Day 7 Up to Bryce Canyon

Out of Cedar City, and by the way just so you all know we ride city limits to city limits – OK. Also we now had Charlie White with us who had flown in on Saturday night from Chicago. He’s a friend of Jacks and is here with us as back up and a good photographer with a camera that takes panoramic pics!! Wow, watch out for his pics. Decent road out for Cedar City, but then into Cedar Pass. Tough going, but as per usual every 5 miles there is the van, our saviour. Great views and a river by the side of the road which was in full flow, definitely because of the late snow. Don’t think the rivers would have had as much water in them if it were not for this. Water drains of the sides of the passes, and it’s really clear, meanwhile the river, dark brown, is carrying loads of sediment.
Felipe is preoccupied by the NBA match tonight, he’s a Miami fan, sad really! But with the new bike man he’s out there ahead of the pack following up at the back is BP as usual. Jack and Andriy are swapping each 10 miles and this is working well for them. Raymond is not feeling well so is taking a break in the morning in the hope that he can get back on and ride later. Charlie loves the views and is just taking pics and encouraging us all. Angel is now good to go after yesterday, when a little too much sun got to him. Although he does try to put his helmet on back to front!
Raymond is back in the saddle and feels much better. We are up on a beautiful plateau, with the canyons way in the background, and it’s an easy ride. But we are up in the snow so it’s cold. We pass what looks like volcanic rocks with snow covering. Pretty spooky. Then a flat upland with a flood plain but again views to die for. We literally stumble into Duck Creek a small town on the edge of a flooded meadow. Most houses and shops are built of wood, so it’s lunch break. I get a text from Suzie Pierrepont which says keep on pedaling – what’s new Suzie and what the hell do you think we are doing!
We are now on Route 89 and headed towards Bryce Canyon which apparently is spectacular. Lots of biking, but now we turn right at Byway12 – Utah’s first All American Road. Man and there’s Red Canyon the first of the canyons, still 17 miles from Bryce Canyon. Lots of tourists and we get one to take a group pic, and then another tourist takes a shot of us all from his camera. Where upon Felipe gets incredibly worried about this stranger taking his pic!!??
On we go and there is a terrific bike route by the side of the road so we are all on this. Jack is looking out for snakes, as he seems to think that they are after him and him only! Our Camp site, Bryce Canyon Pines, is up on the right and we bike in. Relief, sore butts, that don’t seem to get any better, tired legs, but a great days riding. I get a pic with a couple of Harley Davidson bikers and think that maybe I’d just take the Harley and ride back! I thought that we would not have internet or any conveniences, but there is internet and a TV. We see the last of the NBA final, and poor Felipe is devastated by the result, a win for Dallas and the series. Will he be able to ride on, even after our rest day?
Pitch the tent make a fire and sit and chat and remember what we have done today. Tomorrow is a rest day and we plan on visiting Bryce Canyon, although there is so much to see there.

DAY 6

We drive into Milford to start our ride, we are not going to ride the extra 12 miles from Beaver!! No way. Definitely more lakes and rivers. In fact most of the rivers are running high, I guess with the late snow that is still on the mountain tops. It’s Felipe’s turn this time and the chain comes off while he is riding THE bike. Ray is on hand to see that everything works and with some handy mechanics Felipe is on the go again. We are in High Plains territory, or so it seems. I can imagine Clint Eastwood riding (sorry) into the small town up here and helping the towns folk against the bad guys. Certainly reminded me of some of his films. We are headed to Cedar City, and although the roads are not steep, they are very long, and even going downhill the wind is into our faces, so it’s a hard ride.
Cedar City is an old mining town, but it seems to be a busy place and they do call it the Festival City. Sure enough in the first park that we come to there is a group playing – sounds like rock and roll.

KOA is another great site, but no electric cooker and the wind is really bad, so much so that we cann’t get the water to boil. No comments please, just not doing it. Peanut butter sandwiches, granola bars are the order of the meal. We also decide to trade Felipes bike and so to Trail Cycles, we get a decent deal and Felipe now has a road bike which will make him even faster still. The question is will I be able to keep up?
Tomorrow we ride to Bryce Canyon, and there is absolutely no internet there, we will be camping in the wilderness, so sorry all but no report for you, plus Monday is a rest day, so you will all have to wait until Tuesday for the next report. Have fun all as I’m sure that we will.

Day 5 Lovely Route 50 - get your kicks on Route 50!! Then we leave it!

Well we made it to Day 5 which some people predicted that we wouldn’t. Go Team. Climbs and valleys- and this is some of the most beautiful scenery that you could wish to see. It just goes on and on. Our system of the van going 10 miles and we ride to it changed to 5 miles which was a good move. Was just more encouraging, and really did make for better riding. It’s amazing just how we depend on water, water and more water. You really need to drink loads, and as they say a little often is best. Raymond was the man today, he’s like a machine and just rides on with Jack the lad encouraging either Felipe or Angel – who he has now named Rafa after Nadal. Angel does look a little like him.
Nevada seems to be a very dry State, and once we hit the Utah border it was quite strange just how many more lakes and rivers there are. Pictures at the State line, is always a must, plus we gain an hour, then on we go. The scenery is more lush, but only just, and we wave to cowboys and cowgirls rounding up their herd. A terrific site and they and we appreciated the wave to each other. Another site was an entrance to a Ranch which had an arch made entirely of antlers probably from deer or buck, an awesome site but one wonders just how many animals were killed to make this.
But on we ride passes and valleys – one moral of this ride would be that “to go down you first have to go up” and boy did we know that. Rafa’s chain came off at one of the summits, just as he was about to pelt down and get up some speed. Too bad, we thought, but Jack came back in the back up van and fixed the problem and Rafa was off down the pass. Most of the passes are around the 6000+ feet mark and although we don’t do all that altitude they are all tough climbs. So seem to go on forever, and I’m pleased that we all give each other encouragement to keep gritting our teeth and make it to the summit.
Finally we leave our beloved Route 50!!! On to route 21 and on into Milford, our overnight stop. We realized that once in Milford our camp site was actually about 12 miles away in Beaver, so of in the van on this one. Good site with pretty good amenities, an electric cooker was terrific and Andriy cooked chicken, BP had some omelet, so really good food, then tent up and then to bed – yippee.

