Day 20 - Colona, CO to Montrose, CO

39 Miles / Day 21 of 54 / Colona, CO to Montrose, CO

It was tough to leave Dan's after such an amazing time (thanks for everything, Dan!) but after a slow morning we were on our way again! We left Colona, and were on our way to Gunnison.

Everything started fantastic and we cruised through Montrose. Unfortunately, though, Seth had some of the same rear wheel issues that had been causing him issues the few days previous. He could only got 3-4 miles and his wheel would seize up. We couldn't go any further, so we pulled over to the side of the road and put up the obligatory thumb to hitchhike.

A nice couple from Alaska stopped and gave us a lift to the next town over, Gunnison, where Seth's wheel could be fixed. They were a great retired couple, where the wife had worked in Alaska's public schools for 25 years. It was great to hear about her experiences in public schools, and we were indebted for the lift.

We got into Gunnison in the afternoon and had some time to kill. Went to the bike shop, Seth's wheel was taken care of and we dropped our stuff in Dan's kayaking friend's yard. Tyler is an outdoor enthusiast and let us pitch a tent in his yard (thanks, Tyler!)

Gunnison is a beautiful little town and we were lucky to catch a Sunday evening folk concert in the park. It was so cool. Tons of families and young people from all over biked in to listen to the concert. Great atmosphere, great people.

Went to bed after a great day ready to climb over the Continental Divide the next day.

Blog Updated

Thanks to a week in the high desert of Utah it's been a good minute since we had wi-fi. Blog is now updated.

Day 19 - Rest Day!

0 miles / Day 19 of 54 / Colona, CO

Today, thanks to Dan, we took our first rest day of the trip. Our goal is Pueblo, CO by July 4th and thanks to a few big days across the Utah desert it looks like we can afford to take a day off.

We were lucky to get to spend the day with our friend and fellow teacher Mari (shout out to Minnesota!) who has been using summer to trek across Colorado, see old friends, climb 14,000 mountain peaks and sleep on mountainsides. You're too real for these streets Mar Mar.

Lesson #49: Forget dinner and a movie, celebrate important events by spending time outside together.

Dan's good friends Rob and Ginger were celebrating their 16th wedding anniversary by spending the day on the Crystal River kayaking and rafting. Lucky us, thanks to Dan, Rob and Ginger we got to join the party.

Jack and Mari blowing up the "Pumpkin".

The Crystal River isn't a commercialized river and our route took us through class 3 whitewater in Bogan Canyon. It's 8,000 feet up in the Rocky Mountains and filled with ice cold water from the continuous snow melt off of the mountain peaks.

As we were pumping up the raft and getting the gear ready the monsoon hit. It was about 15 minutes of a high altitude downpour with thick drops followed  by about 10 minutes of pea sized hail. We put on a few extra layers to adjust to the lowered temperature and we were ready to launch.

Dan and Rob have been kayaking together for over 15 years and led the scouting effort down the river yelling and using hand signals to communicate with Ginger about obstacles to avoid and best currents / routes to take.

Our fearless leader Ginger.

Ginger was an excellent river raft guide. The water was low and the four of us in the raft had to do a lot of technical maneuvers to avoid the rocks and driftwood that filled the river. The river was absolutely gorgeous. Snow capped mountain peaks, pines as far as the eye could see, and crystal clear water kept distracting us as we were paddling through obstacles.

After about two hours in the raft we got off the river just in time to beat the second monsoon and hail. We finished off the rafting experience with a dip in the natural hot springs, 104 degrees of sulfur water to get nice and toasty.

Dan is a carpenter built a house on a plot he and his wife bought 16 years ago in the Uncompahtgre Valley. He gave us the history of the area as we drove through the continuous stretch of mountains and valleys. Various billionaires have swooped in over the past 10 to 15 years to stake their claim in this beautiful (and undeveloped) part of Colorado.

