Day 8: Nine Miles After Crouch Towards Cascade To 4 Miles Up Last Summit Before Cascade

Being back on dirt roads was great... what was not so great was all of the RVs rolling out of their campsites because it was Sunday and time for them to go home.  RV after RV kicked up dust onto us, and while they were respectful of our space, the dust was pretty annoying.  It wasn't until we turned onto the winding road away from the river to our next summit that we finally got some peace and quiet.  We dominated the major climbs of the day and made it back down to the north fork of the Payette river again by 1:30 pm.  This day was supposed to be the hottest day of this heat wave, so we planned to take a 5 hour siesta at the river to wait it out.  We lazed, jumped in the river, I read an entire short story on my Kindle for iPhone in my hammock, played with the dog that came to visit us several times (aka Wolf Dog), and terrorized (accidentally) a little kangaroo mouse.

Wolf Dog comes to inspect our little shady corner.

Chilling in the river.  No hot springs for me on this 110 degree day.

The relaxation zone.

This little guy kept jumping all over the place with his hilariously large feet and long tail... until I went to take a picture, when he tried to play dead to fool me.

At last, the sun started to go down and provide us enough shade to make biking tolerable by about 6:30 pm, and so we started up the very last major climb of the trip.  This road began as the sandiest cruddiest road we had encountered so far, with 4 inches of sand built up at the bottom.  After a while, it got a little more rideable, but we had to be careful lest we wipe out.  On the way up, I saw what I thought was a dead fawn on the road... until it bolted and hopped in an adorably wobbly newborn kind of way down the hill.  The fawn nearly scared me to death and I almost fell off my bike!  We weren't sure of our camping prospects on this climb, so we stopped earlier than expected because we found a great campsite 4 miles before the summit.

Last night of camping!

Go big or go home... or rather, finish the whiskey so we don't have to carry it up the rest of the climb!

A few travel notes for bike tourists:

• Fourth of July and the weeks preceding it are nuts in Crouch and the areas beyond towards Cascade.  Beware tons of RVs and dust.  Sunglasses and something to cover your nose and mouth will be appreciated!  Or try to avoid this area on the weekend...