We woke up to another wonderful meal at Barb and David's! David made some waffles with pieces of apple and simmered maple syrup! We even had some fresh squeezed orange juice, which was a little tart, but good. After we got packed up, Kumar, Joey and I rode to Vons to restock on food before heading out of town. Kumar continued on west to Las Vegas where he planned to take a day to site see. We rode through the very cute little downtown portion of Boulder City and then had just a few miles to get to the entrance to the Hoover Dam. We climbed off of the main highway up and over the hill to where the security check to go over the dam was. It wasn't much of a check since they just waved us right through, but that's ok. We stopped to take a picture of the Hoover Dam sign and a really nice guy saw us, came over and asked if we wanted a picture with us and the sign and then took it for us! When we rode over the next little hill, there it was! It was really big, but for some reason I was thinking it was a lot wider. Either way, it was pretty cool that we would get to ride our bikes over the dam! There was a switchback as we were going downhill where we got a pretty neat view of the underside of the new bridge. Like all touristy places, there were quite a bit of people there. We crossed the line from NV to AZ (which for some reason I thought was painted right on the roadway, or at least that was what I remember seeing in a movie, but it wasn't). After taking a couple pictures, we headed up the hill with all of the switchbacks. We were happy to see a welcome to AZ sign so we could get our state picture. After the long climb out of the canyon where the dam was we got to the top and found out that the road was no longer a through road (apparently now that they have the bridge, the way into see the dam is also the only way out). There was a police officer, but it was pretty frustrating to waste so much time and energy just to have to come back down the hill, go across the dam back into NV and start climbing out of the canyon again on the other side. Amazingly, there was a line of cars all the way out to the main road. That was not the case at all on our way in- in fact there were no cars at all when we came in. I guess we had really good timing to beat the Thanksgiving weekend crowd. We finally got up and out of the canyon and back on the main road. The ride across the new bridge was boring since you couldn't see anything- but at the same time it would have been pretty scary if those big cement walls wouldn't have been there! For the first 20 miles it was a very hilly ride. After all the climbing we did around the Hoover Dam, I was already feeling tired, but eventually I got my second wind and it wasn't so bad. At one point we came to the top of a hill and we saw another long valley ahead of us. We descended down and then for a good majority of the time we were riding up a slight incline. It was a breeze though because we had such a great tailwind pushing us along. Even though we had a nice big shoulder the whole morning, the shoulder disappeared completely at one point and we were forced to ride right in the lane. The good news is that it was a double lane road at that point so most of the cars gave us a full lane. None the less, it was very nerve racking to worry about them not seeing us. Every once in a while a car would not move over to give us a lane, but there was still room between us, so we knew that they at least saw us. As we rode along we got a little worried because there was a fence all along the road on both sides- meaning it would not be easy to find a place to camp for the night. We took a little break at the only little cafe/shop we passed since we left Boulder City. After enjoying a little bit of our Hershey's chocolate, we continued on for a little bit before we started looking for a place to camp since it was getting close to being dark. We got very lucky to come to one of the few intersecting roads. Going down that we crossed a cattle guard and were able to get "inside" that fence. We stumbled upon a dirt road almost right away after turning onto this road and decided that looked like a good bet to find a place for the night. The road looked like it was a road to no where. There were quite a few desert bushes scattered around that made a perfect place for us to hide ourselves. It wasn't dark yet when we found our spot for the night, but we only had about 20 minutes left before it would be. We enjoyed a full size sandwich since we didn't have anything for lunch today after our great breakfast this morning. It didn't take long at all for it to get pretty chilly. We got our tent set up pretty quick and got in our sleeping bags so we would be warm. At this point we are still hoping to go to the Grand Canyon, but keep toying back and forth with the idea. We checked the weather for there and it gets down to 15-18 degrees at night now. We were cold tonight and it was only in the upper 30s/lower 40s. It would not be very fun at ALL to camp when it is 15! We will see what the next day or so brings to see if we will go to there or not. Part of the problem with going there is not just that it is that cold there, but in order to go to Phoenix afterwards we will have to go through some of the taller mountains, where we will run into the same problem with it being really cold. This is going to be a tough decision! Our miles totaled 59.33 today.
0 Comments
Happy Thanksgiving!!!! I still can't believe that Thanksgiving is already here. It is a perfect 70ish degrees out today and the sun is shining. What a weird feeling to not be home for the holidays; this is a first for both of us. We are just so thankful to have been welcomed into David and Barb's home for Thanksgiving! We slept in a little today, but not too late. Barb made some awesome homemade cinnamon rolls for breakfast and we enjoyed orange juice and some super great hot cocoa with whipped cream. For most of the day we just relaxed. Kumar and Joey played a little wii sports for a little while today. There wasn't a whole lot to do in terms of dinner except for stuffing the turkey and putting it in the oven (some of the guests were bringing some of the side dishes). Everyone started showing up about 1:30-2 ish. Their daughter had one of the cutest little dogs ever!! His name was Bronte and he was so soft and cuddly. We had a great time chit chatting with everyone; there was probably close to 20 people, 2 kids and a baby included. Dinner was incredible to say the least! There was ham and turkey, corn casserole, all the mashed potatoes one could ever eat, homemade rolls and just so much more. What a great group of people. It was a lot of fun. There were 4 kinds of pie for dessert including the traditional pumpkin, sweet potato, apple caramel, and rhubarb/mixed berry. Later on that evening, when everyone left, the 5 of us that were left just relaxed and watched some tv before retiring pretty early from our food comas. An awesome turkey day to say the least- we are so glad that they invited us to join them for dinner- and that Kumar got to enjoy his first American Thanksgiving! The first holiday away from our families will be one that we will never forget. Thanks again David & Barb!!