The ride to and from the Roaring Fork Valley to raft was about two and a half hours each way. On the ride Dan told us of his theory that the uber-rich come here to buy their mega ranches in an effort to validate their manhood and virility. The ego is a powerful thing. We drove past Ralph Lauren's 15,000 acre ranch. The next valley over was Friedken's (owner of Lexus) 10,000 acre ranch. Charlie Ergen (Owner of DirectTV) was most recent to put his flag in the ground.

Lesson #50: Sometimes what comes around doesn't go around.

Dan pointed out the former CFO of Enron's ranch. She apparently left the company right before the crash and avoided any legal charges and any loss of wealth.

Lesson #51: The best part of being a parent is getting to regress back to childhood.

On the ride home Dan told us about how much he enjoyed being a dad and watching his daughter grow up. It was priceless to see him talk about getting to be a kid through being a parent.

Thank you to Dan and his wife Sammie for the adventure, much needed showers, and chance to rest before our push to Pueblo.

Day 18 - Rico, CO to Colona, CO

44 miles / Day 18 of 54 / Rico, CO to Colona, CO

Home sweet home for the night.

After a lovely night in Rico spent sleeping in the shack (literally) and relaxing out muscles in the hot springs, we had about a 13 mile climb up to Lizard Head's Pass, a great welcome to the state of Colorado. Sitting at over 10,200 feet, you could see plenty of 14000 peaks left and right. It was a beautiful climb, not very steep and real gradual. Throughout the climb we followed the Dolores River which was teeming with fly fishers and rafters. A real outdoor mecca.

Admittedly, the pass was easier to ascend for me than for Seth. With more back wheel issues, Seth was pedaling hard yet his wheel wasn't spinning like it should. He had major rear axle and rear bearing issues that made it even tougher to ascend Lizard Head's. But Seth being Seth, he never complained and had to work twice as hard to see our beautiful vista. What a champ.

The best thing about ascending so high is the descent. There's no feeling quite like the wind in your face coasting down the mountain at 35 miles an hour with some of the most beautiful vistas possible. I flew down the hill, yet Seth was slowed down by his back wheel. He was pedaling as hard as he could downhill and going around 8 miles an hour.

Travis aka "Lifesaver".

We made it down the mountain and with Seth not able to go any further, we hitched a ride (thanks, Mickey) to Telluride to a bike shop to fix Seth's back wheel. Thank you Travis for your help rebuilding Seth's back axle and bearings.

Thanks to our good teaching friend, Amy, in North Carolina, she set us up with her uncle and aunt, Dan and Sammi, who live out near Montrose, CO. We met Dan in Telluride and he drove us and our bikes to his home.

Commence probably our best memories of the trip so far, and it wasn't even on the bike. One of those times where everything works out perfectly. Dan, being one of the most welcoming people I have ever met, made us feel right at home. Seth's college friend, Mari, was in Colorado and met us at Dan's.

A huge outdoors man, Dan asked us right away if we wanted to spend the next day rafting a river in Colorado. Right away, we know that it wasn't an opportunity we could miss. We quickly decided on having an off day and spending a great day with Dan and Mari rafting the river.

Would write more about it, but don't want to spoil our next post :)

Dan the man with the friendly and loving dog Buddy.

Day 17 - Dove Creek, CO to Rico, CO

76 miles / Day 17 of 54 / Dove Creek, CO to Rico, CO

After basically sleeping next to the Dove Creek Sheriff's house in the city park we were quick to wake up and get out of there and get on the road.

Two guys riding New York to Los Angeles, heading west. Dude on left is on a bamboo bike.

We stopped at the open 24-hour convenience store for breakfast. Thankfully, Seth and I are both avid cereal eaters. Our breakfast will usually consist of a full box of cereal and a half gallon of milk and we're ready to start the day.

With Seth limping along with more back wheel issues, we needed to get to a bike shop, and fast. We had a 35 mile morning ride to a cool little hippie town called Dolores, CO. While there, we stopped in Lizardhead Cycle and got to meet two pretty unique people, Nicholas and Joey. Nicholas is the owner of the bike shop and an ex-sponsored triathlete who road in sponsored bike races and even competed in worldwide cycling competitions in Germany. Super knowledgeable about bikes, Nicholas had a lot to share and was really helpful with getting both of our bikes back to peak working condition.

