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DAY 3

Thar She Blows....

ROUTE: Blythe CA to Wickenburg AZ DISTANCE:  117 Miles WINDS: East at 15...in our face or cross most of the day.
WEATHER: Sunny and warm TERRAIN: Hilly on interstate and one other time before lunch.  Flat the remainder. TOTAL CLIMBING: 3300 feet or so

DAILY DOINGS: Check out MEET THE RIDERS to see who is riding with us.  There are a couple of riders who I haven't gotten up yet, but I should have it all complete in a day or two. 

Another breakfast at Dennys!  Up early, eat, and load.  It's starting to be routine by now.  When I open the trailer, bags start flying and poof...everyone's gone!  We woke to a beautiful morning with light tailwinds, but that would soon change when we got on highway 60 where the winds were quartering in our face and picking up.  I was riding this morning so Jim could have the afternoon...WHAT WAS I THINKING?  This is two days in a row that I've chosen the headwind portion of the ride.  People are starting to wonder if it's a plot or something...ride leader rides, headwinds...ride leader in van, ok.  Hopefully, this too will pass.

The first portion of our ride took us into Arizona via I-10 and we stayed on the interstate for about the first 36 miles of the day where we made our only turn to get on highway 60.  I've affectionately coined this highway "The loneliest highway in the US."  It is an arrow straight road that seems to go on and on and on...disappearing into the haze of the horizon in places with only one significant rise leaving Hope AZ. Don and Mark got a kick out of the sign on the way out of town that read, "You Are Now Beyond Hope."  I'm sure many of the riders, or at least their families, would agree that sign really describes our status.

There's really not much out here at all.  There are small farm houses dotting the landscape in some areas but the land is mostly high desert unless its watered.  One gentleman told me that one farm near Aguila, where we had our last SAG, was over 22 miles long...from the highway to the base of the mountains in the distant.  It looked pretty fertile, but if it were ever to run out of water, I'm sure it would just be sandy desert too.  I asked the gentleman where they got the water they needed to farm and he said they had deep wells that were fed by seasonal rainfall.  Rainfall?  You couldn't prove it by me that they ever had rainfall since every year when I come through it's so dry out here your spit evaporates before it hits the ground.  He said that when they have their rainy season, water gets up to the window sills of the houses in town.  Wow...guess there's no place for the water to go when it does fall.

The ride after lunch was almost dead flat until about 10 miles short of Wickenburg where a 10 mile descent into town is a welcome finish for another tough day in the saddle.  The ride today was a bit more strenuous than it should have been mainly due to the pesky cross winds that pelted the riders most of the day.  By later in the afternoon, the wind seemed to be about 2 degrees behind us...not great, but not entirely in our faces to the finish.  But the good news was that it wasn't nearly as hot as it could have been...mid 80s in this part of the country is definitely welcome.  Almost everyone was in by 4:30 so they had a little time to rest for tomorrow's climbing.  I didn't have the heart to tell them that they will have payback tomorrow morning as they will have to climb out of Wickenburg on the way to Cottonwood...I just let them enjoy the afternoon.

If the day wasn't tough enough, we had a few interruptions that made it even a little harder for a couple folks.  Andy discovered he had a broken spoke as he was leaving lunch.  Jim quickly swapped out his cassette on our spare wheel so he could finish without taking too much time to fix the wheel.  But Stan on the other hand really had a tough day as the flat fairy visited him on 5 separate occasions.  Just as he would get going well, he'd have another one.  Now he is leading the flat competition and has been affectionately named "Flat Stanley."  The race is on for the coveted "Most Flats Award" at the end of the ride.

After Jim and I swapped positions in the van, I spent the late afternoon supporting folks until they got to the downhill into town.  In spite of the dry air, nagging winds, and warm temperatures, everyone seemed to be doing fairly well and are well on their way to getting into the rhythm and pace of the ride.  Tomorrow we'll test their climbing legs as we'll stack up over 11,000 feet elevation gain by Cottonwood.  It's a beautiful day of riding and I'm sure the temperature will be much cooler as we go up.  Stop by and see how we do...and see if Stanley has enough tubes to finish the day.  See you then.

PS: A friend from last year's north ride, Bill Kiess, came by to say hello this evening.  Always good to see alumni.  And a retired Chief from the Air Force that worked with me in Alabama, Glen Miller, also came by for dinner.  Great to see them both.  Stay well and keep in touch.

 

DAILY DISCERNING DIALOGUE:
-"They say if you're not the lead dog, the scenery never changes...well out here, it doesn't matter.  It doesn't change for the lead dog either!"

-"I felt like the movie Ground Hog Day...I kept seeing the same thing over and over all day!"

-"Why are all the cacti in Arizona?"

-"Did you see the sign "Land for Sale?"  "It looked like it had been there for 100 years."

-"How's your saddle feel?"  "Better than my butt right now."

-"Now you can see the crappy job I did shaving my legs with the dog clippers.  No wonder my dog hides when I get them out."

-"Why does this concrete bench feel better than my bike seat?"

-"I don't have a camel back, I have a camel gut."

-"Mike, why doesn't the Schwanns man stop when we tap the top of our head?"  "There were two that drove by and ignored us when we tried to stop him."

 DAILY DUH: Actually, I just heard of this one this morning...but it happened yesterday.  Seems our Team "Pair A Docs" (Dana and Gene our recumbent riders) were a bit adventuresome after lunch when they talked to a local who said there was a great back road that would get them off the interstate for about 9 miles.  Well, that sounded pretty sweet...only thing is, if there's a "good" alternate to the interstate, we know about it and we'd be on it.  Unfortunately, Dana and Gene didn't think to ask if anyone else that took that road had ever been seen again.  So off they trekked off into the southern California filled with excitement of what adventures may lie ahead.  The road kept getting farther and farther away from the interstate until they couldn't see the interstate any longer...9 miles had come and gone and there didn't seem to be an end in sight.  Plus, the farther they rode, the worse the road got...Deliverance came to mind.  Gene was thinking, "If we got into trouble, could the SAG van ever find us?"  "Do we turn around and go back or keep going?"  They were eventually so far out in the boonies that one local called the authorities and reported a UFO sighting...the local stated he'd never seen anything like this in this neck of the woods...two funny looking space vehicles with aliens wearing goofy lycra and head gear.  I think the Discovery Channel had dispatched a reporter to investigate, but they were long gone by the time he got there.  Well back to the story...luckily their map showed that the road eventually would connect back to the interstate...and luckily, the pavement didn't end in the process.  Finally, after 17 miles to miss 9 miles of interstate they were happy to get back on track!  I'll bet they check with me before going off on another "unknown road." 

DAILY DIGITAL DELIGHTS

Several locals reported alien sightings today...but we found it was just Mike in his cool shades and helmet.

The saga of the abandoned water bottles continues, but most of the bottles now are afraid to wander too far from their bikes for fear of being left.

Jeff has been in the saddle for so long over the last 3 days that the position is becoming permanent. 

Rachel is getting to the point where her arms aren't long enough to read the energy bar labels.  One advantage is that when you have to have it so far away to read it, it's too far away to eat.

Hmmm, I must have misplaced the air in the rear tire again.  It was here a minute ago.

It always pays to know a good mechanic when you have a day like Stanley had today.

 

Look no farther.

  

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