The Golden Years (read: days)

P$ and I spent the better part of a day at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. That place is pretty incredible, and I even managed to drag Phil away from the rock exhibits to explore the rest of the place. From mummies to mastodons the museum had it all, but the most surprising exhibit was a number of small Russian sculptures depicting peasant life:The crazy part is those sculptures were assembled from different precious stones and gems. Wild!

In the afternoon we took a ride over to Golden to check out the Coors brewery, the biggest in the world, and spend some quality time with the 25-cog on Lookout. Before we made it to the climb we had a run-in with the worst bike shop service I've ever encountered. Phil blew a Specialized tire about a half mile out of town, but as luck would have it Peak Cycles, a Specialized dealer, was just a 2 minute ride away. I took the faulty tire into the shop where the guy lied about Specialized's unconditional lifetime warranty, demanded the receipt for the tire and then sent me on my way without any help, leaving us stranded miles from home. Peak Cycles of Golden, CO: you suck. Hard to believe dicks like this are still in business. I'm definitely going to report them to Specialized. I rode all the way back home and got the car and a spare wheel and we had just enough time to get up to the top of Lookout. We were rewarded with some spectacular views and a display of such unadulterated awesomeness that it almost exploded my head.

Here's Phil at the top of the climb. You can see the road snaking up behind him.
And here are two absolute lunatics who were prepping to rip down the descent on longboards. They were stoked that two roadies were interested and they let us follow them as they absolutely FLEW down the mountain. They had plastic pucks on the palms of their gloves which they'd drag along the ground as they gapped me off through the hairpins. Ridiculous! Here's a video of some guys doing the same descent. I'm not sure if its any good because my computer is too slow to play video. Joel and his friend, whose name I sadly forgot, were super nice and happy to talk about the ins and outs of bombing mountains. If you're wondering how to learn all it takes is balls of steel and the absence of whatever gene is responsible for self-preservation. They'd make damn good crit sprinters. They were kind enough to pose for a picture and I've never felt like such pussy as I did standing bedecked in purple spandex next to two certified adrenaline junkies. Speaking of junk, that guy on my left surely approves of mine.

To make the day even better I got a text out of the blue from an old college buddy. Turns out she and her husband had just moved to the bottom of Lookout in Golden so we got to stop for a cold one on the way home. Awesome.

But that ain't all! I was so tired from all the riding at altitude that I could barely get dinner from my plate to my mouth, but when Dev told me it was ladies night at the Cowboy Lounge I sucked it up and put on an amazing, and quite lengthy, display of my dancing prowess. Fun Phil made friends with these gents who had the best threads of the night.
Yesterday turned into a nice slow day in Boulder replete with a homeless-style park nap, an amazing meal at Sherpa's, and a visit to University Cycles, the exact opposite of the loathsome Peak Cycles. University Cycles of Boulder is one of the coolest shops I've ever seen. They have just about everything you could ever want in stock, the employees were kind and helpful and they looked like they could wrench on a whole fleet of bikes. Yup, they had no fewer than 12 stands on the shop floor, and that doesn't count the other 15 stands upstairs dedicated solely to building new bikes. Unreal.

We're staying with Phil's good college friends Matt and Jenna Allen. They're legendary. So much so that they get their own post. And I'll get to that right after they finish riding me into the ground.