Day 4 Still loving Route 50!!

Getting tired of saying that we are up early (care of Jack O ‘Brien), packing all the equipment, and on the road. Out of Austin on Route 50 headed East, and into Eureka making good pace and using our 10 mile system, with a 5 minute break. We carried water with us so were good there. Eureka is an old mining town, really quaint, not very big – sneeze and you’ll miss it!. But it does have a Opera House, much to our surprise! Not a lot open at the time that we passed through other than a great deli. Downed some food and on our way. Dropped down into Smokey Valley and a long stretch of flat oh and boring scenery,, then a tough climb up to Pinto Pass 7376 feet high! Another great ride down into a valley and then up to Pancake Pass 6359 feet, hey another great drop down. Jack’s Pass was next, followed by Petite Lawrence, and then the long haul up before dropping down into Eli. No real mishaps, sadly, although Jack was sick and drove all day which gave Andriy the chance to ride a full day. After which, surprisingly he said that his butt was sore – join the club mate. Met two bikers who are doing the West coast to S Carolina, and they were amazed at what we were doing – quite right. Eli is a great little town, and we are now camped at KOA just outside the town. So not too exciting a ride.
Angel and Felipe are in charge of cooking, well lighting the electric cooker! Angel took a while to work that one out! And ever ready Andriy is our chef again. It’s me cooking breakfast so watch out guys.
Lots of facebook entries from loads of friends and squashers. We really appreciate this and please keep them coming. Got any questions please e-mail or blogg us with comments. Cheers all. And good night.

BP

Day 3 Or how we learnt to love Route 50 – the loneliest Highway in the States

Woken up early by Commandeer Jack!! Everything down and packed and ready to go by 6am!!! Not nice! So out of Carson City and onto Route 50, our companion for much of this day. Not much talking at this point, just head down and ride. We took some side routes through Fallon and around the Naval Air training base, which is huge, and saw a dozen planes take off. Once round the base we were back onto Route 50 and headed towards Austin. Pretty flat at this point, so a good pace. On the bikes were, me, (BP), Jack, Felipe and Raymond, with Andriy driving and Angel the co-driver. Man this was a boring part of the Ride flat – which I like, but the scenery becoming more and more desert like with just scrub and sand and the occasional horse. The backdrop were mountains which were kind of foreboding as we were never sure if we would have to ride over them. We didn’t but we were now being treated to long inclines, which were tough. Our first bike problem, Felipe lost the front nut that keeps the wheel intact, and although we went back to look for this, but unsuccessful. So his bike was out of action and Angel took over on his bike. At this point I have to say that both CitySquashers are riding Mountain bike and putting us all to shame, man they can ride.
Andriy set up his camcorder on the front of my bike, he showed me the start stop button and we were on our way. We were now ascending and coming into higher passes, the riding up was tough but man the riding down was terrific especially from two passes - Mt. Airy which is 6679 feet high – what a descent, I think that Andriy, who was now on a bike with Jack driving, achieved 35 mph going down. At one of our frequent pitt stops, which were usually for no more than 5 minutes we saw the shoe tree! Yes a shoe tree with lots of shoes wrapped round the branches. Very unusual to say the least. At a gas stop which was in the middle of nowhere, a great bar and what looked like a café, with cowboys in their boots, cowboy hats, looking just like cowboys, We gassed up, and went on our way. At another stop we met Bruce who was the driver for another X America Ride. We had overtaken his 4 riders earlier. They are raising money form a Catholic Church in Russia in an area where Stalin had whipped out the entire Christian population. We gave Bruce one of our CitySquash X America Ts and were on our way. We had a terrific system going on with the van driving 10 miles and waiting for us to catch up. What was annoying was having Jack lounging in his folding chair, as we arrived, playing Regae music. Still this kept us going at a good pace.
One final long incline into Austin, that really was tough for me. Andriy eat it up and Raymond was kind enough to ride with me into Austin. We found our Camp site just East of Austin in the Tiomay Forest Park, and put up the tent, collected fire wood (Felipe and Angels job) and set about cooking pasta – and now to bed. Another long Ride tomorrow, starting on – yes you’ve guess it – Route 50 our favourite Route.
Right now my reflections on Nevada, so far is why do people live here?

Good Night
BP

Tough first day but we amde it to Placerville, food fent up and now sleep. 100 miles plus and the same tomorrow, but hillier terrain - ouch!! One hill to many today we all had to push our bikes up, but the Ride down was great.
All the guys did well especially Felipe and Angel the two CitySquash kids.Went through Sacramento, but I guess Arnie is no more.

Come on tomorrow and Carson City.

The night before...

This is it! We had about 2 days to check out the beautiful San Francisco. We Start biking at 6AM. Only a few hours away. It's getting exciting in here