We woke up nice and early today so that we would be able to get riding. After a shower and some great french toast that Shirley made, we got everything all packed up. It was a little sad to be leaving, but that is always how it is. My throat unfortunately isn't feeling all the better yet, but I'm sure it will eventually. Shirley is still pretty under the weather, so us being gone will give hear a good amount of time to rest. Before leaving the city, I wanted to get a picture of us by the famous "welcome to Las Vegas" sign. It would be about 7-10 miles of extra riding total to cut over to the end of the strip where the sign was and then back out to the road that would take us out of the valley. The first few miles were fine, but the last 2 miles proved to be a challenge. As expected, the traffic picked up significantly once we got close to the strip. Luckily for us, we were at the tail end of the strip and didn't have too far to go to get to the sign. We ended up crossing over onto the sidewalk to get away from the traffic because there was a barrier up making the road very narrow. Apparently where we crossed was a "construction site," although they weren't doing anything but unloading a couple things from a truck. A security guard from one of the hotels waved us over to tell us that we should be careful because cutting through a construction site like that could get us a pretty hefty fine and or jail time. The lady seemed a bit crazy, but either way- fine or no fine, we weren't about to get killed by a car on that road either. We decided not to go any further in that direction and to find a different way there. One of the construction workers saw that we were "lost" and helped us out. He was so nice in comparison to that security guard lady, and didn't seem to mind one bit that we were in that area. After much discussion about going to/not going to the sign, we ended up going to the sign. There was a road with much less traffic that would pop us out right after all of the big hotels. Going that way we also got to see the Pyramid and the monorail, which we missed the other day. After the main strip, Las Vegas Blvd. wasn't too bad to ride on and wasn't worse than any other busy road we've been on. I was so happy that we decided to ride to the sign- after all, we are only here once (or at least won't be back for quite a while) and this is probably the only time we will have ridden our bikes here, too. The sign was pretty awesome because unlike the other signs that were hard to get to, they made this one so that people could easily and safely go there to get their pictures. Amazingly there was a whole line of people there waiting to get their pictures done. We waited a couple minutes in line with our bikes until it was our turn. One of the people behind us was nice enough to take our picture for us. There was a lady there who was working as a photographer and said that she would be happy to take our photo. She also said that she works on tips but understands if someone doesn't have the money for that and would be happy to take anyone's photo anyway. On the way in, we overheard a guy saying that "she wouldn't give my camera back until I tipped her." I swear everyone in this city is out to get your money! After we got our picture, we headed down Sunset Blvd. which was a lot less busy than the other roads near the strip. It paralleled the airport and runway. Just in the time we were next to the airport, we saw 4-5 planes take off. One right after the other. So many planes for the busy holiday weekend. Eventually we found ourselves back on the road that we took into the city. We climbed the hill and took our last looks at Las Vegas. Just as it has been with every single place we've gone, we feel like we just got there and we're leaving. We didn't see everything there was to see, but we did have a great time walking around and spending time with Papa Mike's sister Shirley. About 8 miles from the top of the hill was our host's house in Boulder City. On the way there, we passed the intersection with the long road that brought us into NV- the one with that incredible downhill! On the way into town, we saw a bike shop and decided to stop to see if they had any anti- chafing cream. With this dry weather, chafing and saddle soreness had become more of a problem for some reason. There was an incredible amount of traffic on the road that we had to cross to get there, so Joey ended up just waiting for me on the other side of the road and I wiggled my way across to the bike shop. Luckily, they had some cream, so it was worth waiting forever to cross that road. We didn't have any trouble finding our way to our host's house, which is always really nice. When we got there, we were not only greeted by our host, but also by Kumar- another cyclist!! There were going to be three of us spending Thanksgiving there! It was just so cool. Kumar is from Australia and is riding from Boston to LA, so he is almost done with his trip! Our hosts David and Barb were just great. Since there were two of us, we ended up sleeping on the pull down bed in the office and Kumar got the rv trailer all to himself. He was pretty excited to sleep in one because he had always seen them on the highway but had never been inside one before. So I guess it worked out perfectly! Later on, Kumar and I went with David down the hill to work on their Christmas float for the parade. They were in the very beginning stages of it, but seemed like they were having a lot of fun with it. For a snack, we all enjoyed some tortilla chips- from the biggest bag of them I'd ever seen. It was a 3 lb bag of tortilla chips! David joked that it was because people in the southwestern USA eat so many of them. Barb and David made all three of us a wonderful dinner. David grilled up some chicken and Barb made some carrots, and Quinua Salad. We also enjoyed some baguette bread with butter and wine/beer. What a great dinner! After dinner, us cyclists helped move the tables around and get everything in place for tomorrows Thanksgiving dinner. It worked out good that we were there so that Kumar and Joey could do all the heavy lifting! Later, we all watched a movie and then turned in for the night. A pretty good morning and a great afternoon. Even though it was a relatively short ride from N. Las Vegas to Boulder City, we ended up with 43.94 miles after our little detour to go down to the Vegas sign.
Today we slept in a little after a long day of walking yesterday. For most of the day, I did computer work, uploading photos, etc while Joey watched a movie or two. We had a burrito for lunch that was left over from our burritos the other day (they gave Shirley the wrong kind-so there was an extra one she didn't want). Later on that evening, Shirley made an awesome roast dinner fit with potatoes and carrots. We had Klondike bars for dessert and had a chance to do a little laundry. It was an extremely relaxing day! Not only did it give my blisters a little break, but my throat as well- hopefully it is better by tomorrow. We also got an email from our Warm Shower's host in Boulder City that said we were "Cordially Invited" to spend Thanksgiving dinner with them and their family. Originally we had only planned on spending one day there, and figured we would be out in the middle of the desert for Thanksgiving. We couldn't believe that we would get to enjoy a real Thanksgiving!!! It still amazes me how much kindness and hospitality we have been shown on this trip- we are just so incredibly blessed to have met and stayed with so many great people. Our trip would definitely not have been as fun if we hadn't, that's for sure! We can't wait for Thanksgiving now!
