Not going to lie, today was a shit day. At midnight, I was woken up by an officer of the law at my window, there to inform me that overnight parking at the truckstop was not permitted and that I would have to move on. My heart beat fast as I said I understood and that I would move on, but I was grossly embarrassed to be in my bed talking to a policeman through my window. I knew it. Even though I’d talked to Jon, who’d roadtripped around the US and stayed in Flying Js periodically, it didn’t seem right, and it wasn’t. I did like the way the cop approached the situation, he said what needed saying, then moved off straight away. No hanging around, no “think about what you’ve done”, which was nice.

I was wide awake and pulled out my phone to determine where I should go next. Back to the Walmart carparm maybe? Nah. I was done with concrete camps. I was planning to ride at City Creek Canyon north of the city, so I went to the trailhead. Unfortunately it was signposted no parking between 10pm and 6am and I didn’t feel like breaking more rules. I went back to the suburban streets near the trailhead. I found a dark spot, parked and camped again. I was tired, I didn’t even care that I was parked on a hill with my feet well above my head. I shoved an extra pillow under my head and made do. Definitely not my best camp. The silver lining? I got to see Salt Lake City at night. The State Capitol building was lit beautifully against the dark sky.

I was in a foul mood when I woke up for real. I felt like a criminal stalking around the city. I drove to the trailhead and sat in the car, pissed off that my “Service Engine Soon” light was now persistently on, instead of being intermittent. Stalling, I got my code reader out and discovered that I had an issue with the electronic timing circuit. Brilliant. That would mean starting at the distributor which is only accessible from the inside of the car, meaning it would be a pain in the ass just to look at the problem, let along fix it. I was pissed with myself for not addressing the problem sooner, like when I had the car pulled apart in a nice warm garage a few weeks ago. Anyway, I didn’t even feel like making breakfast so I sat and ate a Clif bar while I pondered what trails I should ride. My pissy mood continued. I wondered if this was even worth it. Was I just going for a ride for the sake of it, or did I really want to see these trails? It was cold, the sun wasn’t reaching me and I felt gross (having not showered yesterday). I tried to see if they were popular trails and in doing so, found out that Park City, a ski mountain not far away was a mecca for riding as well as skiing. There, I made a decision. I drove out of Salt Lake City and head east towards my new destination. Listening to music, I tried to get myself in a more upbeat mood. I was going riding!

I stopped at the visitor’s centre and spoke to a very helpful older lady who, despite her age, knew heaps about the trails in the area. She shot down my idea of doing the “Warwuck” trail because of snow, but suggested how I could do the entire “Mid-Mountain” trail and catch a bus at the end to get back to my car. Great! I drove over to Deer Creek Valley where I would start. Before getting ride-ready I warmed myself up with a brunch of bacon and eggs. Feeling better, I kitted up, packed and rode off.

I struggled at the start to find where I was supposed to be going, but eventually understood that I had to ride up a ski run to get to the start. Ouch, my foul mood was threatening to come back at that. Needless to say, it was mostly walking and I had taken off most of the layers I was wearing by the time I reached the start of the actual trail. It is called “Mid-Mountain” because it is just that, it snakes across the different ski mountains of Park City about halfway up, without any great climbs or descents, but gentle ups and downs along the way. Which is just my cup of tea.

It was nice single track that wound its way through forest, around chair lifts and along the side of each mountain. When it climbed, it was gentle and when it trended downwards, it flowed and flowed and flowed. Really enjoyable. With the sun out, it was just warm enough for the most part. I listened to music as I rode, taking my earphones out whenevr I came across other riders to see what they were up to. We were all doing similar versions of the same thing, but it seems that most people ride the “Mid-Mountain” from “Armstrong” to Deer Creek, instead of the other way around like I was doing. It reminded me of the Big Bear Lake trail, either direction doesn’t really matter.

A pair of riders told me that they had come across a moose and her calf on the trail and had to navigate around them. They expected they would be gone by the time I got there. Despite that, I had yet another rider tell me fifteen minutes later about the same moose. Hmm, maybe they would be camped there. I was excited to see a moose, but when I turned a corner and saw them, I was immediately anxious. The calf was huge, let alone the mother and they were standing, looking right at me. I drew in a sharp breath and backed up a little. I could see two riders the other side of them and they called out that I should ride back along the trail a bit and get to high ground because they were going to try and encourage the moose off the trail. I did as I was told, taking myself and my bike into the bush a few metres up a steep escarpment next to the trail. A few minutes later, the two riders came over after trekking through the bush above the moose. Their persuasion had been unsuccessful. I explained how I had never seen a moose and so was a bit terrified. They explained that they saw them all the time and they were still anxious. I asked if they would stay while I hiked-a-bike through the bush around them, which they were happy to do. It was a scramble, but not too bad. I swear the Mum didn’t take her eyes off me the whole time. The other guys had told me she’d do that, just watch what was going on, but shouldn’t do much more than that. I got to the other side safely, thanked the others and even got brave enough to take a photo, then I was off.

