March 9, 2018

The big event of the day was finally leaving California and crossing the Colorado River into Arizona. We had to walk our bikes across a foot bridge and then get onto Interstate 10 for the first of two times this day. Every day I seem to find something abandoned along the roadside. Two days ago it was a fully functional flashlight and yesterday it was a nearly new hose nozzel. Today I claimed a nearly new bungee cord but the find of the day went to Cammie, one of our tour leaders who found a flower display and an unopened six pack of work gloves.

Compared to yesterday, today was an easy 62 mile ride. Once again we had to use the Interstate due to the lack of an alternate route. The nice part about this is that they really smooth out the hills on the Interstate. Along the way I took a picture of the husband and wife team that are part of our group. Bill and Barb Samose are a great couple and it has been a pleasure to bike with them so far.

Once off Interstate 10 we hit the town of Quartzsite where I spent some interesting time in a rock and mineral shop and had an interesting conversation with another heart attack survivor from San Diego who now lives in Quartzsite. We were told there was an interesting place here called the Reader’s Oasis that featured Phil, a naked piano player. A few of us check this out but since I have already seen a naked piano player I decided to visit the Dorothy and Todo Ice Cream Shop instead. They had a $4.00 malted milkshake that was fantastic! Also nearby was the Desert Garden RV Sales and Park and home to a great collection of vintage cars and other machinery. The most unique of these was a Lear Jet strapped to the top of a truck.

The time zone change caught up to us so even with an easy ride we were fairly late into the KOA for the night; however, the bonus was that we had an extra hour of daylight. Tomorrow is is on to Wickenburg, AZ home of the Wickenburg massacre. The ride will be a fairly boring one down a long straight stretch of highway with lots of desert for company. I may not post anything but we shall see.

March 13, 2018

There is nothing like 84 miles of riding with 9000 feet of hills to climb to make you realize just how tough this group has become. Add to this a complete lack of so much as a pop machine for over 50 of those miles and we are a hard core group of bicyclists.

Our day started early in Mesa with nearly everyone up and gone by 6:20 am. After snaking our way through the outskirts of the metro area, it was on to Usery Pass and our first climb of the day. It was only a small taste of things to come.

The scenery was fantastic being some of the best vistas so far. It almost made up for the body breaking climbs that we made to pay for them.

The high point of my day, literally, came at around 40 miles in. While it was the highest climb of the day; unfortunately, it was not the last. After one more serious climb and a number of lesser ones, we came out of the wilderness and onto the oasis known as Jake’s Corner. After 50 plus dry miles it was nice to be able to bolt down a cold drink or two…or three. From there it was on to Tonto Basin and a well earned night’s sleep.

March 19, 2018

Today we had a choice of three different routes of various distances and difficulty. The most difficult was a 90 miler that ended with the Gila Cliff Dwellings; The easiest a 25 miler direct shot to our next campground. In between was a 50 mile journey to Robert’s Lake. All ended up at the same place. While my mind wanted to do the 50 miler, my heart (quite literally) recommended the more direct route. Along the way I met Karl the Magnificent.

Karl was a cross country rider that my travelling companions, Annette, Jim and I met along the way. He was headed in the opposite direction towards San Diego. He was from Sweden and doing a self supported ride by himself. What made him magnificent in my eyes was that he had started his journey in Key West, Florida a brief 3 week ago! His average ride was around 130 miles a day with his longest day chewing up a glorious 160 miles! He expected to reach the Pacific within a week or less. Just when my travelling companions and I were beginning to think we were made of steel, along came Karl to show us what real steel looks like. Ah, to be young again.

Another feature of the shorter route was a view of the giant Santa Rita pit mine. Here they were creating an artificial tunnel across the highway to allow them to link up operations on both sides of the road without having to cross traffic. The mine is immense and claims to be the oldest operating pit mine in the USA. Just the tires on their ore haulers dwarfed our bicycles.

There is also an interesting history of a mining strike at the nearby Empire Zinc Mine back in 1951. After many months of the strike a court issued an injunction against the miners picketing the site. However, that injunction did not apply to the Ladies Auxiliary of Mine Worker’s Local 890. Withstanding threats of violence and other hardships, these women persevered and brought the mine owners to the table to negotiate a successful agreement.

It did not take very long to cover the short distance today so the six of us who took that route had time to relax and wait for the ACA van carrying our tents and street clothing. During that wait the step-mom of one of out leaders paid us her third visit of the trip bringing us gifts of beer, tortillas, wine and other goodies. I would like to say that we kept the beer cold and waited for our fellow riders on the longer route to get in before cracking open a cold one. Yes, I would like to be able to say that.

We had one rider who opted to follow the 90 mile route to the Gila Cliff Dwellings. He got an early start leaving before sunrise. Kevin is the real adventurer of our group and decided to make his trip alone when no one else felt like making this epic trek up and down the numerous, steep climbs to this national park. Unfortunately he ran low on battery power having used his headlight as a safety beacon on the long winding road to the dwellings. A few of us rode along with tour leader Kelly to backtrack his route to make sure he was O.K. We met him coming uphill from the park where he had spent a little too much time enjoying the cliff dwellings and he feared he would be travelling light-less in the dark well before reaching the campsite. He accepted our offer of a ride back to camp in the ACA van having accomplished the most epic ride so far in our trip.