Miles Friday: 161
Hours in the saddle: 4:17
Friday morning we stopped at a post office in Flagstaff to send some more things home. It took a large and medium box. Some of it was souvenirs and things that replaced other things, but we’re also just realizing that there is stuff we’re not going to use. This is our 2nd post office trip and we have now sent 2 large and one medium flat rate boxes home. Jaron downsized from a 20L bag to a 10L bag, and now we have an extra bag for hanging a bear bag. Julie has eliminated a few things here and there and made closing her panniers easier.
We were forewarned that the Inn we were staying at Friday night does not have internet. It probably doesn’t have cell service, either, so over breakfast we downloaded maps and took screen shots of places we were interested in. Update: there is cell aervice.
We were lazy this morning, driving from a cooler place to a cooler place and not realizing that it would be triple digit temperatures in between. We stopped more often and had more electrolytes and it went a lot better than last time. Last time we were probably still acclimating to altitude, too. It got up to 105 according to the Tigress’ thermometer. I mean, when it cooled off to 99, we were feeling pretty good.
Our route took us past the Vermillion Cliffs. Whoa, it was fucking spectacular. At one point we were completely surrounded by cliffs and canyon walls as far as you could see. Sorry, Jaron did not have the Go Pro set up today. The road was mostly straight but the views were awesome. There were these striped rock formations that almost looked like dunes in shape but had layers in different colors including greenish.
We are settled in at the Jacob Lake Inn, which has a restaurant. The gentleman at the Forest Service station gave us some super helpful info on dispersed camping and we bought a couple of maps. The town of Jacob Lake consists of the Inn, the Forest Service ranger station, and a gas station all next to each other. We will have patronized all of the businesses by tomorrow morning when we hit the gas station.
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Miles Saturday: 40
Hours in the saddle: 1:23
Drops: 1
Well, camping didn’t work out. It monsooned on us during our ride to the north rim — we saw small hail accumulate on us. The ranger at the north rim visitor center advised us against camping near the rim due to lightening exposure. The area we were thinking of going did not have the view that we wanted. There were little cabins all around so we checked and they had a vacancy due to a cancellation, so we took it.
Side note: this is the first time it rained on us, 2 weeks in to our trip. Jaron started referring to supposed monsoons. At the south rim, a sign on an overlook mentioned monsoons and I pointed out that the government believed that they existed.
We had lunch at a cafe and then wandered around to see the views. While the north rim was less developed, it was still too peopley. And it seems like the development draws a different crowd than who usually comes to see the outdoors. We were sitting enjoying the view, and a family with giggly teenagers comes literally in front of us to take pictures. There was a back porch with nice views, but people were drinking and being loud so we left to find somewhere more quiet to watch the sun set. So in conclusion: the Grand Canyon is spectacular, but we were disappointed in the experience that we had because of the disney land/country club atmosphere.
Jaron did some online stalking and found that the National Park Service let a 15 year contract for a company to provide services for the north rim, and the government gets 9.4% of gross reciepts.
We had dinner at the Grand Canyon Lodge, which was built in 1928. It is a pretty solid piece of construction. A chipmunk got in to the dining room and we overheard a waiter telling a table that the park service had to take care of it. Ah, government contracting.
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Miles Sunday: 119
Hours in the saddle: 3:11
Drops: 0
Sunday we headed to Page, AZ to see our last desert sights befor heading to Colorado. The drive was amazeballs. It took us back through the Vermillion Cliffs and then through some red mountains. It was very pretty and the road was right up next to the mountain. There were signs that said “watch for rocks” (falling), and Julie was so distracted by the views that Jaron suggested that she instead “watch for ROAD”. We went from 8200 ft elevation down to 3500. As we approached Page, you could see the landscape change from red rocks to white rocks.
We got a hotel on Lake Powell, which is apparently inside a national park or recreation area. At the south rim last week, the ranger at the fee station suggested that we get an annual pass for $80 and applied our $30 that we paid at the Petrified Forest to it. Otherwise it would have been $30/bike just for that. Anyway, it was a great idea, because it got us in to Lake Powell, too. (And, our hotel is run by Aramark, a service provider for Lake Powell National Park).
This is the view from our hotel room. It’s pretty hypnotic.
[will update w/ pic when I’m on non-shitty internet]
We arrived by 1:00 and crashed out for a couple of hours before dinner. It got up to 108. Watched the sunset from our porch, and then had a cool lightening show.
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