Ride Day 27

I woke up a bit sore this morning and got a late start for me. At a bit after 7AM, I headed down the road from Caballo to El Paso TX. I had a plan for the day. I would ride without pushing it and when I got to the outskirts of El Paso I would jump on a public bus and ride to the far eastern side of town. I hate riding my heavy touring bike in busy city traffic. It is dangerous and for me pointless. Sure there can be some site seeing but at the risk of getting killed. Not worth it.

So I rode down the freeway for the section they allowed bikes on which was a nice smooth safe ride. Then they kicked me off to a narrow two lane road with almost no shoulder to ride on and a dangerous drop off on the edge of the pavement. There were lots of big trucks going in both directions and I had a cross wind blowing me into traffic. How is that safer than riding on a freeway???? The states need to allow adult bikers on more of the freeway system. Maybe with a driver's license requirement or something because the freeway is way safer to ride on. Or they need to widen all roads so there is a safe place to ride a bike.

I stopped for lunch around 10:30 and ordered a cheeseburger, fries and V8. When I was finished I ordered another burger. The waitress did not believe me and I had to convince her I was serious. They were both delicious and I then ordered a third one. She almost died when I asked for that one. Then I told her no two was enough and she started having a laughing fit. I guess not many people in these small towns mess with their waitresses.

I had a head wind for a couple of hours which slowed me down from 17mph to under 10mph. It really killed my legs and my spirit. I only had one mile more to go to get to my bus stop that I had already looked up on the internet. Then the worst thing happened to me. A big sign that said DETOUR. I tried to go around and get through the closed part of the road but it was impossible to get through so I had to back track and take the detour. In the country a detour can mean a half mile or it can mean 50 miles. This one ended up being about 10 miles out of my way. My tired legs were complaining and my mental state was a mixture of anger and depression or something. When I finally got across the border into TX I could not make myself backtrack to get to my planned bus stop so I went ahead into El Paso thinking there would be a bus stop. I stopped and asked lots of people but nobody knew anything about the bus. I rode on another 10 miles which made my day's ride way too long. Finally I just gave up and checked into a hotel for the night.

I soaked in the tub and showered off all the crusty salt and sun screen. I am windburned which is the same as being sunburned. Not too bad but I was putting sun screen on frequently so it annoys me that I still got burned. If it is going to be this windy here in TX I am going to have to start using zinc on my lips and up my sun screen to spf50.

I feel good now. Did some stretching and realized I need to do a lot more of that. Going to have to work it into a daily routine. Tomorrow I will deal with getting out of the big city. Tonight just sleep sleep sleep...

Ride Day 26

I am finally past the big mountains in New Mexico. Emory Pass was 8228 feet. The views from the top were awesome as usual from mountain tops. I just can not capture the grandeur of the vistas with my little pocket camera but I included a few pics here anyway.

I left Silver City right as dawn was breaking. There were two choices for roads. One went to the Gila Cliff Dwellings and the other went by a giant open pit copper mine. I chose the giant open pit mine because it was flatter and much shorter than the other route and I have been to the cliff dwellings before back in the 1970's.

The road was rolling hills with various changes in scenery as I went up the grade. I was getting tired much faster than I am used to but I was climbing and working hard at between 6200 and 8200 feet in elevation where the air is pretty weak to say the least. The weather was perfect. Sunny but cool with a light breeze. I took some pics of the copper mine and then I just got into my work routine of pumping and letting my mind go blank. Letting my mind go blank seems to be getting easier as I go along in this ride. I had to rest a lot and a few times I walked a short distance to get my lower legs some blood. I do not use my lower legs when I ride. I can only push with my heels. I lose a lot of power because of that but it really only hurts me when I am doing a steep long uphill.

I was resting and walking at one point today and a truck stopped and asked me if I wanted a lift. My mind said no, that is cheating, if you take the ride you did not ride across the entire country. My legs however spoke up much quicker than my mind did and said yes right away. So I put my bike in the pickup and took a short ride with them. We stopped for pics here and there but I did not realize that my camera battery was dead so I missed a lot of great pics. It is very difficult to see the screen with my sunglasses on in the bright sunlight and I just did not know the camera was dead. Each time I turned it on it showed the pic I wanted to take and I pushed the button but the pics did not show up on my chip. Such is life. I think I still got enough pics for the day.

I met a Canadian family, Mom Dad and two boys riding on tandem bikes at the top of Emory pass at 8228 feet. They had just come up from the eastern direction which is a single very long uphill climb. We talked for a while as we rested and ate some food. After they left I used the restroom and when I came back out my bag of food was gone. I thought Yogi the bear only existed in the cartoons. I have no idea what or who took the food. It was just some bananas, sardines, candy bars, cookies and a gatorade.

