June 7, 2025
Day 25: What you’ll do for a bed
6600 feet of vert
Let’s be honest, we were both a little grumpy when we started biking this morning. Erin was grumpy because her tummy was hurting and she didn’t sleep well (she hasn’t been sleeping well most of the trip, so she’s accumulated some sleep debt). Megan was grumpy because the climb was rocky and bumpy and the sun came out when she had her jacket on and she wasn’t wearing her sunglasses, so she got hot and agitated. After a stop and a hug to address our emotional states, we carried forward.
Back to the beginning of the day though: like all mornings in town, it was loud! We did not sleep until our 6am alarm. Who knows whether it was the roosters or the people or the megaphone or the cars. We tried to make up for our lack of sleep by starting the day off with an instant cappuccino mix! It was actually quite good. We shared one pack and would recommend the dilution so it’s not too sweet. Today was a special morning because we did not have to have oatmeal—we had cereal!!!! Corn flakes to be exact. We had the flakes with peanut butter, canned milk, bananas, cinnamon and a few nuts and dried fruit, yum! This was an especially nice change for Erin who doesn’t love oatmeal.
We left town around 7:45am and headed off on a medium-size climb. We passed many small towns and settlements, which has been unique to this southern section of the route. As someone said, “This part of the route feels more cultural” and that feels true for us. We even got invited to return in August for a small town’s big fiesta!
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We climbed some pavement and gravel until we started to descend. We descended until we made it to a small town just before the large town of Cangallo. This town had a swimming pool! We have not seen that yet. We stopped for lunch—eggs and bread and fruit, as always! Our front tire was soft. Again. We lucked out that when we asked around for an “inflador”, a little boy sprinted down the street to go get one for us! We continue to be so grateful for the kind people we meet here, who often go out of their way to help us.
After lunch, we climbed back up gravel. We had a big 3000+ foot climb—we were hoping to make it to a town where we could spend the night in a bed. And we did! We climbed about 6,600 ft in total today, and the section on gravel was very glorious, smooth gravel! We descended in golden hour and made it to Hospadaje Rosita just before dark.
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Rosita is a very sweet older lady. The place was simple, but there was hot water for showers, a seemingly clean bed (although there were ginormous spiders and remnants of a few other animals around) and best of all, she cooked us dinner! We didn’t know exactly what she said she was going to make, but turns out, she made exactly what we didn’t know we wanted. It’s called a “tortilla con verduras” and it’s basically an omelette over rice! What a delicious meal to have after a long day of climbing. We picked up some desserts for tonight and cereal and fruit for the morning and watched our favorite tv show in bed, before getting some much needed sleep.
Today's ride: 56 miles (90 km)
Total: 775 miles (1,247 km)
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