It wasn’t the last wildlife I would see. I chased a few deer of the trail, then chased a huge stag with impressive antlers down the trail for a while before he pranced off it onto the side of the mountain. I was thoroughly enjoying the last half of the trail, even though I was feeling tired and lacking energy. I warned another rider of the moose as I came up on the Armstrong trail, where most other people start. From here, it is a commitment because there is no way off the trail for another eleven miles. I had it in me! I kept going. It felt like late afternoon way before it was the case as I rode through thick forest. I was within 8 km of the end when the tube in my rear tyre exploded. Bad mood is back. This was another case of it being my own fault. The sidewall of my rear tyre has a few tears, a couple of which you could actually see the tube bulge out of. I obviously knew this and knew it wasn’t good, but lazy me, I hadn’t bought replacement tubes since the last flats, nor patched the existing damaged ones I had. I was carrying my patch kit because that had made me feel better, but I also knew that my success rate at patching tubes in the past was low, so I wasn’t confident. I sat on the cold ground as I used the biggest patch I had to cover the huge hole in my tube, feeling very aware that if this didn’t work, I was on the side of a mountain with the sun going down and a long walk ahead of me. While I was at it, I also put patches on the inside of my tyre to block up the holes in the sidewall.

I tired out my arms using my emergency pump to put air in the newly-patched tube. It seemed to be holding so I put it inside the tyre and seated it then pumped it up proper. Once it was up to pressure, I let it sit while I checked my options on the map. I could shorten the ride a bit to make sure I could make it down if the tube had a slow leak, which I’m sure it would. After map consulting, I found that the tube was completely flat. Now I wanted to cry. Silver lining was that it had gone down because I had left the pump attached and air was leaking through the connection. The patch actually seemed to be holding up. My punishment was another workout with my pump. I lost count at about 400 pumps. Once it was full enough, I removed the pump and literally stood there with my arms folded, waiting for it to go down. To my surprise, it held, so then I hurried up and put the wheel back on my bike, packed my shit up and got riding. Now to get down before all the air leaked out.

Turns out my patch job was good and the tyre was fine. I was cold as I descended the mountain along “Holly” and “Ricochet” and tried to enjoy them as best I can, but honestly the flat had been a real downer because of my fragile mood. Near the bottom, I passed another moose which scared the shit out of me. I saw her at the last minute, she was standing a few metres off the trail and snorted as I went by, which is what drew my attention. I kept going, didn’t look back. I was happy to make it down to the village, but I did feel a bit like I was trespassing towards the end because I was riding amongst busy construction vehicles getting the place ready for the snow season.

This isn’t where my visitor’s centre advisor had told me to go, I was meant to finish at the next lodge over, so I tried to figure out how to get to the bus stop from here. I was riding off when I saw someone who looked like a local. He was great and told me how to get to the bus stop just around the corner. I found it easily and the next bus was in twenty minutes. I sat in the shelter, ate the rest of my food and put another layer on against the cold. I was joined by a worker at the village who told me about his life there and that the silly season was getting underway in five days, just in time for a snow storm due early next week. I was sad to understand that this was probably the last riding I would do for a while considering my plans to head north. His wife picked him up just before my bus came.

I plonked my bike on the carrier at the front of the bus then hopped on, grateful to be driven somewhere. The bus service was completely free. I enjoyed looking out at the various villages, but was honestly just looking forward to a hot shower and desperately hoping that my planned process would work. The bus dropped me off in the main part of town and I rode just around the corner to where I’d parked. I was thoroughly cold by the time I’d got back. The whole valley was in the shadow of the mountain.

I put my tarp up (the carpark was pretty empty and I didn’t care about cars driving by, I was desperate) and got some water boiling. I heated it up to temperature then funnelled it into my water bottle. The hot water felt like it was healing me. It was great. I soaped up, rinsed off and got dressed before the cold got to me, but it had worked brilliantly, and the hands-free sandals were a great improvement.

I resolved to find a better camp tonight than I had yesterday. I settled for a rest stop on the highway heading north-east towards Evanston which had some trucks parked and another van that looked like they were camped. I delayed my decision while I made and ate dinner. With a full tummy, I knew I wasn’t going anywhere. The ride had tired me out more than I realised. I did my SPOT, then had an early night.

Tomorrow is another day, it can only get better!