Today is the day we get to explore the Las Vegas Strip. I had a hard time falling asleep even though I had an amazingly comfy bed. Since it is just so dry out here, my throat hurt a little last night. This morning, it didn't feel any better- in fact it felt a little worse. Shirley woke up with a sore throat too, except hers was most likely from the flu (she was much sicker than I was!). We had free run of the kitchen and could make anything we wanted for breakfast. I decided on french toast and sausage! It was SO good- nothing beats french toast in the morning, well at least in my book anyway! For the morning hours we relaxed and figured out what we wanted to go see on the strip. Joey watched a little TV and I looked up where things were. Right around noon, Shirley gave us a ride down to the strip. We are so lucky to have gotten a ride down there- it would have been a pain with our bikes because they would have limited what we could go see; Shirley is just too nice! She dropped us off at the Mall on Fremont street. There was so much going on! Right away we saw the "Heartattack Diner" that the firemen in 29Palms told us about. We walked up and down the whole "mall" area. There were all sorts of street performers, from a magician to guys making spray paint art. There were even people riding a zip line through the air above the street. Throughout the whole area were old neon signs from the hotels and attractions that were saved from quite a long time ago. After exploring that area a little, we walked down to the main part of the strip. What a LONG walk it was! On the way, we passed a couple wedding chapels- fitting for Vegas, along with the Pawn Shop that is featured on the show Pawn Stars. The first thing we came to was the Stratosphere tower. I was expecting to see the roller coaster on top, but they must have done away with that. Now they have this spiny ride that goes out and over the edge way up at the top where the roller coaster used to be. We thought about going up in the tower, but figured like everything else, that it would be too expensive. Either way, we still had so much to explore. We kept walking and walking, passing all of these elaborate hotels. We came to Circus Circus that has the little theme park inside. Joey remembers coming here with his family as a kid and was pretty excited about getting to see it again. He even remembers going to the buffet inside there, too. A buffet is definitely on the list for today, but a little bit later. We walked through so many incredible hotels. It's a bit overwhelming to see really. At one of the older hotels, the Flamingo, we stopped in and saw the flamingos in the habitat they had inside. Eventually we made it almost to the end of the strip and went to the MGM building. They had this thing in "TV city" where you could rate a new tv show in terms of if you think it would last on the air or not. We decided to do it. What a horrible show it was! Although it was only supposed to take an hour, it ended up being longer. When we got back out on the strip it was dark and all of the glimmering lights of Vegas were shining. It sure was pretty. We walked half way back on the strip to where the fountain show at the Mirage was. We hit it with perfect timing. It was so neat to watch the water synced to the music of Elton John. So beatiful! All day we were hoping to go to the buffet at Caesar's Palace because we were told that was one of the best ones. When we got there, we found the worlds longest line- it was just like the lines at Disney World! As soon as we saw that our hearts sunk. We would be waiting in line for an hour to two hours and it was already almost 8pm. Feeling extremely disappointed, we headed over to Treasure Island to see if they had the same problem at their buffet. Again, it was a pretty long long-- although not anywhere near the one at Caesar's was. Either way, it was too long for us to wait. From there, we went outside and caught our seats for the TI pirate show, since we figured that we had missed the buffet and might as well not miss the free pirate show too. We waited for a little over a half hour before it started. It was worth the weight though! There was singing and dancing and pirate ships being blown up and sunk. The special effects were great! That made us feel a little better, but by then it was almost 9pm and we were starving. We had seen everything we had time to see and knew Shirley was going to come get us soon (we didn't want to take too long since she was doing us such a huge favor). We somehow made it back to Circus Circus and figured we would give the buffet a chance just on a whim that there would be a short line. What do you know-- we walked right in with absolutely no wait! Part of that probably had to do with the fact that they were going to stop letting people in at 10 (which was only about a half hour from then), but either way, we were so excited! They had so much great food! Although we only had a half hour-45 minutes, that's all we needed to eat our hearts out after all that walking. Shirley picked us up right there at Circus Circus. On the way back, Shirley dropped us off at one end of Fremont Street and picked us up at the other end just so we could see the mall lit up at night. Unfortunately they didn't have any light shows up and only had advertisements, but either way, it was still really neat. We are so spoiled to have gotten a ride down there AND a chance to see Fremont St. at night. I don't know what the total distance is for sure, but we must have walked close to 7-8 miles today, or at least it seemed like it. By the end of walk down the strip, I had the worst blisters on the balls of my feet- I didn't even know you could get blisters there! Anyway- they hurt so bad that I was walking pretty funny and was going really slow as a result of it. Joey even gave me a piggy back ride for a little while to give them a break. Tomorrow will be a nice day to relax and help my blisters to heal. Another great day!!