My original plan was to sleep at the top of the mountain but with so many hours of good light left I decided to take the downhill run of 4000' drop in elevation. Now that was fun. The worst uphills are past me now for this ride. Tomorrow I go to El Paso. Maybe I will stop at the Alamo in Texas but more likely I will just pass through the big cities except for Austin which I really like. I am starting to like the lonely time on my bike in desolate areas like I just passed through. Just me and nature...more later

Ride Day 25

As usual I started early on my ride. I planned on going from Buckhorn to Silver City today a distance of about 40 miles with a couple thousand feet of climbing. The road started out downhill and then the rolling hills started. The road was good with a nice shoulder but I found my legs were still tired from yesterday's long grueling ride. I took it easy as I went.

I stopped at a coffee shop in Cliff and caught up on my internet while I ate some breakfast. Then I hit the road again. The road disappeared off into the distance for most of the day. Very little traffic for a Monday morning. I did run into five other bikers. A Belgium couple, a lone guy from Georgia, and a couple from Switzerland were all on the road going the other way. We all talked for a while and compared notes on the road ahead of us. I enjoyed the Swiss couple because they were vivacious and trusting. We talked for about 20 minutes before we broke it off and continued our rides.

The road started to climb after our talk. It was only 10 more miles to Silver City but my legs were tired and the road was climbing at a long slow rate. I had to rest often as I am at 6000' and I was getting winded. I would just stop for about two minutes to let my heart and breath catch up and then take off again.

I made it to Silver City but I was tired for only a 40 mile ride and only a couple thousand feet of climbing. I blame it on the elevation but it is just as or more likely that I over did it yesterday on my 90 mile ride with almost 6000' of climbing. Us old men don't recover as fast I am finding out. I hope I survive this ride coming up over a 7200' pass and Emory pass at 8228 feet, then some glorious downhilllllllllll.

Ride Day 24

I waited out the big storm in Safford. I had a good time there. I spent some time talking and hanging out with a woman from Oklahoma. When the storm passed over I left the next morning.

It was still dark when I left. The sun came up about a half hour into the ride. My goal was to get as close to Silver City as I could which was about a 125 miles away. The weather was cool with a light breeze blowing behind me. It started out with a flat ride then quickly started to climb. It was a slow climb until I got to Solomon where the climb to the 6350' pass started. That was a grueling climb for me. I had to rest often at this high elevation. I even walked a little of it because my lower leg started to cramp and I hoped that a short walk would help.

I met a nice 70 year old man riding his bike around near Solomon AZ. We talked for a while and he was very fun to talk to. Very active for 70 also. I like that.

The views along the road were spectacular rock formations and high desert. There was a bit of ranching in the valleys but not much else. The ride was pretty lonely and desolate. I saw very few cars and no other bikers. It had one small store at a place called Three Way but otherwise nothing until I arrived at Buckhorn 90 miles from Safford.

After I climbed to the top of the 6350' pass the scenery changed to conifer forests. I saw some elk but I did not get a pic of them. They stared at me while I pulled out my camera but the second I aimed it at them they vanished into the thin air. I had to laugh. Digital cameras are just too slow for wildlife pics. I prefer the old fashioned SLR cameras.

There was a long downhill to get to Three Way which I enjoyed. But if I have learned one thing riding a bike it is that whatever goes down must come up and it did big time. I was getting tired after fifty miles but since there was nothing around and it was only noon I slowly pushed on. The New Mexico border passed and then the road started rolling up and down for miles. I was dreading looking at the climbs up with my already rubbery tired legs. I pushed on with lots of rest stops. Once I hit the turnoff on 180 the road improved and I sailed into Buckhorn with a tailwind. I pigged out on food at the cafe there and drank potassium drinks, vegie drinks and fruit drinks to try to replenish my tired old body then went straight to sleep in my tent.

Waiting out Weather

I hope I made the right decision to wait out the predicted storm. The weather prediction says high winds to 55-60 mph, lightning, half inch rain below 4000', up to 10" of snow above 4000' and possible tornadoes. So I am sitting in Safford AZ waiting for this storm to pass over. I did not want to get caught up at 7-8000' in conditions like that. It could be deadly.

There are also storms coming up from the Gulf of Mexico into Texas. These warm wet storms and the cold air passing over here will collide near the borders of New Mexico and Texas and could cause weather havoc there also. Texas has been getting slammed lately with lots of bad weather. I hope I get through there safely.

Unfortunately for me I do not trust the weather predictions. They tend to over hype all storms as worse than they turn out to be. I am guessing a few inches of snow up high and 1/4" of rain down at lower elevations. I am still not going to challenge the weather because if I am wrong I could be dead wrong. Such is life.

