 August 14th – Day 46
Angels Landing!
Today’s hike wasn’t ever on our original agenda, but since we decided against the backcountry trip we had a chance to get in one more hike before leaving Zion. We are all very glad that it worked out that way because Angel’s Landing was one heck of a hike. It isn’t very physically demanding, being a 2.5 mile hike up about 1500 ft, but the last half mile will make your boots shake a bit. Once you finish climbing their paved path to intersection of the West Rim Trail, the real fun begins. The trail turns into a knife ridge where you have to climb on the side of the ridge with thousand ft. drop offs on each side. Needless to say, now is not the time to throw a water bottle at Lee and say, ‘think fast!’…
There are places along the trail were metal chains are bolted into the rock to give you something to hold onto as the trail becomes narrower and steeper. The path at some points is literally only a meter or two wide which means you better not be afraid of jumping off the high dive at the pool at this point. As Lynn pointed out, “The Angels Landing Trail is one of the most famous and thrilling hikes in the national park system. Zion's pride and joy runs along a narrow rock fin with dizzying drop-offs on both sides. The trail culminates at a lofty perch, boasting magnificent views in every direction. Rarely is such an intimidating path so frequented by hikers. One would think that this narrow ridge with deep chasms on each of its flanks would allure only the most intrepid of hikers. Climbers scale its big wall; hikers pull themselves up by chains and sightseers stand in awe at its stunning nobility. The towering monolith is one of the most recognizable landmarks in the Southwest."
The scrambling, cliff dangling, and climbing are well worth it because the views from the top of Angel’s Landing are simply incredible. We were rewarded with panoramic views of the entire valley, the Narrows Canyon and Virgin River, the White Throne (a rock formation…), and Jimmy Hoffa’s final resting place. Ok, that is in Giant’s stadium. Unfortunately for us the escalator down was having maintenance work done and not working today, so we had to climb back down the knife ridge the way we came up. What also made this climb a bit more challenging for me at least was the fact that I was wearing my Crocs since they were the only shoes I had that could handle the blisters on the feet from the day before. After going up and down this trail, I think Crocs can think about launching a new line of shoes called ‘Croc Climbing shoes’…I was very impressed.
Once reaching the canyon floor, the Virgin River was calling us again for a very refreshing dip. Climbing Angel’s Landing was one of the highlights from the past few weeks, a truly memorable climb, and are really glad that we actually got the chance to experience it.
-Brent
 Day 45 – August 13th
The Narrows!
Once we reached the backcountry office of Zion National Park at 7 AM (when they opened their doors) to acquire our backcountry permit to camp overnight in the Narrows, we got some very unsettling news. The weather forecast for the day called for a 50% chance of rain at the headwaters of the Virgin River, which doesn’t sound like much of a big deal, but is when you are considering walking down a river that is prone to flash floods and has 1000+ ft. canyon walls on each side of it preventing any kind of escape. In addition, we would each also have to pay a pricey shuttle to take us to the top of the river (hour and a half ride), which would put us closer to the afternoon shower time zone. As much as we wanted to spend the night in the Narrows we decided we liked living too much and didn’t want to part with any more greenbacks, even though I am sure we would have been just fine. What we decided to do was the more traditional hike UP the Virgin river, which would still take us through the famous Wall St. section of the river and make it to the first campground upriver as a day hike. This would also allow us to do another day hike the following day since we budgeted two days in Zion. On our way to the beginning of the hike we met David Hatwell who was a very nice man and turned out to know several of the same people as Niki’s father since they are in the same industry. He was on quite a whirlwind trip himself and headed to Vegas next.
Once we reached the trail head and got in the river, the hike is a very surreal experience. You are hiking up a river that is probably no wider than 40 ft with thousand ft. canyon walls rising above you on each side. The Virgin river methodically cut out this canyon, straight down, over millions of years and now here we are hiking up it. You have to pick and choose your steps carefully since there are plenty of large rocks to navigate along the riverbed, which is why a walking stick makes it much easier. Some areas of the canyon don’t ever see light and others are lit up at certain times of the day since the canyon walls are so steep. We hiked up the canyon about 6 miles to Big Springs slowly becoming the only people hiking upriver before turning around. The hiking truly was an awesome experience. What wasn’t an awesome experience was walking in the one size too small Nike’s I had bought (bad $4 spent) at the thrift store in Monticello for the hike and Muddy Buddy. After 6 miles, I had worn some good sized blisters on the backs and tops of my feet which made for a tender walk back.
On the way back down the river, we took a side trip down Orderville Canyon, which is one of the more popular side canyons that gets even narrower. We didn’t make it too far up this side canyon, but was interspersed with small waterfalls to climb over.
