The day started with a stark reminder of the conditions we are under when Greg asked “can anyone top 3 days in the same clothes including undies and socks?”, and almost everyone put their hand up. Roger lead a quick prayer session with the hymn “Me and Bobby McGee” to get Mickey underway, whilst Rusty (now quickly becoming Crusty) tried to patch up a deflated Calax to no avail.
Mickey lead the way through Sedoma, an amazing town of red rock moonscapes – a place we all agreed we’d like to come back to. Mickey tackled the 20 or so miles to Flagstaff on a narrow climbing route, whilst the RV was diverted to the freeway due to the narrow roads. This gave Gary, Dave and Greg who were in the RV the chance to pump out the RV, and freshen themselves up with fresh clothes, a shower and shave - an absolute delight. This also lightened their bags as underclothes were unceremoniously dumped in the bins. The clothes would have been burnt but for an Extreme Fire Danger in Flagstaff.
Mickey hit headwinds and uneven surfaces, testing him on the undulating roads towards Tuba City – a very small city of a few petrol stations and a couple of houses in the desert. Celine worked on Mickey’s sore backside – no-one else wanted to go there, and his other aches and pains with quite a few grimaces and expletives from Mickey. The “rough treatment” Celine gave him worked wonders as by nightfall the blisters on his bum were less of an issue, and his feet and legs were all feeling ok.
After Mickey took off post lunch, Dave gave Celine a “Dummies Guide to emptying the RV” – a video tutorial in how to pump out the toilet and wastewater. Watch out for the Limited Edition Video - a great Father’s Day Gift. I hear the Convey’s have already already ordered one for Paul!
Mickey continued on through the barren conditions, pedalling like a demon and reaching Kayenta by nightfall. Kayenta is a desert town of service stations, McDonalds, Burger King, KFC and little else. We attracted interest from a number of locals whom also wanted to take our stuff (well at least Dave’s stuff), and also kept asking us for cash.
Dave is struggling with the term “Miles” and keeps using “Kilometres” even when Mickey corrects him by responding with “Miles”. Dave says he’s testing Mickey’s mental faculties to make sure Mickey’s alert, but truth is Dave can’t help himself. We have a 20c fine for each time Dave uses “Km” – he now owes $1,068.40, but that’s nothing compared to the gazillions in Roger’s swear box!
We got to pass through Monument Valley, but there we couldn’t see it at it’s best as it was at night. Mickey had some issues with lights, and after a quick repair and re-start, a coyote took interest and started to chase him down the road, then backed off, then chased hard again to get within 2-3 metres of Mickey whilst the MickRooCrew gave chase rapidly to scare it off. It would have been really interesting if we reported into Race Headquarters our rider had been taken by a coyote!
We could see elements and silhouettes of the large mesa’s as we passed through the valley bathed in bright moonlight, including the mesa that looked like it was from Close Encounters. We continued on and called camp for the night at the tiny village of Mexican Hat (da da da da de da, de da da de da da de da) – and yes some of us did an impromptu dance albeit a tired one.
No comments:
Post a Comment