I am resting up and trying to regain some weight here in Safford AZ as I wait. I am eating five meals a day and resting as much as possible. When I leave here I have some very tough hard climbs over desolate, high mountain passes. I need fresh legs to make it. My friends ahead of me say the ride is difficult but has awesome scenery along the way that makes it worth the effort.

I will be out of touch once I leave here until I rejoin a more populated world on the other side of the mountains in New Mexico. I might find an internet in Silver City but otherwise not likely. More later.

A Weather Delay

I am in Safford AZ right now. I had planned on hitting the mountains in Eastern AZ and into New Mexico starting today but the weather is ugly. As I arrived in Safford yesterday afternoon the winds hit 55mph and they are coming out of the direction I am heading into. There are higher winds predicted for the next few days along with rain and at higher elevations snow is predicted. I have a 6800' pass and an 8228' pass to climb over in the next few days of riding. I guess this weather will force me to wait here in Safford for a few days until this system blows itself out.

I could use the rest. I left San Francisco weighing 210 pounds and last night I weighed myself and I was only 187 pounds. That is too much weight to lose that quickly. I have been trying to eat as much food as possible but also healthy food. I am eating lots of protein and fruit and vegies. I also pack in the carbs to make myself last riding all day.

My caloric burn is just higher than my intake so I am losing weight. I can afford to lose weight but I just don't like it going down this fast. A few days rest might allow my body to rebuild some muscles instead of more fat. I still have a belly roll it is just smaller. I think by the end of this ride my belly roll will be totally gone. That is a good thing I hope. More later.

Ride Day 23

I left the civic center Rv Park in Globe AZ this morning at first light. I had a good day of rest at the RV park. I had not intended on resting there but for the last three nights I have not been able to sleep because I have had really high pain and cramps at night. The pain is not from the riding, I have it all the time but it goes up and down for various reasons. The main thing that makes it go up for me is walking. Almost any amount of walking will cause me to have pain later that day and night. I finally resorted to sleeping aids last night and got a good nights sleep.
On the way out of Globe I stopped and ate breakfast at Jack in the box, now I remember why I don’t eat there very often, sorry Jack. I headed out of town with a somewhat full but not satisfied stomach. The road was uphill at the beginning and would have a nice shoulder to ride in then all of a sudden the shoulder would disappear and I would be in the same lane with big trucks and speeding cars. I did survive without any real close encounters. Road engineers clearly don’t give a rats ass about bicyclists that is obvious from the jack ass way they provide for us then suddenly don’t. How would car drivers like roads to switch from two lanes to one lane suddenly with no warning and then back to two lanes? I don’t think they would put up with it. For a bike rider it is life and death because our vehicle weighs less than thirty pounds and a car is at least 1500 pounds for the smallest one and the big trucks are fifty thousand pounds. So needless to say a collision between a bike and a vehicle is always bad if not deadly for a bike rider. Please improve the roads for bike riders.
I rode hard with my fairly fresh legs after the rest. I was in top gear when I hit my first downgrade. It was a long slow downgrade and with a good riding shoulder in sight I cranked up the speed. It took me a couple of hours from leaving my camp to make it to the first city. I stopped there and took five minutes rest then hit the road again. There were more rolling hills on this stretch of the road than I had expected. People had told me it was all flat or downhill to Safford from Globe. I found it to be a lot more work than I expected. I still made very fast times. On the downhills I pushed it and on the uphills they were short enough to tire me out but not so taxing that I had to stop and rest.
I saw one heavily loaded guy riding west but he did not acknowledge my wave. I understand that mindset when you are working hard. A bit later I ran into two young girls riding from Louisiana to San Diego. They had been riding for 25 days which was about the same as myself. We talked for about fifteen minutes about road conditions in both directions and motives for riding. They were happy and friendly and I enjoyed running into them.
I made it to Safford by noon. My map said 86 miles but my odometer said 102 miles. I felt like it was 102 miles. My odometer and the state road signs that appear every mile and tell you how far from the state line you are both agreed it was 102 miles all together. I considered riding the alternate route to the Coolidge Dam but after reading the map description of rough roads I skipped it. I have seen the dam before and also been to the Gila Cliff Dwellings previously so I am skipping them both.
I stopped at Sunset RV Park in Safford for the night. The lady in charge, Starr was very nice. She let me stay in the Rec Room instead of putting up my tent. They also had showers and a full kitchen and a laundry that were all available to me. I took a long shower, put my laundry in and wrote this.
Tomorrow I head for the continental divide and after that to Emory Pass at 8228 feet. I saw snow up on the mountains today so I guess it might be cooler up at that height. More later.