We both had an amazing nights sleep last night and were so glad to be in a bed. We slept in a little and woke up feeling rested, unlike yesterday morning. Once we were all packed up, we heated some water in a tea kettle on the stove in the cook cabin for our oatmeal. Shortly after, we said goodbye to Julien and Maryse as well as the other couple that came later last night. Although it was raining for part of the morning, by the time we got ready to go the sun came out! We were pretty excited that the majority of our ride today would be downhill and that we didn't have to climb any passes. I had a lot more energy today than yesterday, but still didn't feel 100%. This mornings ride had a was a little more hilly than later in the day. We rode for about 35 miles before stopping at Athabasca falls to make lunch. We were really hungry so we opted for our most filling meal choice: mac and cheese. After lunch, we went to see the waterfall, and it sure was beautiful! From where we were, there were only 20 miles left until we got into town. When we got within about 10 miles of town, a huge group of 26 cyclists came riding out of a rest stop; it must have been a club or some sort of organized group ride. Shortly after, we met a guy from the Netherlands who was also touring, except it was a rest day so he didn't have a loaded bike at the time. He is part of a group of about 14 that are riding from Banff to Jasper and back (2 week trip). He said that the group goes on a 2 week tour every year to a different country which we thought was pretty cool. Once we got into town we looked for a bike shop to try to get Joe's broken spoke fixed. The first one we went to said that it would be a while before they could get to it and suggested going to find a campground set up everything and then come back in a couple hours (which didn't make sense because they were going to be closed in an hour and a half). We didn't really know what we were doing at that point for the night so we opted not to do as they suggested. Instead, we rode around town for a bit. I found a spot that had free wi-fi and Joey went to find another bike shop. We attempted to contact the Warm Shower's Host in town but didn't have any luck. Unfortunately we hadn't had internet in a while so we didn't contact them earlier. Guess that's our fault for not planning that far ahead. When Joe got back from the bike shop he said the guy could fix it first thing in the morning, so we will try to be in town tomorrow at 9am. Despite everything in this area being ridiculously expensive, we figured our best bet would be to try the hostel. If we went to the campground, it would be $27 and they probably would have charged us another 25 for a park pass (since we didn't have one because the lady at the gate let us in for free). After we figured out what we were going to do for the night, we headed to the grocery store to get some stuff to make bacon cheeseburgers for dinner (and get more cookies too!). We weren't too impressed with Jasper. It is a nice little town, but is pretty much just for tourists and is extremely expensive. The hostel was about 3.5 miles out of town and a good 1.5 miles of it was up a pretty steep hill, (just when we thought we were done climbing for the day!). The hill seemed to never end. We were passed by a guy on a mtn. bike heading towards the hostel, but soon I passed him because he decided he needed to walk. It made me feel good that I was able to ride all the way to the top of that really long steep hill with a 100 lb bike without stopping or walking (and that I passed a guy on a light mtn bike!). When I got to the top, Joe came out of the hostel and said that there was still room and that we would definitely get a bed. After climbing that hill I couldn't be happier; it would have been horrible to climb all the way up there and find out it was full! There weren't enough beds left in the Co-Ed dorm, so Joe was there and I was in the female dorm. Joe found out that one of us (or both if we wanted) could get a free nights stay if we help fold sheets for 3 hours each. Since I had to make dinner and catch up on blogs, Joey decided it would work just fine if he folded so at least one of us could get in free. That saved us $30 so it was definitely worth it! After we got all settled, took showers and I got our bikes put away in the storage place, Joe began to help fold and I started making dinner. There was even a nice grill outside that I could use to cook our burgers! By the time we were done with dinner, we were stuffed. Joe went back to finish folding and I worked on blogs (I was really far behind from being so tired and then having too much fun last night to worry about blogs). Another night with a bed, except this dorm was a lot different from the one last night. There were about 30 bunks and a good majority of them were full. Tonight's hostel was not nearly as fun as last night because there was just too many people and they were all doing their own thing. Last night, it was just the 6 of us, well 7 if you count the manager, so we really got the chance to have a lot of great conversation. By the time we went to bed it was pretty late again. With the sun going down around 10:30 it makes it hard to got to bed much earlier. We rode 60.57 miles today and it was much easier than the last few days, that' for sure!
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