Hello,
I am writing from Safford, AZ where, yes, it is raining and 41 degrees. I can actually see some snow on the mountains out the window. Fortunately I am a day ahead of schedule, so I get to rest today out of the rain.
I spent Thanksgiving and the day after at my aunt and uncle's in Scottsdale (Phoenix)which was really nice. My cousin and I went out with some of her friends on the 25th. I haven't seen my cousin in a really long time and we have never really hung out seperate of the family so it was really fun. My grandma and aunt from Portland were also in town so we had a big family dinner on Thanksgiving.
On the 28th my uncle drove me back down to Tempe where he picked me up on and 25th and I began part 2 of my tour. I rode through the suburbs out into the desert to Superior, AZ (57 miles). There were some pretty cool looking mesa style mountains along the way to break up the flat monotony of the desert. At one point I was taking a break and looking at some far off mountains and when I looked up again a few seconds later the mountains were gone cause a dust storm moved in! It was weird. I wasn't sure what to do and all the cars were still driving into it, so I decided to keep riding. Sometimes I could only see about 1/2 ahead of me. It only lasted for a few miles though. In Superior, I stayed at an RV park and the owners said they insisted I sleep under their car port cause it was supposed to rain, so they moved their cars and let me sleep in there. It did rain a little tiny bit, but was really windy so the car port was great.
Yesterday the plan was to ride from Superior to the Gila River where I was going to "stealth camp" on what I thought was Forest Service land. First thing in the morning out of Superior, I had an 11 mile climb up to the top of a pass. There were lots of pretty rocky red mountains and canyons and pine trees, but it was about 35 degrees up there and windy and it was a fairly hard climb. I had to stop in the next town for some hot chocolate at McDonalds cause I was seriously cold. From McDonald's I headed into the San Carlos Apache Reservation. The desert out there is a lot different than around Phoenix- there are lots of mountains and canyons and all the canyons had cottonwoods in them with bright fall colors. So anyway, I got to where I was going to camp and it was actually on the reservation, really close to a sketchy town called Bylas and there was beer cans and trash and grafitti all over the place. I was too scared to try stealth camping there, so I thought I would continue into Bylas and try to find a church or something to stay at. Tried the only church in town, no one was there. The next town to camp in was 30 miles away and I had already gone 72 miles for the day. I didn't really have any other choice so I continued. On my way out of town, a little dog decided to chase me and ran across the highway where it was promptly hit by a car. It was the worst thud and it rolled around on the highway and then ran back to its owner. I think the owner was drunk or something and he just kept staggering along, ignoring it. The person who hit it just kept driving. It was really obvious they had hit it, and they even slowed down afterwards, but kept driving. The dog laid down in a field and that was the last I saw, so I don't know if it made it. It was really sad. I was chased by dogs two more times before I finally made it off the reservation. I made it about 20 miles past Bylas and then it started to get dark and I was really really tired so I decided to try to hitch hike the last 11 miles into Safford (I decided I might as well go all the way there cause that was my planned destination for today). The first truck to pull over was a grandma and grandpa (Pete and Mary) coming back from visiting their grandkids in Phoenix. They were headed past Safford and gave me a ride. Pete used to tour back in the 80s so it was really fun talking to him. They dropped me off at the edge of town and I rode to my hotel. I rode a total of 90.5 miles yesterday and am tired today for sure. Getting a ride from Pete and Mary does mean I didn't ride 11 miles of my route, but I'm kinda over it.
Today I am just resting since I am already in Safford. They have a bike shop here in town so I might go pay them a visit in a bit. Next I head up a really steep and long pass to the AZ/NM stateline. I may run into the reminants of the snow storm they had last night and today. Luckily there is a ranger station 14 miles before the top of the pass, so they can help me out with road conditions I'm sure.
Hope all is well at home! Next time I blog I will be in NM!