Even though we didn’t get to spend the night in the Narrows, we didn’t feel cheated out of anything since we got to do a long day hike and experience a long portion of the canyon with about the same mileage as we would have done. Plus, the hike we were about to take the following day was going to blow our socks off…
-Brent
 Day 43 + 44 – August 11th + 12th
Since we had a bit of extended time in Moab and now being mobile since Niki met us, we had the chance to take a short drive to see Arches National Park. We caught it just at the right time too and got to see some of the arches right around sunset. The fading light really brings out the amazing red colors of the magnificent rock and truly was a memorable night. We did not have the time to make it to see Delicate Arch, but were able to get to the North and South Window Arches to get some great shots of them and the sunset.
The following day was filled with a lot of driving to get across the state of Utah and down to the state of Arizona to see the Grand Canyon. We got a little preview of what we will be seeing once we get back on the bikes going West through Utah and I will hold off on the description of it now, but from the looks of it is going to be a really amazing ride. Though I have a sneaking suspicion that we may be shedding a bit more sweat than we did with the car windows down.
We got to the North rim of the Grand Canyon in the early afternoon, just in time for some afternoon showers. Both Niki and Lee had never seen the Grand Canyon before and after this much time in the car, very ready to see it. Both thought the canyon was beautiful and impressive but unfortunately did not have the best viewing day for it with the rain and a bit of haze. This was my first visit to the North Rim and after seeing both, I think the South Rim has much more impressive awe-inspiring views, but that is just my opinion. Also, I am very glad we made the executive decision to drive here rather than bike, which would have been a multiple day, hot, climb intensive ride, only for a few hours at the canyon. I believe we chose wisely…
After spending some time at the canyon, we were back in the car to make it to Zion for the night to get an early start to the hike the following day.
-Brent
Arches National ParkGrand Canyon
As Brent said in the last post this is the section of the trip where we leave the bikes for about 10 days and do some “other” activities. It’s hard to believe this section of the trip is here. We left our bikes in Monticello, UT on the 9th and will pick them back up again the 20th to finish out the 1200 miles left to San Francisco.
Niki met up with us again in Moab, UT and the three of us headed to the Grand Canyon. The Canyon was with out a doubt spectacular and we thought about how crazy it must have been to be one of the first pioneers exploring the west and stumble upon the canyon: DETOUR. After seeing the Canyon we headed back North to southwestern Utah and Zion National Park, which really feels like you’re on another planet with all the beautiful red rock. Yesterday we hiked the famed “Narrows” up the Virgin River. Basically you walk up the actual river through the canyon and the further upstream you walk the narrower the canyon walls get, only 10 feet across in certain sections. The hike was staggeringly beautiful, however the blisters on Brent’s feet at the end of the day from his one size too small, $4 thrift store Nikes were not. Fortunately my $4 Asics held up ok and caused no serious damage. The Narrows took us the entire day to hike about 6 miles in and 6 out. We’re planning to do the “Angel’s Landing” trail today, which supposedly has the best lookout over Zion Canyon.
Tomorrow Niki and I will drive to Jackson Hole, Wyoming to meet up with my wife Melissa and the rest of her family for a bit and Brent will head to Denver to meet up with some of his friends and climb Pyramid Peak, a 14er in Colorado. Brent and I meet up again in Denver the 18th and then race the Muddy Buddy Race in Boulder on the 19th. We then make our way back to Monticello, UT to pick up the bikes and finish out the ride to San Fran.
Also we wanted to put a reminder out there for why we’re actually doing this bike trip. 1. To raise money for a great Charity, The Lance Armstrong Foundation. 2. Because Brent and I both have “Bike Across the Country” on our Life-Lists and 3. To encourage others to create their Life-Lists on eLIFELIST.com and be aware and invigorated about all the things they want to do, see and experience in their lifetime.
Please help us in reaching our fund raising goal of $20,000 for the Lance Armstrong Foundation.
Thanks to everyone that has been following us so far and donated to LAF, we promise to continue to constantly update the blog with as much content as possible. Pictures and videos from Zion will be up soon. Cheers!
-Lee and Brent
 August 10th – Day 42
Porcupine Rim!
We have reached the point of the trip where we will be taking a break from the daily biking and expanding the things we do on the trip by actually riding in a car for several days. After biking to Monticello, UT, we locked away the bikes and trailers in a guy’s shed that we found who was nice enough to let us store them for several days. So the first stop of stage 2 of the trip is Moab, UT.
After a short ride(50 miles) North, not on a bike, we arrived to check off another item from both of our lists, mountain bike Moab. Mountain biking in Moab is kind of like the Mecca of this sport and neither one of us had really biked West of the Mississippi, so we were both excited to finally have a chance to do this. We knew it was going to be extremely different than the biking we were used to, which turned out to be REALLY different than what we were both used to.
