Saturday night Eric and I went for a ride. We left shortly after 4 pm. Up and over Suncrest, then we took the Alpine Loop to Provo Canyon. Much better in the daylight than last year in darkness. We went up to Heber where we took a potty break. We made the decision then to ride past Strawberry all the way to Duchesne. It was the first time I'd been to that part of Utah. A different kind of pretty. I do prefer the scenery of the Alpine Loop better myself. So we got to Duchesne about 8 PM. Grabbed some dinner at a local cafe then headed out. Thunderstorms were headed our way so we knew we had to book it.

We headed North out of Duchesne then turned West towards Tabiona. Shortly after getting on that road we suddenly came upon a deer in the road. Easily stopped and scared it off. It was going to be like that. At this time it was pretty dark. Just a bit of light that we were racing towards. I could see the clouds starting to trap us in. I just knew we were going to get drenched. We kept going. To get as much light as possible I was riding either on the line, or on the wrong side of the road, so Eric could pull alongside and we could both have our brights on. A car would come up and Eric would drop back, we'd both turn off our brights, and I would swerve back into the correct position.

Shortly after Hanna we began the climb up and over the mountain towards Francis. Suddenly there was another object in the road! This time it was low, moving across the road very smoothly, with a thick long tail. We both slowed down to avoid hitting it. As we came upon the cougar it started to turn towards us. I punched it. Last thing I wanted was a cougar to leap on me, cause me to wreck, then eat me.

We continued over the pass using the same formation for maximum light, seeing 16 more deer along the side of the road. As we got closer to Francis I examined the sky again only to see stars. We had out run the storm! We stopped in Kamas to rest up a bit and examined the sky only to see more stars. We both couldn't believe we made it. After standing around a bit to rest up we finished the ride down Parleys and home. I got home about 11:45 PM. The bike read 247 miles.