of his friends. We will also go bicycling 2 or 3 times while I'm here. On monday we went out for a 30-mile ride which included a several steep climbs. Coming from a flat area like Chicago this proved to be quite a challenge. Add the thinner air at 5,000 ft. elevation and I can sum up my first ride in Colorado in one word, exhausting. It was a satisfying feeling though to know I could comlete this ride and adjust to the climbs and thinner air. Here's a picture from the group outing with Felix on the far right.
Pictured below is the Horsetooth Reservoir above Ft. Collins. The road on the right side of the picture was one of three difficult climbs we did. The good thing about climbing is there's always a descent to follow. Coming down the other side I probably went faster on a bike than at any other time in my life, exceeding 40 mph.