Joey, was a little guy going into fifth grade in the fall and is completely Nicholas's shadow. Just a kid from the town who enjoys spending his summer days around the bike shop and helping wherever he can. Kind of like Nicholas' assistant. We spent 3-4 hours at the bike shop because it was so busy but got to know both Nicholas and Joey well. To be honest, after spending all my working time with children all school year, I have looked forward to spending some time away from kids. But Joey was eager as ever and a fun guy to be around. He tried to help wherever possible and just wanted some good attention paid towards him.

Lesson #48: Children are the future. Listen to them, don't tune them out. You might just get a better outlook on life.

Thanks Nicholas and Joey for a good afternoon.

It was hot as can be once we left Dolores and the temperature was hovering around 100 degrees. Also, we had an intimidating climb ahead of us, our first one in Colorado. Neither of us were real sure what to expect.

Luckily we had great cloud cover most of the way up and the grade was super gradual. For those of you following along at home, it's much easier to do 30 miles of climbing at 6-8 percent grade than 5 miles of climbing at 15 percent grade. After such steep grades in and out of the rock canyons through Utah, it was nice to get an easier grade. Crossing our fingers this continues through Colorado.

Sunset in the smokey haze in the mountains in Rico, CO.

It took 17 days but we got our first rain of the trip. It was nice to cool us down and didn't impede us too much.

By about 7 pm we arrived in this cool little mountain town of Rico, CO. We hit a bar to grab some grub and I heard that the Pirates WERE TIED FOR THE BEST RECORD IN BASEBALL. I honestly couldn't believe this so had to confirm with some telephone calls to make sure this was true. I could go on forever about how proud I am of my Pirates for blog post after blog post, but I will cease by saying it's pretty good to be 18 over .500 before the All-Star Break considering the Pirates haven't had a winning season since I was 2 years old...

You are a scholar, gentleman, and inspiration TJ. Thank you.

We got directions from a local named TJ to where there where great hot springs right outside of town. This guy outside of the bar had ridden cross country three times and across Australia as well.

Probably our most memorable evening, we soaked ourselves in these 104 degree natural hot springs and had the Avett Brothers in the background serenading us as we reflected on our trip so far.

Super awesome hot springs an a great place to tent. Hope the pictures do it justice, it was just what our aching muscles had ordered.

Colorado is awesome so far. The greenery is such a stark contrast to the dust and sand of Utah. It's hard to say which is better because the scenery is so different, but I certainly love the river following along our roue and the tall pines creating a tunnel as we ride.

Big day tomorrow, we're going to continue climbing to get to 10,200 and Lizrad's Pass where we'll see 14,000 foot peaks. We're not in Kansas anymore, Toto.

Day 16 - Comb Wash, UT to Dove Creek, CO

64 miles / Day 16 of 54 / Comb Wash, UT to Dove Creek, CO

We woke up around 8:00 am, not feeling too fatigued from the night ride the night before.

No tent from the night before meant we were on the road quicker than normal. Time to climb.

3 down, 7 to go.

We climbed our last section of Utah mountains into the town of. We had heard a few hundred miles earlier of a small bakery that couldn't be missed.

We found the bakery and feasted on Reuben sandwiches, Waldorf salads, fresh cookies, and homemade granola.

Lesson #44: Apprenticeship is the best form of learning.

The bakery had an incredible story. Seven years ago they started an apprenticeship program for 10 to 18 year olds in the community.

It came out of three boys knocking on the bakers door and asking for money for the movies. The bakers solution was figure out how the kids could learn, do meaningful work and get the money they wanted for the movies. Seven years later the bakery is a safe haven for community kids where they learn accounting, how to run a business, people skills, and how to bake.

The baker was part of the Navajo tribe and told us about how he incorporates the Navajo traditions of the value and energy that come from children into his baking.

He was passionate about their local community garden that was supported by 9 Navajo families. It was priceless to see him beam talking about how the garden brought generations together where grandparents could teach their grand kids their culture of gardening.

