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| Cycling out of Blanding |
It all started with the sprinklers going off in the Kam Park RV park in Blanding at 2am in the morning, soaking our tent and waking us from a peaceful sleep. We had unknowingly camped right on the outside edge of the tent site area in line of the last two sprinklers to water the lawn on that side of the RV Park. Steve was not happy when he had to stumble out of the tent in the dead of the night to try to re-direct the water flow, getting soaked in the process while I tried to zip up the fly before too much water got inside the tent.
Then due to our disrupted sleep, Steve had to have a sleep in so we got a late start to the day. He also left me with the job of going grocery shopping for supplies for the next day and a half as we were about to hit a 74 mile stretch where there was absolutely no services. Naturally, I failed in my shopping duties. Not only did Steve not like the breakfast burrito I bought him (we'd been having breakfast burritos every other day so I'm not sure what the problem was!) but he was upset because I didn't get us a proper lunch for us to have, myself thinking we would just be snacking on energy bars and trail mix like we had on other days so we would not have to carry so much food.
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| The canyons start to appear before us |
Riding through Utah's vast canyons is so incredibly amazing. The landscape is just phenomenal. I am so stoked that we had managed to make it this far. Even Steve's foul mood on this day could not curb the joy I felt watching the ever-changing scenery unfold around me.
Steve was Mr Grumblebum today. He didn't feel well because he didn't like his fried chicken dinner of the night before that he'd bought from the supermarket and we'd sat eating in the RV Park with tiny cockroaches keeping us company. I was being blamed for his bad meal because I'd turned my nose up at the fast food TacoTime joint next door to the RV Park, which was his preference for dinner.
Claiming he felt ill, weak and had a headache, he was miserable for the whole ride, barely able to push through the day. I'm calling this a bonk as he was so out of sorts, he refused to drink Gatorade to replenish his electrolytes or eat anything throughout the ride. With our late start, and me stopping to enjoy the view and take photos, we were cycling through the heat of the day which also added to the problem. Utah is still hot in September, but it's a pleasant hot at this time of the year. Not too humid and not too dry.
On the way to Natural Bridges we stopped at Butler Wash Ruins and Mule Canyon Ruins, two Anasazi ruins right by Hwy 95.
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| Butler Wash Ruins |
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| Butler Wash Ruins |
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| Steve looking over Butler Wash |
Then we had to get over Salvation Knoll Summit at 7,110 feet. The roads in Utah are steep and rolling. 6-8% gradient is common and often there are sections of 10% gradient or more. Our maps warn of up to 14% gradients! I am glad we had all those mountains to climb in Colorado to get us in shape for Utah.
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| A road thru the canyons |
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| Where we just cycled through |
Finally we got to Natural Bridges National Monument at about 3:30pm, a little later than we intended only to find out that the campground was full. They only have 15 sites on a first come first serve basis and they had filled up about 30 minutes ago. Steve made sure to rub this is in for all the time I spent dilly-dallying stopping to take photos. He failed to mention that he also had a slow riding day today. We were told at the Visitor Centre that we would have to go back to the overflow primitive camping along some access roads 5+miles back up the hill. No way were we doing this. Instead we rode down to the campground and asked the first person we saw if we could share their site for the night. Luckily Stacy was car camping on her own and said yes.
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| Riding into Natural Bridges Natl Monument |
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| View from the loop road |
We quickly pitched our tent in a spot that gave Stacy some privacy, dumped all our gear and headed out on our bikes sans panniers on the 9 mile loop to check out the three natural bridges in the park.
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| Sipapu Bridge |
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| Ladder on Sipapu Bridge Trail |
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| Sipapu Bridge Trail |
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| Kachina Bridge |
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| Owachomo Bridge |
At the last bridge the thunder and lightening started to roll in making the canyons appear even more dramatic. We rode as quickly as we could back to the campsite to find that we had unwittingly pitched our tent in the worst spot possible in the whole campsite. Our tent and all our gear was sitting in a big pool of water 2.5 inches deep. Apparently it had rained hard on our tent site. The fact that each site had a raised tent pad should have alerted us when we arrived to look out for flooding, but being as tired and disgruntled as we were when we got there we didn't pick up on that!
Luckily Stacy had a spare tarp that she lent us to put our tent on in a drier position. I highly recommend the Big Agnes Copper Spur tent. With its quality bathtub design that saved us from what could have been a totally disastrous situation, we were able to just pick up the tent fully assembled with all our sleeping pads and sleeping bags etc inside and reposition it without any water having entered the tent, despite it looking like it should have been just saturated. A night in a wet tent with a wet sleeping bag would not have made Steve's day. He was struggling to cope as it was, threatening to pull the pin on the rest of the trip.
We ate a cold dinner of some pre-packaged vegetable stir-fry rice and tinned corn beef hash wrapped in tortillas inside the tent out of the rain and I just hoped it wouldn't rain through the night and the tent would hold out for us.
CRANKING ODYSSEY STATS
Total Odyssey miles: 2,571
Overall Fastest Speed: Steve (46 miles per hour) Mandy (36.7 miles per hour)
Bludge Days: 4
Bonks: Steve (1) - Day 46
Dog chases: 3
Dummy Spits: Steve (6) Day 10 - because it rained; Day 16 - because the rocks in the river were slippery; Day 29 - because it takes me so long to get ready in the morning; Day 36 - because I was blogging and Steve was dieing of starvation; Day 44 - because the clothes dryer didn't dry his clothes; Day 45 - because by the time I got organised he didn't get to eat a crappy dinner until 8pm
Mandy (3.5) 0.5 Day 14 - those freakin' wreckless Idaho drivers!; Day 26 - because my bike computer had a meltdown; Day 28 - because Steve wouldn't help hold my bike up in the wind after watching it nearly fall over 3 times whilst I tried to put my clothes away in the panniers because it looked like rain ahead; Day 44 - because Steve's bushies flew back and hit me in the face (twice)
Flats: Katie (4); Steve (1)
Wrong turns: 8
Beer of the day: N/A
Lesson of the day: Males do not function as well as females under prolonged periods of disturbed sleep patterns
No. of days with no shower: 16
No. of days in a hotel: 13
Starting weight: Steve (90kg) Mandy (51.5kg)
Day 30 Rawlins weigh in: Steve (183 pds / 83kg). Mandy (110 pds / 50kg)
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