I guess sleeping on the rocks last night didn't work out so good for both of us. Joey had a back ache when he woke up this morning, although I was fine. Last night, we were woken up by the sound of footsteps in the rocks. Joe got out to look, but heard a car pulling away out near the road. We think someone saw the rest area and was hoping that the bathrooms would be open, which of course they weren't. It was nice to be able to use a brand new picnic table this morning for breakfast. For some reason, Joey had a little trouble getting our stove to work- hopefully it's not pooping out on us- although it has gotten a TON of use since March! We had a nice downhill for a few miles and then we started the gradual climb again. The climb got steeper as we approached the little town of Searchlight. It was neat last night because we could see the town way off in the distance and the actual "searchlight" on the hill. As we were climbing the hill, we saw something we didn't expect to see- a McDonald's sign! Once we got to the little town, which pretty much consisted of a few little restaurants and shops, a church, and the gas station/McDonald's, we stopped for a break. Since nothing sounded better than a chocolate milkshake, that is what we got. We used the internet for a little bit, let Joey's phone charge a little since it was dead, and enjoyed our little treat. From there, we still had a few miles to go that were up hill. It was a little bit of a struggle for me because I hadn't been feeling all that great today, and for Joey it wasn't as easy because he had a sore back. Amazingly enough though, about 23 miles into the ride, we hit a downhill. The miles were just flying by; the downhill lasted forever! It was a perfect one too because it kept us coasting at 25-30 miles an hour for about 6-10 miles!!!! It was incredible! We could just sit back and enjoy the ride- especially since we knew we were covering a lot of ground quickly. After the "steeper" part of the hill, it leveled out a little, but we were still going on a slight downhill. There, we were still able to move right along at 18-23 mph while peddling. Before we knew it- we were at 50 miles! I was feeling better after the long downhill rest and hardly felt like I had ridden 30 miles let alone 50. At that point, it was only about 2 in the afternoon, too. From there we only had about 20-25 miles to get into Las Vegas. Our original plan for today was to ride 50 miles or so and then have a short day tomorrow. But now that we had all of this energy and daylight, we decided to just go all the way today. We were both pretty excited because we didn't expect to have almost a 30 mile downhill or to get to be in Vegas tonight!! Although we had been riding in one of the never ending valleys since we left the hill, this one we could at least see the hill that we knew separated this valley from the Vegas and the town of Boulder City off in the distance. As we were riding we passed a HUGE solar farm that was pretty neat. Towards the end of the valley, our beautiful downhill was gone and we were climbing again- very gradual at first and then it got a little steeper. At that point though, it didn't matter because we were both so excited. When we made the turn onto the road that would take us to the city, we knew we were close. Only a few miles separated us from Vegas now! As we rode up the hill and around the corner, I was getting very anxious. Then all of a sudden, there it was- the city in the middle of no where! We could see the buildings of the hotels on the strip, the pyramid, and the stratosphere tower all off in the distance! I think a tear or two even came to my eye because of how excited I was. Right away, Joey gave his Dad a call to tell him we were there- apparently Joey was just as excited as I was. From where we stood on top of the hill overlooking the city, we had nothing but downhill for almost the whole way in. The first guy that we saw (outside of all the people in their cars) had on a sparkly shirt- just like I pictured everyone in Vegas to be wearing. Since we had gone so fast this afternoon, we had not stopped to eat lunch yet. We thought about it when we were closer to the road we needed to turn on, but despite being hungry, we decided it would be worth the wait to make it to Vegas to get to a grocery store. So, the first grocery store we saw, we made our stop. When we pulled up, there was one of the Salvation Army guys standing outside ringing the bell for the holidays- it still doesn't seem possible that it is so close to Thanksgiving and Christmas! The only thing that we bought at the store was bread (we still had some cucumber, tomato, and cheese left). It was SO worth the wait! We had nice fresh, soft bread instead of having to eat our last half of loaf of bread that was rock hard from it being so dry out here. We also each had a full half of the loaf, sub since we were so hungry. Although we don't always need to have a full half a sub, it always works so much better because for some reason the toppings stay inside much better than when we have quarter sized sandwiches. From there, our next stop was to find a McDonald's so we could look up the information for where we were staying in Vegas. We gave Papa Mike's sister, Shirley a call (we had just gotten done emailing her this morning telling her we would be there TOMORROW!). We explained how we didn't expect to have such a long downhill or to be here already, but we were here. She didn't seem to mind one bit that we were a day early and said to come right over. From that McDonald's that we were at, we had about 15 miles to ride because she lived in North Las Vegas near the Air Force Base. The wind was at our backs for almost the whole way, not to mention a good few miles of it were downhill again. It didn't take us too long to get there, which was really nice. When we found the road that she lived off of, we came across a gate that had us locked out. Luckily a car came and had the button to push to open it, so we got through anyway. Shirley was standing outside waiting for us when we arrived, which was really nice. It is just so neat that we get to stay with someone that is a relative/friend of someone we rode with for such a long time. We had our own bedroom complete with beds, and a nice hot shower awaited us. I was tired, like anyone would be after a long day of riding, but I wasn't nearly as tired as I normally am after riding that many miles. After we were settled in a little, Shirley offered to get us something for dinner (she didn't want to cook). She listed off some possibilities and we decided on Mexican. We figured we might as well eat as much of this as we can while we are in the area where there are a lot of authentic Mexican Restaurants. The three of us hopped in her car to got pick up the food. We stopped and got a bottle of soda and then went to a restaurant that Shirley's son swears by. Joe and I are very basic, so we each just ordered a beef burrito. When we got back home, we enjoyed our yummy dinner and even a couple Oreo cookie Klondike bars!! Those are my new favorite! For the rest of the night, we relaxed on the sofa and watched some TV. One show that was especially interesting for us since we are on this trip is the show "How the States Got Their Shapes." It was very interesting- it was perfect to watch as we ride all around the US. The show mentioned a lot of places and there were so many of them that we either had been to or at least now know where they are on the map. We had an amazing day and were just so excited already be in Vegas!- a day earlier than we expected to be. We rode 76.51 miles today.
