Day Six - Coeur d'Alene Rest Day

You don't realize you need a rest day until you have one. Wow - its nice to spend a nice sunny day off the bike. (Well not completely off the bike.) I did take a ride down to the local bike shop to get new tires. I purchased a couple Armadillo tires which are supposedly puncture proof - we will see about that! They set me back $100, so they better be worth it. It was a tough ride back to the hotel with two tires across my torso - they kept sliding off my shoulder. I was afraid I'd be playing bicycle hula hoop with them. (I'm talented but not that talented!)

The side roads in Coeur d'Alene are interesting - no stop signs at the intersections. At first, I thought to myself "This is nice a straight shot to the bike store." But then, I realized that the cross streets had NO signage either. That could be dangerous! I think Marc is envious of my new tires, he's now considering a pair for his bike.

So it has been a quiet day of walking around town, doing laundry and eating. I am starting to get discouraged by the pie eating quest. I went to three bakeries today and none of them had pie! I had to do an internet search and finally found a small diner that had pie. We made a special mid-afternoon stop at Hudson's. Its a local dive with $2 hamburgers and $2 slices pie on the menu (and that's about it.) I chose a nice chilled custard pie - a bit like flan with a crust. It was refreshing.

After our pie stop, we found the Coeur d'Alene Brewery. Marc was excited! We stopped in to sample the local brew. Marc tried the IPA and was a bit disappointed with the depth of flavor (whatever that means.) Don't get me wrong I do love beer but I'm not too experienced at the descriptive qualities.

Tomorrow we are off to St. Regis, MT or the town just before. Its about 94 miles to St. Regis with some climbing. We decided to take the interstate route instead of going over to Thompson Falls. It saves us about 30 miles. We've found frontage roads that should get us off the highway for most of the ride. Keep your fingers crossed for sunshine and no flats!