I don’t plan ahead on bike tours. Like, practically at all. The only exception is when I know a tricky stretch is coming up (such as the section from Ludlow to Needles), where a mistake could be really painful, or even dangerous.
So when I stop at the end of a day, I look ahead on the route, consult the Adventure Cycling addenda for late-breaking changes (this has actually mattered exactly ONCE, back in 2019), study the terrain (is it really hilly?), the rain forecast (am I going to get wet?), and the wind forecast (am I going to be grinding into a headwind all day?), and then try to line up a place to sleep and spots to get food and water along the way.
Last night, planning today’s ride, I was a little surprised to see that the 100-mile stretch from Gallup to Grants didn’t have much in the way of lodging, food, or water, at least according to the ACA map. But Google Maps turned up an interesting B&B that rents out RVs (Mountain Harmony Retreat), a reasonable distance down the road. Then I found a highly rated cafe just past El Morro National Monument (Ancient Way Cafe), so dinner was sorted too. The cafe turned out to be amazing, and tonight I have an air-conditioned RV with WiFi and a picture window looking out on the sandstone cliffs to the south.
When I rolled out of my motel before sunrise, the roads were still wet from last night’s rain, but the sky right above me was clear. Off to the east I could see lightning flickering inside a distant bank of clouds, so far away I couldn’t hear a rumble of thunder. There’s something about pedaling out into that: wet pavement hissing under the tires, a cool morning, and a whole storm putting on a silent light show on the horizon while the shoulder ahead of me stayed dry.
And then the sun came up, and I started what became an all-day habit of just saying “Wow” out loud to nobody.
Everything out here feels turned up a notch. The sky is bluer, the clouds are whiter and piled higher, the cliffs redder. Great towers of cumulus stacked up over the mesas as the day warmed, brilliant white against a blue so deep it almost hums, their flat bottoms and cauliflower tops climbing thousands of feet into the air. Beneath them, the land ran out in every direction: pale grass, dark green junipers dotted across it, and salmon-and-cream sandstone bluffs along the edges. Yellow rabbitbrush (chamisa as we called it when I was a child) was blooming along the side of the road, so bright it almost glowed.
New Mexico is my original home state, and I probably can’t be objective about it. But this is honestly one of the most beautiful sections of road I have ever ridden.
When I got to the B&B, I chatted with Jeff, the owner, who let me use a hose to rinse the last of the mud off my bike. This morning I’d left $5 for the housekeeper at last night’s motel, because even though I’d been careful, many dried clods of clay had fallen off the bike overnight. Well, it’s ALL gone now, and yesterday’s hardship is now a cherished memory.
Leave a Reply