It was a little chilly this morning, but it didn't take long for it to warm up, so that was nice. All night we could hear trains way off in the distance and just in the time we were packing up and making breakfast we must have seen 3-4 trains going in different directions. We had our oatmeal and then got back on to Old Rt. 66 and continued riding through another never ending valley. After a while, we came to the "town" of Essex, which doesn't really have anything in it except a couple old buildings and a little tiny post office. This was one of the towns that was booming in the 50's. As we kept riding, we were drawing closer to interstate 40. The train tracks had also gotten closer to the road at that point. Just like this morning, the trains kept coming. Right after we crossed under the I-40 bridge, only about 17 miles into our ride, we saw something amazing-- a gas station that was open!! As we got closer, we could see a whole bunch of fountains in front of the station. We knew they would have water! At that point, we weren't out of water, but getting to re-fill all the empty bottles made it so that we wouldn't have to worry at all about running out of water before we go to Vegas. The gas station also had a little cafe where you could order food. We thought about getting a bag of Doritos for a snack, but since they were 6 bucks a bag, we decided to order 3 orders of french fries instead since it would be cheaper and it would be enough to keep us full for a while. We had a pretty long break, so we decided that would be our lunch break unless for some reason we got really hungry. Within the first 5 miles of leaving the gas station, we saw our first tarantula running across the road. I couldn't believe how fast it was! I said, "Look Joey, there's a tarantula!" He said where... and then next thing we knew he ran over one of it's legs because he didn't see it. Despite having a crippled leg, the spider started running back across the road in the opposite direction, still pretty fast. To make me feel better, Joe said he "ran over it to protect me," even though we both knew it was an accident. A couple times today we had a little "flashback on rt. 66" because there were old cars cruising down the highway. That was pretty neat to see just because it's such a historic highway. Even though the first 16 miles seemed to take forever because they were all on a slight uphill, the next 16-20 miles flew by! Again and again, we saw trains, so many trains. At one point it was less than 5 minutes between when one train would pass and when we would see the next one off in the distance. It was pretty amazing because you could see the train in it's entirety way off in the distance. As it was going by, you could look all the way down the road and see train cars and look behind you and see train cars as far as you could see. Eventually we made it to the intersection of Rt. 66 and 95, which would take us into Nevada and close to Las Vegas. Once we turned, we had a little bit of a tail wind, but were going up a slight uphill for quite a while again. We knew from the turn that we wouldn't have to ride more than 20 miles from the border of CA/NV. That was our goal for today, to get into Nevada. After a while, we came around the corner of a hill and could see the border off in the distance. We could see the color of the road change and could see the state signs. As we left California after quite a long time, we crossed over a set of cattle guards into Nevada. We've never crossed into a new state like that before. From there, we took our usual picture at the sign and then continued on. The road was nicer and even turned into a 4 lane road with a nice big shoulder. About 3 miles into the state, we found another gas station! By that time we were pretty hungry, so we decided to have our sandwiches for dinner at the bench outside. Having our sandwiches saved us in terms of not having to cook, which saved us on water, but because it is just so dry, our bread was rock solid by the time we had our sandwiches today. The sun was already going down by the time we were done with dinner. We figured we would ride for a few more miles and find a place to camp. The only problem was that since we got into the state, there was a fence off the side of the road about 50 feet, which would make it so we couldn't get very far away from the road. There were no trees or anything, so there wasn't a way to really hide ourselves. However, as we were riding, we saw a sign that said "rest area." From where we were, the rest area had a huge building along with a whole bunch of little shelters and picnic tables. When we got there, we found out that the rest area was closed. It looked brand new and probably wasn't finished yet. There were barricades blocking the driveway, but we could easily go around them with our bikes. We tossed and turned around the idea of camping behind the building, but since that would be the only place to "hide" we decided to go for it-especially since no cars would be coming in because of the barricades. We rode around the barricades and around the back of the building, which we found out was a huge bathroom house. There wasn't any water on yet, and everything was indeed brand new. We tucked ourselves away in the corner behind the building and felt like we would be nice and safe there. Although we would be camping on rocks, we figured we would be ok since we have our sleeping pads. There were also some great picnic tables close by along with security lights around the building. It was nice not to be sitting there in the dark. We're getting excited because we only have a couple more days to get to Las Vegas! Our miles totaled 62.16 today.
We were up and moving by around 6:15am this morning. As we were packing up, I noticed a rainbow in the sky, something not all that common in the desert. That started my day off great, just seeing the rainbow. We enjoyed the cereal and milk Joey picked up from the store yesterday while saying goodbye to the chief and the two fireman since it was shift change at 7am. We hit the road about 7:30 and continued to enjoy the flat-downhillish ride that we had at the end of yesterday's ride. That took us right out of town. Just as we were making our turn to head towards Amboy, we saw Gary again. He was right at the corner of the road fixing a flat. It's pretty funny because he was just saying yesterday how he hadn't had a flat in such a long time- he must have jinxed himself on that one. The rainbow was still out for the first part of our ride as we continued on down the amazing flat road. Like yesterday afternoon, the miles really flew by. The only part that wasn't as good was that it was really cold this morning. I had my "skinny" gloves on and wanted to stop to put my pants on too, but instead kept riding and waiting for it to warm up. It would have been much more pleasant if I had just stopped and put them on because it seemed like it never would warm up. It took about an hour and a half for me to feel comfortable. After an amazing downhill of about 20 miles, we started to climb and did so for about 6-7 miles. It wasn't as hard of a climb as a lot of the ones we've done lately where we can only go 3-4 mph. This one we could at least go between 5 and 7 mph as it was more long and gradual. Once we were over the pass we saw such a spectacular view. There were mountains way off in the distance in each direction and in the middle was a section of the Mojave Dessert. You could see forever, it was unbelievable. The road