The Arizona Desert

So we're well past the Rockies and right in the middle of Arizona now. Our first day in AZ was also our first day in New Mexico & Utah, (The famous 4 corners). We had lunch there and took some pictures in four states at once.


So far the highlight of the desert for me, and possibly the whole trip was going to see Monument Valley. Anyone who doesn't know what it is has definitely seen it, it has appeared in tons of movies including National Lampoons Vacation, Thelma & Louise, Mission Impossible 3, & our favorite, it is where Forrest Gump turns around and stops running across the country. We saw it by tour bus during our day in Kayenta. There was a route we could have taken to ride past it while going from Teec Nos Pos to Kayenta, but it would have been 100 miles instead of 57. A lot of people wanted to take on the extra miles and we debated for a while but eventually decided it was better to not add that many miles on a hot desert day. It worked out pretty well because we wouldn't have seen nearly as much of it as we did riding our bikes on the highway. The tour bus took us through all the dirt roads that go through the park that we wouldn't have dared take our road bikes on. I added tons of pictures to the web page so check them out.

The other obvious recent highlight was the Grand Canyon. My parents have brought me there before so I wasn't quite as excited as some of the other riders, but it had been a long time and it was really rewarding to bike there. The day was actually a total logistical nightmare for me. This past week has been the second of my weeks to organize, and the Grand Canyon day sort of fell apart. We were suppose to camp out in Desert View, a 1st come 1st serve campsite on the East side of the South Rim. Scott was driving the van in the morning and we sent him directly there to get us a few sites, only to find out that they don't allow large groups to camp there under any circumstances. They only allow 4 people & 2 tents per site. To make matters worse the Main South Rim village campsite was full. The next available camp site was 30 miles past Desert View, and about 8 miles outside of the park. The one bit of serenity I found was when I stumbled across the coolest bike path ever paved. I was riding by myself trying to get ahead of everyone so I could sort things out at the new campsite, and I noticed a bike path that went away from the road and closer to the edge of the canyon. I decided to take it and was glad it did, the path had tons of tight turns through the forest and spent about half of the time hugging the rim of the Canyon. It only went for about 3 miles but I couldn't wipe the smile off my face the whole time, a nice break from what was otherwise a really stressful day.

Even though we added 30 miles to that days ride, it wasn't the end of the world because they were all along the road we would have taken the next day anyways, making the ride to Williams that much shorter. I lucked out and everyone rolled with the new plan really well. It actually worked out really well, even though it started raining as we were setting up out tents, and didn't quit raining all night. It made for a very interesting evening, but with the next days ride now being 30 miles shorter, we had a nice relaxing morning before heading off to Williams.

Williams is a fun town, although I really didn't get to do much as I fell behind on my leader responsibilities since my week is coming to an end and we hadn't had Internet for a few days. The 2 pages of notes I needed to write regarding the Grand Canyon day for next years leaders didn't help anything either.

Tomorrow we're off to Prescott for our last build day. Dan and some other riders have planned a scavenger hunt type competition for tomorrow. We've been divided into 3 teams, and will get points for completing certain objectives, finishing the day faster than other groups, and there is a "lunch time bananza" that will include some types of games. There are also some supposed bonus point available, all will be revealed tomorrow.

Anyway, I talked to my parents earlier today, they hosted the Northern US group earlier for dinner as they pass through Janesville. It sounded like quite the event, there were something like 60 people at their house for dinner. They said that they really had a good time meeting everyone. I'm glad that they got a good Bike & Build experience before meeting myself and the rest of us in San Diego, they've said that they're looking forward to meeting everyone even more now. My mom sent a bunch of pictures to my phone, but it died yesterday so I haven't seen any yet. Hopefully I can get it replaced in Prescott.