So I made it to Santa Barbara! I got my old bike in Roswell and was smooth sailing from there...well mostly. I will just regail you all with the highlights of the last few weeks of my trip. I appologize for the extended hiatus but due to various circumstances it was just too hard to blog durring the home strech.
So I got my bike back and started biking out of Roswell. New Mexico turned out to be the far and away favorite state of most everyone. It had beautiful mountains with rewarding rides and climbs. We crossed over the continental devide while in New Mexico (Pie Town). We had a 14 mile decent where we practically didn't have to pedal at all but we could maintain 30 miles an hour, it was awesome. I reached my top speed for the trip in New Mexico at 54.2 MPH which was wicked. New Mexico was filled with big beatiful climbs and descents into huge valleys surrounded by awesome mountains. The temperature was great and it was some very rewarding riding. We left New Mexico to enter in the less awesome state of Arizona.
Some of the highlights of Arizona include desert riding, 11 flats on the way into Winslow, Arizona, 35-40 MPH headwinds into Flagstaff, the grand canyon, which was awesome, and Parker, AZ/Colorado River which was awesome. The 11 flats in one day was brutal. It was a combination of biking on I-40 that had these tiny metal shards from Semi's and running out of tubes so I had to patch, which were faulty about 50% of the time. It made it into a nearly 12 hour day which was awful. The grand canyon was breathtaking and everything I could have wanted it to be and more. It is so hard to describe....go there if you haven't been! Lastly Parker...we camped at Parker which was the day before a 120 mile day...It was a cool stop and we all spent all day at this floating bar hanging out and swimming. We got in super early, because we had a really easy ride the day before. We then all had to sleep in 90 degree heat or try, and get up at 2:30 to tackle our longest day of the trip, 119 miles through the Mojave into California. The desert is not flat, in case any of you were unclear. It was a challenging day, but we all made it through. We then had a 90 mile the following day followed by a 60 miler, but then we were really on the home strech with only 3 short days until Santa Barbara!
So here I am now, in Oregon after spending a few days in Santa Barbara, then went to San Francisco for a day. I am enjoying the relaxation but I honestly miss all my fellow riders and miss the long rides...I didnt know how I would feel after the trip was over but I definately miss it. Thank you to all my suporters and I made it!!!
Cheers!
