The Rise Up Ride: Day 34, Camping in Cody at the Feet of the Rocky Mountains
Date: 26 May 2021
Start Location: Basin, WY
End Location: Cody, WY
Distance: 90 km
Time: 5:29
Total elapsed: 7:04
Elevation: 578 m
“In a car you're always in a compartment, and because you're used to it you don't realize that through that car window everything you see is just more TV. You're a passive observer and it is all moving by you boringly in a frame.
On a cycle the frame is gone. You're completely in contact with it all. You're in the scene, not just watching it anymore, and the sense of presence is overwhelming.”
― Robert M. Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values
Pirsig's cycle had an engine. Imagine if Phaedrus had gotten in contact with it all on a bicycle. Full presence!
Today's ride upwards across the other half of the Bighorn Basin to Cody was a wholly-immersive multidimensional thrill. Luckily (and with some meteorological strategy) the unsettled weather was to have passed in the night and the coming afternoon, leaving a few hours of window in the morning when it might be possible to frogger between the huge blue-green radar blobs while riding up along the Greybull River.
Wyoming is officially "Big Sky Country '' and this morning its enormity stormed in an unframed scene all around. Words can't and Instagram's little square picture format won't, but on my blogsite at theriseupride.com and on Facebook I'll post some panoramic photos that did grab more than a slice of that Big Sky.
I rode early, mostly dodging the storms, coasting on a southeasterly blow. As forecast, the front passed just after midday and the wind swung sharply into my face just four clicks from camp. The weather gods abhor hubris, but damn that was well played.
Tomorrow I'll rest and plan for a several-day ride up Sylvan Pass and into Yellowstone National Park. With most facilities (campgrounds, stores, or lodging) closed until mid-June, I'm unsure if I'll be able to explore much or would be safer descending down out of the Park, making progress towards the Tetons. The path unfolds day by day.
