(February 8)

Day 45 - Blythe to Brawley CA

Maybe I Wasn't So Dumb After All

 

 

Riding south out of Blythe at dawn. It was a beautiful morning and a wonderful time to be out riding.

My tribe is growing! I met Geoff and Barclay just outside of Palo Verde early in the morning. They began in San Diego just a few days ago and are planning to ride to Florida. This will be Barclay's THIRD Southern Tier trip: the first two trips were each with one of his sons. This is, however, Geoff's maiden tour. I enjoyed our chat and wish we'd had more time to visit!

Another tribesman today :) I met David as I was laboring through the hills going into Glamis. At first I thought he was a local cyclist just out riding since he had no panniers, etc. on his bike, but turns out he, too, is headed to Florida on the Southern Tier but is being fully supported by his daughter (first half of the trip) and his wife (second half of the trip) who drive the car, keep the gear and meet him whenever he's ridden what he wants to ride for the day. David's journal "Simply On a Bike" is also on Crazyguyonabike.com 

 

The sign isn't joking: Glamis really is the "Sand Toy Capital of the World." My stop included a Drumstick ice cream cone because it was darn hot in the desert today and that was just the thing to cool me off a bit.

 

I rode through Tatooine today. No, I really mean that. The Tatooine "dunes" scenes in Star Wars were filmed here, the Imperial Dunes Recreation Area, back in the day.

 

 

I have posted earlier about how wildly idealistic I was when I planned out my "40 days and 40 nights" journey to San Diego. How I quickly realized that those days in which I blithely put "80 miles" or "90 miles" as my planned ride distance was actually laughably implausible. How I thought I...like other bike tourists I'd read about...was going to average 12mph, or so, a day. Only to learn that that, too, was utterly naive.

 

Well, turns out I wasn't actually wrong. I just didn't account for my learning curve in terms of how to set up my touring rig. I didn't know how much towing my trailer with all that extra weight would affect my riding. Now, however, NOW I've proven just what a massive difference it makes when you carry only what you really need AND put it all in panniers.

 

In short...I went beast mode today. Not only did I ride 87 miles, I averaged 12.1 mph AND got up and over about 20 miles of short, steep rollers coming into Glamis. Not only that, the temperature soared today...95 degress from noon until just about when I made it into Brawley.

 

So, yeah, I've got some swagger now. Today, I proved to myself that I really did have what it takes to measure up to the other bike tourers I've met. I'd really felt like a failure because I was so much slower. So much less capable of riding the longer mileage days. Like an impostor; not a REAL bike tourist, just an actor playing one on TV. But today...honestly for the first time since I started this...I feel like I measure up. I know that many readers will say that stuff doesn't matter, but it did to me. I didn't want to be the weak cyclist. The slow cyclist. I knew I wasn't going to be able to reel off 100 mile day after 100 mile day, but I wanted to have at least a 90 miler in me if I needed it. I wanted to be able to go at least as fast as I knew some other bike tourists could go. And now I can.

 

As for the ride itself...it started off perfectly. The road was smooth and flat, the temperature cool, the wind nonexistant and the skies blue. I made it the first 20 miles or so in probably record time for a 20 mile segment. Sure, the road then turned to pitted, rutted, cracked chip seal that nearly jarred the teeth from my face, but that didn't stop me!

 

Sure, the flat route turned into something like 20 miles of short, but quite steep rolling hills that also included a steady climb up and over a small mountain range, but all that didn't stop me either.

Sure, it was 95 degrees throughout the middle of the day when I was, literally, riding through a barren wasteland of a desert, but that didn't stop me either.

 

Nope, I rolled through my planned camping stop at Glamis after 60 miles that it was just too early to stop and camp. So, why not ride? And ride I did: 27 more miles to Brawley. Not only will tomorrow's ride to Ocotillo be quite a bit shorter and more relaxed, I don't have to camp out on Tatooine!