stretched out so far that you couldn't even see the end of it; it just got lost in the distance. More wonderful downhill- we rode down for about 6 miles at a very comfortable coasting speed of 18-20 mph, without having to even pedal. It was so great to be able to just sit back and take in the surroundings. It was a little overwhelming to sit there and look around at the vast empty space around you. I went a little picture crazy because it was just so pretty. Eventually the gradual downhill turned into just a flat road. At one point, a guy in a pickup truck decided it would be a good time to pass, when I was right there. He pretty much tried to run me off the road. I don't know whether or not he would have actually hit me, but I do know that I was glad I was paying attention and saw him coming. I stopped riding right away and pushed my bike into the sand. Either way, he was way closer (and going much faster) than I ever care to have a vehicle coming at me on a road that doesn't have a shoulder. Now normally I wouldn't have gotten upset that he wanted to pass, but this is such a flat, straight road, with not a whole lot of traffic- he could have passed at any time- he didn't have to do it when he was so close to me. On top of that, the guy was very immature. I gave him a look of disapproval and in return he made a very inappropriate gesture. It's these kind of people that make me nervous to be on the roads- on a bike or in a car- those people that just don't care. As upset as I was, I got over the issue pretty quick because once I started riding again, I got in the groove of riding on the super long, flat road, and lost in my surroundings again. I just couldn't believe that we could see so far. The road looked like it just disappeared. Yesterday when we were having dinner with the fireman, the chief told us how we would pass the fields where they 'harvested' sodium chloride/ calcium chloride. He explained how they flood the fields and in doing so all the minerals float to the top. When the water dries, they scrape the top layer to get the chloride. Sure enough, the last 8-10 miles before we reached the "town" of Amboy, we were surrounded by these fields. We were also very close to a Marine base and we could hear them doing target practice. I had my headphones on to try to make the time go faster (although the roads were flat, it felt like we weren't getting anywhere very fast because we were in the middle of such a vast empty area). At some point as we were riding near the base, I heard a loud boom over my music (which is never very loud anyways). It startled me pretty good and made me jump as a result of it. When I looked back I could see a cloud of smoke over near one of the mountains where they had set off some kind of explosive. Also as we were riding the long stretch of road to Amboy, we saw the Amboy Crater off in the distance. We kept riding and riding and it didn't seem like we were ever going to pass it. Eventually, 10 miles later, we finally did pass it when we finally got to the junction of old Route 66. A mile or so down 66 from where we turned was the little "town" of Amboy. At one time, when 66 was in it's prime, this little town was one that got a lot of business. By the time we got there, we were really hungry, but were glad that we held off having lunch so that there would be a bench or some kind of table to eat on. Although the flat miles felt like they took forever to get anywhere on because of the roads going on forever, we actually covered a lot of miles in a pretty short time. Before we stopped for lunch around noon, we had already done 51 miles. We ate our lunch at the little benches outside the old cafe/hotel/gas station that was there in town. The fireman told us that that place has appeared in a number of movies, which is kind of neat. Before leaving town, we saw a semi that was transporting vehicles that said "North Tonawanda, NY" on the door. It was from SO close to home!! We stopped and talked to the guy, but he wasn't in a very good mood. Either way, it made us pretty excited to see that. Before leaving the tiny town, we stopped at the tiny post office to see if it was open, but it was closed. It's business hours read 9am-1pm, but they weren't open even though they were supposed to be. It is a long story, but a couple days ago-the day we had all of the wind, we found a cell phone on the ground. It still kind of worked, except for the screen. We tried to figure out a way to call someone to figure out who's phone it was, but with the strong wind, we knew we had to keep riding or we would never make it where we wanted to go. So, we just put it in our handle bar bag and figured we would figure it out later. Anyway, time passed and we forgot about it until yesterday. As we were setting up our tent at the fire station, we heard a phone ringing- it was the cell phone. We answered it and explained how we had found it. The lady on the other end gave us an address to send it to, so once we get somewhere with a post office that is open, we will mail it to her- we found the owner- mission accomplished. After lunch, we continued down another incredibly long road, but were excited to be on Old Route 66. Unfortunately the road had a bit more traffic that the road we turned off of, but it wasn't too bad. When we came to the road that turned to go into the Mojave Dessert Preserve, we tossed and turned over the idea of going through the preserve or staying on Rt.66. We had some great suggestions from William to go through the preserve because of how pretty it was. But at the same time, we knew we had an extra 4,000+ climbing to do if we went that way. On top of that as we were sitting at the intersection, 90% of the cars went that way. We originally planned on riding on 66 for as long as we could and we knew the pass with the narrow road wouldn't be very fun with all the cars. In the end we decided to stay on Old 66. We continued on down the road and got to see some old abandoned restaurants and gas stations that would be left from when the road was booming back in the 50s. Eventually we climbed another long hill. When we got to the top we saw the sun setting behind us and the next valley ahead of us- this one seemed even bigger than the last one. It is truly amazing how far you can see-probably for 30-40 miles. Each valley seems to get bigger and bigger with every set of mountains we go over. We enjoyed the downhill and then, since it was already dark, found a spot to camp on side of road. After the tent was set up, and I was making some mac and cheese in the dark, I somehow managed to dump the pan off the stove. We lost some of the noodles, but not so much that we wouldn't have enough for dinner. It's definitely a pain to cook in the dark on a little stove, but I'm just glad this is the first time in 8 months that I've spilled any dinner like that. After we ate, we talked on the phone for quite a while. We are out there in the middle of the desert with nothing around for miles and we have cell reception- we couldn't believe it! The one great thing about being out there in the middle of no where is that the view of the stars is just amazing- I don't know if I've ever seen that many at one time before. I bet it's even better in Alaska when it's dark up there- especially with the Northern Lights (too bad we didn't get to see that....). Although it didn't feel like we rode as many miles as we did, they totaled 73.09 in the end, most of which were in the valley we crossed into after the first hill today.
