In God's Country

As we have continued this adventure of ours, something odd has stood out to me. Time and places really have no meaning. Let me explain. If you had asked me this morning what day of the week it was, what the date was, or even what time it was, I couldn't have really told you (unless I asked Lee who's handy Ironman watch could give you those sort of details). The days run together and as we go further on, the towns we ride through do the same. The one thing that does distinguish one day from another and one place from some other place are the people you meet.

My last post left off in Escalante, as we were attempting to escape some of the 100 degree heat in the area. Later that night, we pulled into Boulder right around dark, with no place to sleep and no food to eat (obviously determination and not foresight is our strongpoint). As we rolled into town, we met a lady on horseback, who's first question to us was, "You boys have a place to stay tonight?" We gave the negative reply, and she then invited us to camp on her farm, as long as we didn't mind the horses and cows, about a mile down the road. Things were already looking up. Next to attend to our hunger. We went to the grocer, but it had just closed, next a diner, but it too was closed, we finally pulled up to another diner, which was to be open for 2 more minutes. Instead of shooing us away, they welcomed us in and gave us a 10% discount on our meal. Life was good, could it get better?

The next morning after waking up amidst the mooing of cows, neighing of horses and quacking of a goose (apparently keeping them in a hen house is a deterrent for foxes), we made our way back to our friendly diner from our fortuitous evening before. We ordered breakfast which was by no means small (I feel compelled here to note that the meals which we partake of could probably feed six normal people, I for example had a veggie omellete, a fruit dish, hash browns, two pancakes, and an english muffin, and my compatriots meals were of similar sizes). As we were eating a gentleman approached and began chatting with us about our trip. This has actually become fairly commonplace to us. At almost every stop we make at least one, and usually two or three people, will talk to us about what we're doing. What happened later was less than commonplace. I had removed my self from the table to attend to some other business.....anyhow, on my return Lee and Wes explained to me that the guy who had talked to us had also picked up our ticket (again, think back to the amount of food x 3). We spent at least five minutes trying to figure out how to thank him without being awkward, and finally settled upon a direct approach. He was incredibly gracious and wished us luck and said he was happy to be a part of our journey. Yeah, life is good, and keeps getting better.

Well, we hit out from Boulder, climbed a 10,000 ft. mountain and headed Hanksville. Life was good, but it was about to get a little tricky for the next couple days. We had been trying to avoid the heat as much as possible, but there was no avoiding the heat wave that hit us after we left Hanksville. Let me give a little info first on what lay ahead of us, or I should say what didn't lay ahead of us. For the next 124 miles there was nothing. Well, there was one gas station located 50 miles in at Lake Powell (a reservoir for the Colorado River) Ranger station, however, the gas station thought it was to maintain hours only from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. Well, we set out from Hanksville at 7:30 a.m. and biked the fifty miles to the gas station/ranger station. Now we were in a pickle. By 9 that morning temps had reached well over 90 and by 11, when we arrived at the station the thermometer read 105 in the shade. It was pretty hot. Not only that, but the next 74 miles were uphill almost the entire way. Well, we restocked at the gas station, gorged ourselves on microwaveable burritos and then decided on a plan of attack. We would sleep/rest/stay in the shade all day. And that we did. from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. we did not leave the ranger station (which fortunately had a sheltered picnic area where we set up camp along with another bicyclist named Chuck who was in a similar situation as us). Chuck, our new found friend was a middle school teacher from Durango who did solo tours during the summer for fun. He had arranged for someone to give him a ride to Blanding (our destination as well). He shared his dinner with us while we waited and was fun to talk to (I think all three of us were excited about a fourth person for conversation). Well, his ride came, and we stayed there until 8. That's when our fun began.

We had decided to ride through the night to Blanding, and that we did, not the whole way but within 18 miles of the town. The ride was incredible. Tiring, mentally exhausting, but incredible. Our location of "in the middle of nowhere" made our view of the stars spectacular. We counted more than 20 shooting stars, and that was just during our break time, during which we would lie down on the road and just look up (don't worry, we were passed by two cars the whole evening, and could hear them well before we could see them). We pulled over to the side of the road at 2:00 a.m., threw the tarp on the ground and went to sleep. The next morning we woke up at 6, biked into Blanding, then pushed on to Dolores, Colorado (Yep, new state!). Getting to Dolores put us at 304 miles in three days, through probably the toughest terrain we will face. We felt accomplished, but exhausted.

Dolores was two nights ago. Now we're in Montrose, CO, enjoying the generousity of Lee's aunt and uncle, who have put us up in a hotel and taken us out to dinner, all the while making us feel like we were the ones doing them the favor. Yeah, life is good.

Utah and Colorado (at least what we've seen so far) have provided sights that are beyond description. At times, when rounding a bend in the road and you see a canyon, a mountain, or mesa, your mouth goes dry and you realize that you're jaw has been open at about a 120 degree angle for the past five minutes. The rock formations in Utah seemed almost painted and the mountain ranges in Colorado seem out of some western flick. You feel as though you're cycling through a John Wayne film, and at any moment the Duke himself may ride up and say something fitting for the scenery...this of course doesn't happen.

When we first rode into Utah, we came to a scenic overlook parking lot. We stopped to take a picture and asked a lady if she would mind taking one of the three of us. She obliged and asked us if this was our first time in the area. We said yes and she replied, "Well, welcome to God's Country."

If God did have a country, I don't know if Utah would be that place...I just can't make that type of claim with such surety nor back it up with any sort of evidence. However, if I was to make a top ten list of places that might be "God's Country," Utah and Colorado would be on that list. Not only because of the beauty of the area, but because of the people. It wouldn't take too much to convince me that some of the people we've met have been angels...and where else would you find angels than in God's country?