![]() |
Everything I needed for three weeks of travel (minus the camp stove and thermarest I borrowed from Taryn). |
![]() |
en route to SLC from Missoula |
- Drove from Missoula, MT to Sun Valley Idaho on June 21 (camped in rental car with bike)
- Drove from Sun Valley to Salt Lake City on June 22 (Rode in Sun Valley for a few hours in the am)
- Flew from SLC to Denver on June 25 (involved last minute borrowing a bike bag!) then drove to Colorado Springs for racing bikes
- Drove from Denver to SLC on June 29 (very last minute plan to drive with new friend Sam rather than rent a car in Denver and stay in the area because rental cars in CO are EXPENSIVE in June!)
![]() |
Views from drive to Fruita |
- Drove from Fruita to Breckenridge, CO July 2 (rode sick Fruita trails in the am)
- Drove from Breck to Denver on July 4 (post Firecracker to spend time with the niece and nephew)
- Drove from Denver to Crested Butte on July 6 (stopped in Salida to ride Monarch Crest on the way)
- Drove from Crested Butte to SLC on July 7 (rode C.B. in the am before this bear of a drive)
- Flew from SLC to Orange County on July 8
You may notice in all that driving that I essentially drove between SLC and Denver 3 times during this trip. This part seems a little painful, but each of those drives was on a completely different route, so there was plenty of scenery, and on one leg I had good company (thanks so much again Sam, you made that one much more bearable!) A lot of the reasoning behind driving so much was to save money. My original plan was to rent a car in Denver on June 29th and stay in the mountains close by through the 4th, but because I wasn't sure about plans until a few days prior to this portion of the trip rental car prices in Denver went through the roof (cheapest was $57 per day), while they stayed relatively low from SLC (I got my rental for $20 per day).
Estimation of $$ spent on rental cars: $356.92 (this accounts for the fact that the team is reimbursing me for the rental car that got me from Missoula to SLC)
Number of different rental cars driven: 4
Miles driven just to get from place to place: 2,306
Estimation of money spent on gas: $191.97 (this is a very rough estimate, only includes miles driven on the trips listed above, and I used 30mpg as an average fuel economy which might be a little inaccurate because they were all small cars, but there was a lot of driving up and over big mountains)
Food/lodging Overview
![]() |
Sleeping in the car in Sun Valley. |
![]() |
Campsite in Crested Butte |
![]() |
View from my tent in Fruita |
I tallied up the amount I spent on food via a google spreadsheet each day mostly because I was curious about how much money I was spending on nutrition. This was especially useful because I am a super frugal/kinda stupid individual and I get anxious about spending $$ on food which results in poor decision making. Throw in eating out a lot/ cooking for just one person when I can cook, and this was a potential source of stress for me. I vowed in Sun Valley that I would prioritize my nutrition though (after a day of very poor decision making), and not skimp on eating well because food is fuel and after all the whole point of this trip was to race bikes fast, something you need proper fuel to be able to do!
Average spent on food per day from 6/19-7/7/15: $26.3
Total spent in the same time period: $526
I included all nutrition items purchased for myself in the total/average, so we are talking from every cup of coffee to groceries when I was able to cook. I am pretty lucky to have great friends who fed me very well on more than one occasion when I was staying with them, so this may have caused my totals/averages to be lower than what is reasonable. I ate a lot of instant oatmeal, especially when camping, and when I eat out I usually have enough leftovers to provide another meal, so this helped keep the average $$ spent on the low side (well, I don't really know, is $26 per day low for someone on the road?)
I know there are other incidental costs of being on the road for extended periods of time, like spending $30 to have my drive train cleaned up in Salida, but in terms of travel, lodging and food I spent $1,074.89. Here is the exciting part though, I won some $$ racing bikes, totaling $1,064.23!!! And that's that, three weeks on the road riding bikes, camping, sight seeing, lots of blowing my nose due to allergies, meeting tons of super fun/cool people and most importantly racing bikes!!!
![]() |
My favorite travel companion, Scalpy the green beast! |
Free camping is the best!! I learned that road tripping with Sanjay. You're having the time of your life right now!! These will be some great storries to tell later in your life!
ReplyDeleteHi there! I like for the above article, very helpful for beginners that plunged into the world of blogging ; new if pleased may stop in my small blog .
ReplyDelete