The last couple days we've been doing pretty good about getting up nice and early so we can get a good start since the days are so short now. It helps quite a bit that we end up going to sleep around 7:30-8:30 almost every night since it is dark and there isn't much else to do. We had some oatmeal, a can of peaches each and an orange each for breakfast. I was in a way dreading the ride today because I knew we had a lot of climbing ahead of us and from what it looked like, we would be climbing all day. We continued on the same road with the same gradual climb to start off. Eventually the road we were on met up with a busier 4 lane road. Joe was waiting for me at the corner and said that while he was standing there, someone offered us a ride up the hill. He turned the offer down because there wasn't any real reason we shouldn't ride up it. But in any case, that made me a little worried because if someone in a car thinks its a tough hill, then it's got to be even worse for us cyclists (a whole lot of people in cars don't notice how steep or long a hill is because it doesn't take them any effort to get up it- in fact sometimes when it is a gradual climb, they don't even realize they are going up). Now I was a bit intimidated by the thought of climbing that hill. But, the road had a fairly big shoulder, so that made things a little better. The climbing really began. Joe rode behind me for a little while but eventually went ahead and waited for me at the top of the hill. Surprisingly, it wasn't nearly as bad as I had made it out to be in my head. It was steep and long, but nothing harder than we've done in the last few days. After a little downhill, we made it to Morango Valley, the town we were hoping to make it to last night. It definitely wouldn't have been fun to try to ride that in the dark- and we found out that it wasn't really worth it after seeing the town anyway. In any sense, we arrived there a lot faster than we thought we would. We took a quick break at the gas station and then headed out of town. In doing so, we had another long climb. It took a while, but the good news is that we could see the top, so we knew we would be there eventually- there was no guessing as there is when the road is curvy and windy. A couple times, I turned around and looked behind me as I was going up. The view was really neat. You could see the road going through the valley and vanishing off in the distance. Once we ere over the top, we didn't have too far to go until we were in the next town of Yucca Valley (where our host would have been for last night had we made it that far- another 18 miles from where we camped). The town was so huge in comparison to what we were anticipating. We were both expecting to be riding through these tiny little towns with nothing in them. Even the Palm Dessert-Palm City valley had a ton more than we ever expected. We couldn't believe there were so many big towns just since we crossed over the hill yesterday. We made a stop at the visitor center to check on some information for Joshua Tree National Park before heading down the road to find somewhere to get internet and or have lunch. We were so happy to see a Vons again, and decided to go there to eat. The store had a table and chairs right out front, so it was perfect. We made our sub sandwiches and relaxed for a little bit. While we were there, we met poor guy that needed to charge his electric wheelchair for a little bit. He asked if he could sit with us for a while and we didn't see why not. It was really sad because after talking to him we learned that he was in an automobile accident a while ago and had been in a coma/incapacitated for about a year after. He told us about how he had lost his business and had to file for bankruptcy because of the hospital bills. Even still, he was in pretty good spirits overall. It does make you think though, and re-realize that you really do never know when something could happen that completely changes your life for ever. There was a Little Ceasers Pizza place on the corner of the plaza that Vons was in. Somehow we decided to get a $5 hot and ready pizza. We each ate a couple slices to fill us up the rest of the way (we only had 1/4 size sandwiches today). Before leaving, I really stocked up on food for the next 4 days because this time we were almost positive there wouldn't be any big stores, or much of anything until we got really close to Vegas. We were pretty sure though, that we would be ok on water. We have so many water bottles that it shouldn't be a problem- and there should be one or two places to fill up between when we leave tomorrow and when we get to Vegas. Once we started riding again, the road turned and the wind was with us. We had a very straight, flat/downhillish section for quite a while. The miles were flying by. We took a little time to check out Joshua Tree for a little bit when we went to what is known as Indian Cove. It was a bit of a climb up to the entrance of the park, but it wasn't that bad. Although we didn't do a whole lot of exploring and didn't ride through the park itself, we were ok with that. I couldn't believe how the last 20 miles of the ride just flew right by. The flat and down hill ride continued most of the way into town. We were in Twentynine Palms. Again, it was bigger than we anticipated. There were big name hotels, lots of chain restaurants, and even an Applebees. We went to the library for a little while since it was still early in the day. When we pulled up, we saw a bike that was loaded up with homemade panniers and had a frame that was full of stickers of where the guy had been. Inside, we met Gary, who we found out is originally from Sodus, NY (the next town over from where Joey grew up!) It's so amazing how small this world is! We talked to him for quite a while an found out that for the past 20 years, he has been taking a lot of little bike trips all over. Right now he was in the process of riding from somewhere in Southern California to somewhere in Arizona. He also showed us a bite that he had on his arm from what he was pretty sure was a black widow spider. His arm was so swollen and the bite was enormous and was oozing stuff. It was amazing that a little tiny spider could do something like that. Gary also said that he was planning on staying in the 29 Palms area for a few days because he is having some stomach problems lately, probably as a result of that bite he has. Seeing that bite of his really worries me, but at the same time, we looked it up and those kinds of spiders are all over the place and we haven't had any troubles yet, so we just have to be careful. After getting a little work done on the computers, we rode to the fire station. We did just as Craig said to do and sure enough, they said we could set up our tent out back. The chief turned off the sprinklers so that wouldn't be a problem and we pushed our bikes through one of the bay doors through to the back yard. It was a nice fenced in yard with a small little patch of grass- it was perfect. We set up our tent and ate the last couple pieces of our pizza from lunch. We were still hungry of course and thought about getting another pizza so we didn't have to cook. We were surprised to see a Little Caesars in town when we were on our way to the library. As we were unpacking, the fireman offered for us to take a shower if we wanted, of course we did!!! It was so great to be nice and clean- that is one thing I miss when we are at home- having a hot shower everyday. But I've gotten used to having one every few days so it's not so bad. We also got a chance to charge what needed to be charged and enjoyed relaxing in comfy chairs watching a big flat screen tv. Two of the guys made dinner and ended up making so much that there was plenty for us too, so they invited us to eat with them. We had really great burritos with lettuce, sour cream and guacamole, cheese quesadillas, rice, and red fruit punch. It was such a great treat. We had fun talking with the 2 fireman and the captain during dinner. For a couple hours after dinner we relaxed and watched some tv. Its crazy to see all of the commercials for Thanksgiving and Christmas already- I can't believe how fast the time has gone. We went to bed at 10, which isvery late for us lately. It was an awesome day and much easier than i thought it would be- very happy about that! We rode 42.89 miles today.
