Currently melting away here in Clay Center,KS (8pm, 95 degrees, humid for sure) as we wait for night to fall & the park to close so we can set up our tent…but I’ll save that for later.
Day 40: Breakfast with Bob at the restaurant again, this time his treat. Thanks, Bob! Packed up, said our goodbyes & parted ways. Quick pit stop at a gas station before leaving town. This building was built into the side of a rocky hill. You would’ve missed it if it weren’t for signs. It was kind of cool. We grabbed a few snacks & extra water since we had 55 miles ahead of us with zero services or even houses to fill up at. Total combined, we had 2.5 gallons of water, which turned out to be plenty. We try to (well I always do, but Ben tries to) sip something every 5 minutes & we only drank half of what we were carrying by the time we made it to our destination: Green River,UT.
The ride was hot but not too bad. No places for shade, unfortunately. We had the pretty San Rafael Reef to look at along the way. The route was slightly uphill but nothing too steep. The last stretch included 10 miles on I-70. Quiet, new pavement, nice & smooth, no debris to flatten our tires. Hooray! As we came over the last hill it looked like town was only 2 miles away again, but really it was 10. So weird!
Once in town, we picked up groceries, then grabbed fries & a beer before biking the last 2 miles to our motel. We dumped our gear & went swimming immediately. Aaahhh 🙂 After relaxing by the pool for a bit we went next door for dinner, at a place called Tamarisk. It was right on the river & they had pretty good food. I’d definitely recommend them if you’re passing through. Back to the motel for TV & planning. Contrary to previous plans, we decided to take the next day off to catch up on some things. Wahoo!
Day 41: I holed up in the motel most of the day, blogging. Ben found ways to stay busy: reading, TV, bike maintenance. It felt good to do nothing & catch up. We had leftovers for lunch, went swimming, more blogging, dinner at Tamarksk again, laundry, more blogging, & watched TV. We saw on the local news that Moab had a fire – where we were heading tomorrow. I hope everything’s OK. After a productive day, it was time for bed. Aaahhh 🙂
Day 42: Today is our 3rd wedding anniversary! We’ve been together almost 7 years, but married only 3. Ben made a scrambler for breakfast, then on the road by 8:30am. We took a frontage road for the first 10 miles…and the road sucked. It was an old highway that wasn’t maintained anymore. There were so many potholes & the surface was rough (almost like gravel but not quite). We were glad to make it through & get back on I-70 for the next 10 miles. The rest of the ride to Moab, on 191, was very busy & super hot- 105! On the way we stopped at a cafe for fries, ice cream, ice & water. The last 10 miles were great: downhill, on a nice bike path with a new sureface – so smooth, quiet, safe, & beautiful.
Once we rolled into town we checked into a campground & immediately went for a swim. The office had a sweet, sleepy, orange cat named Hammy that I fell in love with 🙂 A quick change of clothes, then off to zip-lining for 3 hours – so much fun! There were 6 different lines, all with great views. Two were 1/4 mile long each! The ride up the mountain, in an off-road jeep, was scarier than the zip-lining! It was still fun but I definitely felt more nervous on the ride up than on the zip-line. There were 10 in our group, plus 2 staff (one of which was from Stillwater,MN!). Our group was fun; lots of cool people. There were 2 older gents in the mix (early 80s if I had to guess an age). Get some! There were squirt guns at the end to shoot each other with to cool off so we had a little battle, which was fun. It was a great afternoon. Back down the mountain, at their office, they gave everyone ice pops & cold washcloths with a hint of peppermint on them for a nice cooling effect – so refreshing!
Back to the campground for another quick swim & shower, then back into town for dinner at Singha Thai – very tasty food. Afterwards, we biked down the road to Moab Brewery for a drink. We had to stop at a mulberry tree first, of course! Nature’s candy 🙂 To end our night we had a dumb fight about Facebook that put a sour note on our day (see reflection below). We biked back to camp (fairly far apart), read a little, & straight to bed.
Day 43: Up early & off to rent a car! We really wanted to see Arches & Canyonlands National Parks & doing it by bike seemed a little hairy: very large parks, no shuttle, very few opportunities for filling up water, & very hot. We dropped our bikes off at a shop down the street for a tune up, got breakfast at Love Muffin, picked up lots of groceries, then off to explore Arches all day.
We spent 5 hours hiking Devil’s Garden, which had many arches & just beautiful landscape in general. The parking lot was very busy but the trails weren’t…where were all the people? We did see some people but not very many. One group I actually remember seeing at Bryce since we had talked to them so I said hi & they remembered us too! It was pretty hot today, but windy, which helped. We drove around for a while stopping to take tons of pictures until sunset.
Back into town to the campground, we went for a dip. Aaahhh, it never gets old; it always feels so good. At our site, we made pasta for dinner. We cleaned up & headed downtown for a drink at the brewery (pit stop for mulberries…of course!), then down the street to the movie theater. Wahoo! Back home, Ben & I see lots of movies at the local cheap seats & we’ve missed it so it was exiting to see there was a theater in town. We saw Ocean’s 8. Go women! It was entertaining enough; not bad. Back to camp for a little reading in the tent, then off to sleep.
Day 44: Eggs & veggies for breakfast (mmm), then off to Canyonlands all day. There are 3 districts within the park (all very large), so we spent all day exploring Island in the Sky. The other 2 districts are Needles & The Maze. We’ll have to come back on another trip to see the others. That park is so big!
We went for several hikes today (pretty empty again), but saw a lot of the same people on each one 🙂 One couple we ran into yesterday at Arches & had chatted with them about our trip but also their Camelback. We don’t have one & I’m not sure I’d like one for the bike trip (too sweaty on my back) but it would be nice for hiking. Despite which trail we were on there were plenty of nice views. It’s like a mini Grand Canyon. On the short hike to Mesa Arch (at Canyonlands) we met a really nice couple from New Hampshire, Peg & Steve. We swapped taking pictures for each other & chatted about each of our trips. They were really sweet. We’ll be biking through New Hampshire eventually…maybe we’ll see them again!
We left Canyonlands slightly before sunset & swung by Arches again to see Delicate Arch, which we’d missed yesterday. We went into town for dinner at Zax: salad & pizza bar. Pretty tasty. Back to camp for swimming, laundry, charging, organizing, & getting ready for biking again. A little reading, then bedtime.
Reflections:
1. Cats, well any (friendly) animal really, make me so happy…if you couldn’t tell from all the descriptions of pets we meet along the way 😉 With animals, there’s no judgement, pressure or expectations; just a simple creature that’s easy to please & happy to see you. Humans tend to have a lot more conditions for happiness that are mentally exhausting to deal with sometimes…in my opinion.
2. I’m not a fan of writing messages (either private or through your status) to your significant other (or anyone you live with & spend all your time with) on Facebook if you haven’t said those things face-to-face yet. In my opinion, it’s more heartfelt in person or in a hand-written note. Facebook status messages seem more for other people than the person it’s intended for.
Well, it’s been over two weeks since I started this post…yowza! We’ve been so busy (which is fun) but then I get a little overwhelmed with how far behind on the blog I am. I always update the map so you know where we are but Ben is better at more frequent Facebook updates…it’s nice for some things (like most technology), we just need to work out some etiquette kinks 🙂 Well, I just clogged a toilet in Monrovia,IN so we gotta roll! Until next time.
Whitney