Lesson #45: Eat dinner around the table. Don't underestimate how important this is.

He talked about how fundamentally important it is to eat dinner around the family table. He talked about how it is a sacred space were families pass down values, share stories, and build a sense of cultural pride. Shout out to the fam. May we forever break bread around the same table.

Lesson #46: Trust is priceless.

He told us about the struggle over Navajo land rights and water rights. And how the tribe's leadership has been selling off off their land and water rights to private corporations.

He talked about the pain and betrayal of the corrupt leadership of his tribe and how he or his family and community  members have never seen the profits from the casino on their land. Not a penny. Apparently the majority of investors have no Indian heritage but the casino holds and operates as if it is legally owned and operated for the benefit of the Navajo tribe.

With much to think about we left the bakery full and started the final climb for the day to Dove Creek, Colorado. We were going to make it out of Utah safely. (Thank goodness we no longer need to sleep with one eye open.)

We slept in the city park, across street from Sheriff's house and hid our tent / bikes behind a shed. We split a pizza and waited for cover of night to pitch tent.

Lesson #47: The problems we experience our self-created. We can fix them but our values and priorities have to change.

Day 15 - Hog Wash State Picnic Area, UT to Comb Wash, UT

78 miles / Day 15 of 54 / Hog Wash State Picnic Area, UT to Comb Wash, UT

Shout out to picnic tables with roofs over them. 

We woke up in the cool shade with the sun still not yet having crossed over the tops of the canyon walls that we slept between.

We had about a water bottle each and 19 miles to the next watering hole so we didn't mess around getting packed up and on the road.

The 19 miles were downhill to our lowest point of elevation in Utah to Lake Powell, wowzers is the desert basin hot.

A few miles before the water spigot my back tube blew out. Flat count now tied at 6 to 6 between Jack and I.

Hollywood invades Utah.

Lesson #41: Hollywood types are tight lipped and sometimes are able to talk down at you without saying many words, if any, at all.

We stopped and loaded up on water and fuel at Glenn Canyon State Park. The park had few people in it but trailers, RV's and movie cameras packed the parking lot. Apparently they've been shooting the movie for the past few weeks. All we could muster out of a guy with dark glasses and a walkie talkie on his hip was that the movie was to be called Dark Moon. Hope it's not the newest installment in the Twilight saga. And Jack and I looked hard but we didn't see Tom Cruise anywhere.

Nap time in the shade.

If I didn't make it clear earlier - it was hot. Like don't go outside hot. Jack and I were gassed after doing 19 downhill miles.

There was only one logical decision to be made - it was time for our first night ride. We laid out our sleeping pads under one of the four trees in the park and napped for a few hours. Thankfully the breeze completely saved us and we were able to drift off to sleep.

Seth, Eric, and Dave are 37 days into their cross country ride.

Lesson #42: Riding 6300 miles on a tandem bicycle is a great way to figure out if you should act on your hunch and ask your significant other to marry you.

After napping we met Seth, Eric, Dave (dad). Dave had gone 6300 miles 30 years ago with his wife on a tandem bike across the USA. He was doing the second installment of the trip this summer with his sons. We were both on the same route, in opposite directions. We learned many tips and lesson for the route to come, good eats, great places to stay. Sounds like we have less elevation ahead of us, but many more people and towns. Disclaimer - The "6300 mile" test is solid but not foolproof. Dave let us know he was no longer married.

Lesson #43: The desert is meant to be explored and experienced under the cover of darkness.

We left at 6:30 pm for our first night ride of the trip. It was still blazing hot with the sun beating down for a good 3 hours.

About 10 miles out of the canyon we disrupted movie shoot. The sunset brought a much welcomed evening cool.

The desert became outlined by a sky full of stars and we couldn't find the moon. A few hours into darkness the moon started to rise.

The night ride was the most calm I'd felt on the bike. Jack and I finished our 40 mile climb and around 1:00 am. We slept under stars on sandy river bed, no need for our tent, just sleeping bags.

Riding at night. About that life.