We are dropping down North Tom Beall road. The sun is shining brightly in a blue sky softened by an Autumn haze. The smell of smoke is just a hint in the air. We are in shirt sleeves. The fields have been harrowed and are richly dark. Trees and brush have turned color. We are a bit late for the best colors in the high country Sean says, but there are still plenty of subtle reds and yellows. We take turns passing one another in a crouched-aerodynamic coast. We are doing 23-25 mph with no effort. What could be better? Well, you might have been there to enjoy it with us. Still we found it heady enough to turn on down to Spalding. "Too nice to head home, now," Sean said though Caroll had been clingy when we left.

At 10 the radio said the temp was 41 degrees. Probably so, but I was tempted to leave off my jacket even then. As it was we spent most of the day climbing in shirt sleeves and only slipped the jackets on again when we dropped down Cottonwood Creek Road to CuldeSac.

Now that's a story. Neither Sean nor I had ever done the road, we decided, without Steve. We discussed which way was best to take the series of rollers along Misner road, the top of the ridge to the east of lapwai cutting across to Culdesac. Caroll likes to run them South to North because it ends with the long descent that is steep enough to give you a good pace and yet not so steep as to make you uncomfortable about control. But the rollers tend to climb in that direction. We decided to do them North to South, or at least I thought we had. But at Lapwai Sean turned South and up Garden Gulch. I was agreeable but I just assumed he'd decided to do Lyle Gulch to Jacques spur first. But, no, Sean took us past Lyle Gulch on up Garden Gulch claiming it would intersenct with Tom Beall. I pictured the rollers and remembered the road we had to cross and thought perhaps he was right.

But Garden Gulch is paved and paved all the way to the top. We kept expecting it to turn to gravel. It never got steep either. We were running 10 mph and feeling comfortable. Out ahead and intersection appeared. But it didn't look right. There was no farm house in my memory. And this intersection took us onto Cottonwood Creek Road. But my head was still in a different geography. I didn't recognize where I was though I've been there many times. Then I did spot the small silos at the top of the hill and the geography in my head and that in the world snapped into alignment. "If we keep going, we'll drop down a long hill to ReubenGifford road," I said.

We had completely missed our rollers and found a more gentle paved road to the Cottonwood Creek drainage. We turned back and headed to Culdesac and Jacques Spur for lunch. But Jacques Spur has recently changed owners and was closed for business. Looks like renovations going on. I hope it reopens. It is a great rest stop located just about where we need one.

So it was back to CuldeSac and the Thunderbird convenience store where we got hotdogs and chips and then headed back up Cottonwood Creek. This time we knew just where the rollers were--on Misner Road.

You can't call it easy, but taking Lapwai Road up the hill is the easiest of the routes.