Day 07

Needless to say, it was pretty cool this morning when we started...42 degrees, brrrrr.  But this morning was about the warmest I've ever seen here.  There's something about Gallup...it's always been in the low 30s when we depart this town and when we load the truck the bags are much lighter than usual.  I think everyone was wearing about everything they had, but most everyone had shed the heavy stuff by the time they got to the divide.

Gallup is over 6000 feet elevation and we ride over the Continental Divide which is 7275 feet at about 32 miles.  We had our first SAG there and everyone took the obligatory pictures to record the event.  Supposedly, it's all downhill from here...at least if you are water.  Of course I tell everyone it is down hill but they find out pretty quickly that there's lots of humps in the terrain before we get to sea level in Massachusetts.  But it does drop for quite awhile after the SAG before they have to start going up and down again...a good ride after a nice warm up climbing up to the Divide.

Even though it was a tough day, we rode through some interesting, beautiful, and desolate areas.  The mesas were beautiful and I imagine that they looked the same a thousand years ago.  We also rode by Fort Wengert where Kit Carson led campaigns against the Navajo Indians.  We'll see Kit Carson monuments all along our route through Kansas.  There's even one in Kansas where he shot his mule thinking it was an Indian...makes you wonder how good an Indian fighter he was if he had trouble telling his pack mule from the enemy.  We also rode through the largest lava flow in the continental US...another area that probably hasn't changed much for thousands of years.  It's sobering to think that well after we are long gone, these formations will still watch over people passing by on our route.  But for now, they just tell a story of a time when the terrain was much more volatile than today.  I wanted to find out more about it like when did it develop, but I didn't have time to do the research...there's only so much I can do out here.  From what I understand, the entire area around Grants NM is volcanic...no thank you.  I'll just ride through it and look in amazement. 

After Grants, we venture out into the New Mexico back country and an Indian reservation around Laguna.  From there we pick up I-40 all the way to Albuquerque.  At the last SAG, we take a frontage road up 10 mile hill to Central Avenue for the screaming downhill into town.  The final hill into town is a doozy.  You seem to just keep going down forever...it's about an 8 mile descent to the Rio Grande River where we can break the 55 MPH speed limit if we try.  Last year I peaked out at double nickel, but this year the winds were a little squirrelly so riders didn't press their luck. 

We only had one hiccup today as we found unexpected construction on I-40.  Karen drove through on her way east and found the area was easily passable by bicycle, but I thought it best to check it out before the riders got there.  Since her trip, DOT had changed the traffic pattern and we were unable to ride through about 4 miles of interstate...bummer.  We had to shuttle everyone through the non shouldered area.  Everything went well but it didn't go without challenges.  When I was on top of the van securing bicycles, the torrid winds about blew me off the top of the van.  It was blowing so hard, I couldn't stand up at all and spent my time up there crawling around and trying not to drop the bikes.  After a couple of trips through the construction, everyone was back on the road enjoying the howling winds blowing them to town.

Tonight we celebrate our first leg of the trip...we all arrived safely in spite of the close call with Linda in the canyon.  Along with our celebration, we sadly said good bye to Linda and Mike from Bermuda as this was as far as they were planning on riding.  We wish them well and hope to see them on another ride someday...great having them both.

Tomorrow is a rest day and we'll spend the day prepping for the next leg and trying to get some much needed rest.  The next riding day is no picnic as we ascend on Las Vegas...the one in New Mexico.  See you then.