Wednesday, September 13, 2000

Wickenburg, AZ to Williams, AZ - 134 miles

Today was the longest day so far, and will be the most feet climbed in one day for the whole trip (9000 feet). Right out of town a cop pulled our group over for riding three abreast. Having recently heard from my friend Rob that he got a $275 ticket for running a light in Sausalito CA, I was as polite as I could be. He gave us a warning and we continued on. We became a group of eight. A good pace line formed, easily peeling away the first couple of miles. The sun was still rising and the surrounding green hills were a welcome relief from the stark landscapes of previous days. We were at a much higher elevation too, almost 2000 feet, and this was keeping the temperature down.

Slowly but surely a wall of mountains moved toward us. They were determined to stay directly in our path. When reached the base of them and the climbing began. The group broke up to everyone's individual pace. This was a serious climb. I passed Lon, who was standing on his single speed green Rivendel. The gear on his bike was a 42X15. I'll take my 39X25 thank you very much. At the top, got some grub and drinks.

We left again as a group, and another paceline formed. We whipped along at 27mph+, with a slight downgrade and tailwind helping. A few rollers appeared and the group broke up. We hit a very steep downhill, where I hit 45mph. Looking back, it was just Nigel and Brian. Hmm, I wonder where the other people went - Kimberly, Keith, some others. We kept a pace line going as we grinded up a slow grade. Suddenly a large dog like animal darted in front of us. As it sunk in, we realized it was a wild bobcat. The large padded feet and the white tail cued us off. We started to wind up around curves in the road. The road hugged the ridges. More and more pine trees popped up around us. We arrived at a break stop. We heard from the support that Kimberly had run off the road into a ditch, while we were descending at 40mph. Apparently, however, she only had a small scratch on her leg and was going to keep riding after her bike was fixed. Amazing. Comments about "nine lives" popped up.
After a little more climbing, replete with some spectacular views, we rode into the busy town of Prescott. Out of town, there was a brisk tailwind and easy grades. We rode into lunch for some tasty tacos and chocolate pudding. We climbed some more then got on the nerve-wracking interstate. It was pretty much all uphill until we had a brief downhill into Williams, a tourist haven for Grand Canyon gawkers.

Overall the day was tough; the hills were not too bad, as the grades were gentle, but long. The heat backed off because of the higher elevations (Prescott was at 5300 ft.).
I'm tired. Signing off,