Friday, 3/20/2009. Riders: Ted & Fred. 79 miles, 5.5 hours.

After going to bed at 2am last night (curse late flights and shuttle service!), I was up and poking at the farkling on the bikes before 9am. I moseyed out to the garage in my pajamas- I could get used to the ultra-mild March temperatures in this area of the world.

Anyhow, the new DRZ ("The Doctor") needed quite a bit of farking- the Acerbis Rally II handguards needed their inboard mounts installed, but Dad didn't think he was sent the right brackets to mount them up to the Pro Taper bars. Because of this, I stole the mounts from my DRZ at home and brought them down with us. It turns out the difference between the standard mounts and the Pro Taper mounts is so small it is easily overlooked- this is good, because I can reinstall the inboard mounts on my DRZ now.

There was more prepwork necessary: add a GPS cable and RAM ball to the "old DRZ", mount up the Clarke fuel tank to The Doctor, and so on. We got it done in an hour or two, so we were on the road before 11am.

Today was meant to be a checkout ride- make sure the new bike handles well, find some nice bumps to play on, and not be all day. After all, we were both tired from a short night of sleep and we'd be missing lunch because of the late start.

We headed south on River Road after trading bikes a few times- The Doctor has a wheel balance issue, perhaps the rear wheel is out of true. Nothing that will hold us back from riding, though- it'll need to be dealt with eventually.

Anyhow, after taking River Road across the border into Arizona, we went east towards the petroglyphs at Little Black Mountain. We spent a little bit of time walking to the petroglyphs- the shapes are very interesting and there is a lot of art to see. Supposedly the 'ZENO' inscription was done as vandalism and the person responsible is still in jail- I couldn't find any information online to support this, unfortunately.

After sightseeing at the petroglyphs, we rode south and east on some roads that Dad has been on before. One of them is a fairly hidden canyon and wash- we went in to where the road dead-ends, then turned around and left. I had a hard time turning around- when I went to turn my front tire, it slid on the silt, so down I went. Not a big issue, but it was one of many times I'd drop my bike during the day.

We then traveled north to get around some cliffs, then headed south again and went to a very small gypsum mine. You can see it from a long distance away- it looks like someone has dumped a lot of glass. In fact, when we rode in, I rode over a tailings pile. I went VERY gingerly over the gypsum, thinking I was about to get a flat tire from broken glass!

We parked the bikes, then walked down to the vein of gypsum (or, specifically, probably Selenium). It isn't a large-scale operation, but must be used for something medical or food grade- it's a very pure deposit, and the quantity is nowhere sufficient enough to be used for drywall. It was fun to look through (since the "fresh" bits are as clear as window glass), but it is such a bright white that I was squinting as if we looking at light reflected off of snow.

We continued south, stopping at a very small horizontal test mineshaft. Obviously the creators didn't find what they were after- it only went in about 12 feet. It was a very consistent width and height- about 4ft tall, perhaps 3ft wide- so it must have not been opened with explosives. I don't know what they were after, but the debris from the shaft were a sulfur-yellow color, while the surrounding soil was more red. My rule of thumb is that the interesting mineral deposits occur at the intersection of two colors of soil, and this mineshaft certainly fits.

After this, we threaded through the valley south and then east. We saw what looked like a mineshaft on the side of a plateau, so we tried heading to it. I dropped the bike when I hesitated going through a wash, then had a lot of fun following the wash. We didn't find the mine shaft, even though we turned around and went both ways. I did find a fun little jump though!

We then climbed up Joe Blake Hill. It has a nice set of switchbacks that were fun on the bike, climbing almost 600 feet in a short distance. Dad took some video of me climbing along the road, then we stopped for photos at the very top. The view was great- we were standing at the top of a steep hill, looking across dozens of square miles of land in two states. We could easily see St. George, which is 12 miles away.

Dad said he wanted to head south on Sunshine Trail, then head east and north up to Hurricane. I looked at the GPS and found tracks that would take us through, but we saw there was a section where the trail paralleled another road, then became very twisty.

So, we headed south along the main road. There were some range cows around, and one got "trapped" on the road in a steep section. It was funny to see him hustling down the road. We then turned east along the dirt road, then north. This section was a lot of fun- very dusty because of silt, but it curved through the landscape and through some washes.

Finally the road started crossing over the (relatively large) creekbed. We probably crossed it five times when we realized we were actually on the "wrong" side of the creek, which is the trail side, not the road side. We decided to take the trail, though it wasn't easy: it was very rocky, it crossed many small creeks, and the creek crossings weren't the easiest. They were usually in a sharp turn- imagine being on the side of a hill, making a u-turn on baseball-sized rocks, with a creek crossing right at the apex of the corner with bowling ball sized rocks.

We then had a steep hillclimb. Dad and I both had trouble- if you hesitated, your forward momentum would be lost and you couldn't get going again. We both did that at least once. Keep in mind we are very exhausted by this point, since we've dropped the bikes multiple times in the last half-mile segment.

After the hillclimb, we had a very steep descent. It was long and very loose. We got to the bottom and took a long break- Dad was tired and starting to tremble from exhaustion and dehydration. We got some water in him, then surveyed the path ahead. It went down into the creekbed, crossed it, then made a sharp turn and up a very steep hill. We decided to hike to the path, even though it was a ways away.

