Year: 2012

We’re on schedule to get Rai Sue to her plane in Cortez, but not without some help. Our plans to ride the Burr trail were thwarted when we found out that the dirt portion was now all sand due to a dry winter. The detour through Grand Escalante added about 70 miles and a big climb. Luckily, we managed to get a couple of  rides from some very kind people. The first ride involved stuffing four people, two bikes, all our great, and the angry chihuahuas into an old ford explorer. For the second ride, we put our bikes and gear into the boat they were hauling. The riding has continued to be amazing – every hill we go over brings us to a different landscape. We just finished the last big climb before I trade Rai Sue in for Nick and Jeff.

If you were going to imagine the perfect place to camp while bike touring, what would it look like? Maybe put it in a cute little town at the end of a sweet 20 mile downhill? Free unlimited hot showers? Across the street from the only bike shop for 300 miles (that opens at 8 am!)? Attached to a store that sells camping gear? Oh, and the store is also a restaurant that has gourmet pizza and microbrew? And breakfast burritos? maybe throw in a family that offered to share their homemade cobbler with you? Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Escalante Outfitters. And how much would you expect to pay for such a paradise? $5 per person (if you are bike touring)

We’re still having a great time riding through spectacularly beautiful country. Bryce canyon was gorgeous – it got down to the mid thirties last night. I’m having some minor issues with the zipper on my tent, but other than that, we are living the dream. Rai Sue is worried about her drivetrain, but luckily there’s an 8 am bike shop.

We’ve made it into Utah. It’s been a great couple of days. We had an great lunch in Kanab – if you’re ever there, I recommend The Mediterranean Table. We had an awesome ride out of Kanab – uphill in twilight, downhill by the full moon. Riding into Zion was absolutely amazing – beautiful rock formations, canyons, etc. Big thanks to J. Sperry for tipping us to the world’s best swimming hole – just the thing we needed when it was 101 degrees.  We met up with our French friend, Frank, again. We did an awesome hike in Zion canyon, hiking in the river where the canyon narrows to about 20 feet in some parts. The photos will not do it justice.
Got another early morning start. It’s back down to the mid sixties, and we’ve transitioned to yet another landscape – forested mountainsides with lush meadows. We’ll be in Bryce canyon tonight.

Oof…yesterday was a tough one. We got on the road at around 5 am to beat the heat and watch the spectacular sunrise over the rock formations. The night before, it probably only got down to like 75 degrees. We had an awesome ride in the (relatively) cool morning air, a great second breakfast 15 miles in (they make a killer breakfast burrito in Cliff Dwellers, AZ), and discovered that the little tunnels under the road for washes make great spots to take a cool break. But we were pretty much climbing the whole day. The first 2000 feet were fine. The next thousand was didn’t seem bad because of the amazing views from the switchbacks. it was really the last two thousand ferry of climbing that did us in. that’s right, we went from 3100 feet to 7900 yesterday. It took us about 12 hours. Thankfully, the air got cooler as we climbed, transitioning from barren rock, to spotty cactus, to scrubs, to juniper pine, and ending in a ponderosa pine forest. Also thankfully, there is a resort lodge restaurant across the street from the campground. Overall, a beautiful day of riding, but pretty challenging.

Today, we head back down the hill and into Utah!

Well, it seems to have warmed up a bit. We’re now at about the lowest elevation of the trip, about 3200 feet, and it has gotten pretty warm, I think pushing 100 degrees. No worries though, we beat the heat by getting up at 6 am and finishing our 60 mile day by around 3 pm. we’ve been rolling through jaw-droppingly beautiful desert landscape – giant cliffs, boulders, mesas in every hue of red, orange, yellow, brown…the photos will not do it justice. The campground we’re at now, lee’s ferry, is especially amazing – a postcard  everywhere you turn. The road into here looks like you’ve been transplanted to mars. Tomorrow we’re getting up at 4 am to hit the road before sunrise.
Rai Sue’s street score tally:
– Someone’s glasses (quickly returned to their grateful owners)
– A fancy sun hat
– A bicycle computer (quickly returned to a very grateful Greg)
– a pair of sunglasses

Hey everyone. As spectacular as it was,we’ve moved on from the Grand Canyon. Got in a great hike yesterday on the Kaibab trail, more amazing rim cycling, and a ranger talk that barely made any sense. Now we’re heading to the nearest bridge across the Colorado, which is still about 70 miles away across the desert. We’re about to hit a section that has 120 miles between grocery stores, so if you don’t here from us, it’s either because there’s no cell service or we ate each other.

The Grand Canyon is awesome!!! We camped last night at bedrock city, a Flintstones-themed campground that at first seemed really run down and creepy, but we quickly realized it was run down and awesome! A left over relic from a different era of American tourism that seems to be still hanging on. We woke at 6:30 and had a huge breakfast at Fred (Flintstone)’s cafe for about $13 total. We made it into the park by noon, dodging RVs, helicopters, and elk carcasses along the way.
Luckily, we had the foresight to reserve a campsite, since the campground was full by 11 am. We turned our site into an impromptu hiker/biker site by inviting two groups of Francophile bike tourists to share with us. We spent the rest of the day making root beer floats, bumming in the visitor center, and catching the shuttle out to “the abyss” to have a car free sunset ride along the canyon rim. Btw, the shuttle back from the sunset viewing is similar to catching the 1 California at 7:30 in terms of crowdedness.
Tomorrow, I think we’ll give the Kaibab trail a try. One day down and no one fell in!

Rai Sue and I made it to Flagstaff okay, albeit three hours late, which was fine for us since it was 43 degrees when we were supposed to get in at 4am. The delay was caused by the one percent – it would seem you can pay Amtrak to put your own private car on the train, and sometimes those cars break down, delaying everyone else on the train.

Anyway, here we are, heading north to the grand canyon. The weather is perfect – warm sun, cool breeze, clear skies, full heart, can’t lose! We climbed up to 8000 feet through gorgeous pine forests. The elevation change is making us huff and puff a little, but the climb wasn’t too bad since we started at 7000 feet!

Also, big ups to my niece Jennifer who just graduated high school! Congrats!

Sarah,max,manjula,Sasha,and I all made it to San Luis Obispo fine. We had great weather down the coast, mostly sunny, cool, and mostly great tail winds. Manjula’s friends Sara and Pedro let us camp in their backyard in SLO, which was fun and convenient. Last night we spent wandering around downtown pretending we fit in with all the partying 22 year olds. I was also introduced to froyo by the ounce. Unfortunately, those guys all needed to head north. Now i’m on the train – I should meet up with Rai Sue in about 20 minutes in LA, where we’ll take the train our to Flagstaff – we get in at like 4 am! I just uploaded a bunch of photos, so check out the gallery. See y’all in Arizona!