GDR Day Fifteen

No real updates yesterday made it a long day to be hitting the 'refresh' button on iTunes... so getting up at 6.00am to discover nothing new posted on the website did induce a slight feeling of sickness. But Simon Kennet is showing as having arrived in Del Norte and as he was behind Jenn and has ridden part of the trail with her before I reckoned he must have seen her- and would mention it. So..... fast forward to Simon and yes! He uses the word 'we' at the beginning of his call so that's some relief, then finally mentions he caught up with Jenn. That's OK then, as long as I know she's with Simon it doesn't matter there's not a call. (Funny putting your faith in someone you haven't met, but he does have his own blog that his family is updating, so it is possible to virtually meet him.....) But then... and it's not reported on the updates yet, but the last call is Jenn!!!! It's at 27.33 minutes /seconds. And it's been hard.

"Hi this is Jenn. I'm phoning from Del Norte- got here about tea time today. Since yesterday - well yesterday was pretty rough after I phoned from Poncho Springs I got half way up Marshall Pass and just had to stop. Just rode into a big wall of complete exhaustion- couldn't pedal any more, so lay down and had a sleep and then dragged myself over the hill. Coasted all the way down to Sargents, got a cabin for the night, ate a lot, slept a lot and felt better today. I had good riding today, got caught in a thunderstorm out on one of the open plain bits so spent an hour under a sign board trying to shelter from it, hoping it would pass fairly soon, which it did. Pedaled off again and then at the top of the climb after that, turned round to see Simon following me up the hill, which was lovely. Having not seen anyone for five days that was really good to catch up with him, and then bumped into a local rider Steve who invited us back to stay at his place this evening, which we have done. It's been lovely, just beautiful hospitality, really lovely people so we are settling in for a night and then off tomorrow morning to tackle Indiana Pass. That's it, OK, bye."

It sounds like meeting up with someone again has lifted Jenn's spirits - she's nearly at the New Mexico border and even though there's still a lot of pedaling, the end is in sight. Get to it Jenn- you have all our love, best wishes and strength with you.

Minx