There was a switchback in the climb, and immediately after the switchback were some large rocks in the path. I decided to hike up to the top of the hill to make sure it was passable. Thankfully, it got better, not worse. Still, we decided turning around was the prudent thing to do.

At this point, we'd only gone 0.9 miles on the rough trail, and it had taken us 45 minutes including 25 minutes of trail scouting and resting. It doesn't seem like very far, but we were very tired, and I was concerned about three places we'd have to encounter by turning back. First was the hill. We could see it behind us. Second, one of the creek crossings had a four-foot drop on it. The drop wasn't straight down, but it was fairly significant. Finally, there were a lot of difficult creek crossings.

After resting some more, we decided to have Dad go first. I'd follow, which would allow me to help him if he dropped his bike or got stuck. Dad headed up the hill, and I hopped on my bike, planning on turning it around and following him. I promptly dropped the bike on a downhill slope (well past 90 degrees). So I struggled getting it picked up and still had to turn around and go up the steep hill!

The hillclimb was incredibly difficult, and it was much longer than we'd remembered. I was getting hopeful when I was over halfway and hadn't seen Dad- perhaps he made it to the top okay. Unfortunately, I then spotted him. He was laying off the trail with his bike on its side. He had taken his helmet and jacket off, so I knew he was at least alive.

When I reached him, he said that he'd hurt his ankle, hit his head, and he was overheating. I gingerly got his boots and socks off to help him cool down, then got his riding pants off, then stood so that he had some human shade. Apparently he got the bike off the trail, which meant going into large boulders. He managed to get back onto the trail, but the drop onto the trail meant the bike effectively highsided. He didn't know quite how he hit his head, or exactly how his ankle got hurt- but the boot was partly blown off his ankle.

We discussed what to do next. Dad could walk up to the top of the hill and I could ferry both bikes, then we could ride ahead to the next tough section. I contemplated using the HELP or 911 buttons on the SPOT tracker. (the HELP button contacts Tamara, the 911 button sends search and rescue). Dad was thinking that I'd ride the bikes to the top until he stood up- ouch. Finally he decided that riding was probably the lesser of evils.

After more resting, he hopped on. I got geared up, but waited until he got going. About 30 feet up the trail he had a slight issue staying on-track. That's typical in this type of riding, but I jogged up to keep him stable. He lost his forward momentum, but once he got it going again he was fine. I went back, caught my breath, and rode up the hill (stalling in almost exactly the same spot!).

Our next major obstacle was the "step-up". Dad stopped before it, took his gear off, and had me take both bikes up it. He then waited near the step in case I needed help. The real issue is that the step occurred right in a u-turn, just after a creekbed. I took the first bike and lined it up to the step. I then ran through the maneuver in my mind. The only way I could make it was by pinning the throttle. Easier said than done.

As soon as I started accelerating, the bike dropped into the tiny creekbed. It's really just a wash, perhaps three feet wide. Since it is on a hill, there is no silt- it is made up of softball-sized rocks. Out of (bad) instinct, I cut the throttle, then immediately realized my mistake and gave it full throttle. I barely made it up the step-up, so I then fell at the top. Thankfully, I fell into the hillside, so the bike was still almost upright.

I then went back to the second bike, caught my breath, and repeated the maneuver. This time went much better- I stayed in the throttle and popped up to the top perfectly. I was pretty proud of that!

The rest of the ride out of the trail went smoothly. I misjudged one crossing- I tried to "cut" the corner to the downhill side and noticed at the last moment that the creekbed was washed out. A quick correction and some awkward clutch work fixed that.

When I got back to the intersection between the creek and the road, Dad wasn't there. I was surprised- he knew the approximate distance to the intersection, and the plan was to forge ahead using the road. I looked around and spotted him backtracking to the south along the road we came in on. I waited a little while, hoping he'd see me and come back. When he didn't, I started racing to catch up to him. After a while, I realized that too was futile, so I stopped in a place where I could see far ahead so he'd see I was stopped. That worked, and he finally stopped and came back.

We then went back to the intersection (for the third time!). We went about 20 feet on the road, which put us in a position we could see the road go through the wash. The problem was that the road disappeared! We couldn't see where it went through the wash, nor where the road was on the other side. Since Dad was already hurt, we took the prudent choice to turn around.

From this point, the trip back was fairly easy. The first few miles were very dusty, as it was an infrequently traveled road that was about half dirt and half silt (aka 'fesh-fesh'). We passed our range cows again, as well as the test mineshaft and gypsum. Not long after leaving Arizona, the road became wide enough that we could ride side-by-side so we weren't eating each others' dust.

Overall, it was a fun day with a very difficult section. The bikes came home well-scratched, even the semi-pristine new bike. Dad came out of the situation even worse: hurt foot/ankle, sore hip, and a sore rib.

As an addendum, two days later we went to the local urgent care clinic. They took x-rays of his chest and foot/ankle, then determined he didn't have anything broken, just some major ankle damage (swelling, spraining, etc). That means he's okay to do what he wants without worrying about further damage- the doctor said "let pain be your guide."