We woke up around 6:30 this morning and felt very refreshed after sleeping in a bed last night. Thanks to our hosts, we got to enjoy some cereal with milk and dried fruit for breakfast. Afterwards, William shared a few photos from their little tour while they were in Japan. It was interesting to get a little glimpse of what it is like over there. When we finally got all packed up and said our goodbyes, we rode down the dirt road from their house and back out to the main road. Both of us were very happy to find that the wind wasn't too bad today. It was still against us, but was no where near as strong as yesterday. About 2-3 miles into the ride we rode through the little town of Anza. A few miles outside of town we started to climb. The climb was much like the other ones we have done in the last couple days, long and pretty steep. We watched the elevation signs again today as we went up. Yesterday we started at an elevation somewhere near 1,390 feet and ended up at an elevation of about 4,200 at their house. For the first few miles of today's ride we started by going down for a little bit. With the climbing we weren't positive what elevation we would get to, but according to William, would get up to an elevation of somewhere near 5,200 ft. Unfortunately the elevation signs stopped when we went into the San Bernadino National Forest, so we weren't sure if we actually got that high or not. We had a pretty short little downhill before we made a turn onto a new road. From there we had a little more uphill and then finally had a pretty good downhill through an area that was full of these weird little bushes. Eventually we were doing what else but climbing again. It wasn't quite as steep, so it wasn't so bad, but it was still slow going. The views were so pretty, we could see so many mountains in the distance. They were very deserty looking mountains. I guess this is more exciting for me because I've never seen any of this before, so the desert is definitely a really neat thing. The road hugged the mountains pretty close at one point and when you looked up there were huge rocks and boulders as far up the hill as you could see. The highlight of the day came when we were on our way down-on a 10 mile downhill that is. As we looked down from the side of the mountain we were on, we saw the most amazing road ever laying ahead of us. It zig-zagged all over the place; it looked like the road was a piece of string curving down the side of the mountain. There were so many switchbacks, that wound really close to each other. It was pretty amazing. The descent was really fun, too. It was not too fast, not too slow, and had nice wide turns. We came down from around 5,000 feet all the way down to 224 feet. After that long descent, we were in the city of Palm Desert. On the way in we got pretty excited because we saw a few big cactus. Because there were trees and a little bit of greenery I felt like the air wasn't so dry and my nose started to feel a little better. We rode through the cute little shopping area that had a whole bunch of fancy expensive stores, and actually kind of reminded me of Rodeo Ave. in Beverly Hills. We made a quick stop at the visitor center and found out there was a nice park not too far away. The park was awesome. There was green grass- thanks to the insane amount of sprinklers, and even a pond with little waterfall and a ton of ducks and geese to watch. Joey and I made some pasta and spaghetti sauce for lunch and enjoyed the shade for a while. The rest of today's ride was flat or only had a slight grade. As we were going between Palm Dessert and Palm City we could see some really nice houses on the hill. William told us that some of those houses were homes of some of the stars. There were also street names like Frank Sinatra and Gene Autry. Although we had a place lined up to stay for tonight, it ended up being way too far away, not to mention there would be a significant amount of climbing too. Craig, the person's house we were going to stay at was ok with the fact we wouldn't make it, but provided a possible way to help us anyways. If it worked out distance wise for tomorrow night, he told us to stop by the fire hall in the town of Twentynine Palms and mention his name. He told us that there was a good chance they would let us set our tent up in the back yard! On the way out of town, we stopped at Vons to restock a bit on food. Once we got out of the busy area we were riding on roads that were really straight and flat, so much so that we could see for miles down the road. When we left the store, we made it a goal to try to make it to Morango Valley tonight. Somehow we missed the turn for the road we were on, but it ended up being ok since we were on a less busy road in the end. It probably took us less than a mile out of the way going the way we went. The roads are so straight that it didn't really matter. In doing so, we came withing 3-4 miles of the city known as Desert Hot Springs and also passed through the tiny area of North Palm City. As we kept riding and riding, but not feeling like we were getting anywhere, we realized we might not make it to where we wanted to. Then, as the sun was going down and we could see the mountains we knew that where the road would cut through was still pretty far away, we really knew we wouldn't make it there. There was a whole fleet of windmills in one section that we could see off in the distance for quite a while. Eventually we ended up riding right next to them. The last few miles were a very gradual climb, but we could still tell we were climbing. Although we turned our lights on, and there wasn't a whole lot of traffic, we found a spot to camp on the side of the road once it was too dark. The road had no shoulder and a lot of the cars showed that they saw us but still didn't give us much room. It wasn't worth fighting with them when we could just call it a day. We made a frozen veggie, chicken and three cheese pasta dinner that I picked up at the store when we were there since they were on sale. I love these dinners- they don't use a whole lot of water and they are pretty quick to cook and clean up. After that, we hit the sack pretty early again. It was pretty nice camping in the deserty area. The sand wasn't like we had pictured- we pictured beach like sand, but it was kind of neat even still. We were surrounded by the little desert bushes and could see the lights from the windmills blinking and all of the lights from the little cities in the valley off in the distance. Our miles totaled 60.42 today.
|
|