We signed on to go for a tour on the Porcupine Rim trail with the Chile Pepper Bike company since our touring bikes wouldn’t exactly cut it out here. Porcupine Rim is one of the more popular rides in the area, though not for the faint of heart. It is a pretty technical trail with the last 3 miles being all single-track down the side of a canyon wall, with not too much room for error. We got a couple sweet Cannonade Prophet dual-suspension bikes that we were ready to give a punishment to. The punishment turned out to be not just on the bikes today, but more so on the people riding them. It began with a 3 mile climb up wide rocky ledges that took us a little while to get the hang of climbing these ledges. After the climbing, the following description of the trail didn’t come from me, rather I took it straight from the Utah Mountain Biking site so it can properly be described by a ‘professional’…
“The real ride begins at the Rim. This is primo downhill advanced technical stuff, dropping off a gazillion small rocky ledges, with the last 3 miles a hairy single-track on the edge of deadly cliffs. From the Rim, you'll drop 2,700 vertical feet to the Colorado River over 11 unforgettable miles.
Once we reached the top of the climb, we had an amazing view of Castle Valley and really took a moment to soak it all in. After a few miles of the downhill and both of our confidences and speeds were rising, I took my first big spill of the day. I was riding on the left side of the trail gaining speed over some of the ledges, must have picked a bad line and shot myself off the trail into a nice tree/bush. After accessing the damage from the spill, the bike was fine(very important) but I had taken a few bruises. What I thought was my biggest injury, a sprained thumb, turned out not to be the worst of it. I must have decided that I wanted to take a souvenir home from the rim because I had somehow lodged a piece of the tree/bush into my calf, which I was not able to fully remove with the tweezers and knife we had with us after plenty of digging around. So we kept riding, having a great time, while taking several more beatings along the way.
While riding behind Lee, I came across him a couple of times with him laying face down on the rock with his bike several feet away, moaning. Lee got pretty banged up too with his worst injury coming less than 150 yards from the end of the trail. The last mile got extremely technical and we won’t lie, we had to walk several of the drops that at this point didn’t think even a professional mountain biker could ride cleanly. We were assured that it was feasible, but at least not for us in our beat up state.
Once we finished an extremely fun day’s ride we were done… We had plenty of bruises, cuts, and scrapes and knew that we were going to be walking around like old men for the rest of the day and tomorrow. After a brief lunch, I got a ride to the local clinic to get the ‘souvenir’ removed from my leg so it didn’t get infected. They had to do a bit of cutting since it was really lodged in there, but eventually pulled this guy out.
Porcupine Rim was really a different riding experience for both of us and we picked up several new skills to apply to our next ride, but it really beat us up pretty good. We would both totally do it again tomorrow, if we weren’t so sore…
-Brent
Absolutely "Colorful Colorado"
 Montrose to Telluride
After seeing the Black Canyon and a good ride from Gunnison to Montrose we had some dinner at Chili’s and then moved on to find the campground in Montrose. We were moving quickly to set up before the rain, we have become experts at setting up our camp in 5 minutes before the rain can get there. Like clockwork, not 10 minutes after we had set up camp the rain began and stayed the whole night while we in Montrose. Our tents held up well against the downpours.
A little background on this campground, Belinda a former truck driver runs the park and lives in one of the RV’s that is perminantly parked there. She told us stories of how the campground “used” to gave drug dealers and be kind of unsafe but that she had really cleaned it up and had her 12 gauge to back it up. We felt good about that. We woke up to pouring rain again the morning we were biking to Telluride, so we packed up our wet gear and hit the road.
We had one good climb over “Dallas Divide” and went through some nasty road construction heading into Telluride. The three mile detour off our route to Telluride was more than worth it. Telluride is just about the most ideal “Ski Town” imaginable. We camped in the city park right by a river and had a gorgeous view of Telluride Peak. We set up our tents hoping to dry them out a bit and then the rain came again. After the rain passed we headed to town for some dinner at the Cornerhouse. After thoroughly stuffing ourselves we grabbed a drink at a local bar and then headed back to the campsite. We ended a great day of riding with cigars by the river, accompanied by some lightening looming far off in the distance. Going to bed we braced ourselves for another night of rainstorms. If you can ever go to Telluride, do, great place.
 August 5th – Day 36
Monarch Pass!
After looking at this pass for the past week on the map, we were fully prepared to kick it in the butt. We were expecting the worst and it actually turned out to be fairly easy. Yes, it was high and long, but it really was not too steep. So we just had our bikes in a low gear and methodically cranked it out while really only taking one break for the entire morning. We both thought that the climbs in the Smokey’s were much tougher. It could be because we think that they are graded higher or it could be that we have been biking now straight for over a month. Most likely it is a combination of both. Regardless, we made it up to the top when this jeep could not. We were passed by a huge number of motorcycles on our way up, which at our one stop for the day came to find out was the BMW club having their annual 100,000 ft of climbing ride. There were 330 bikes that would do over 350 miles of riding and 100,000 ft of ascent and descent in just one day. Oh, it must be nice to have a motorized vehicle.
Unfortunately the traffic camera on top of the mountain did not quite work out like we had planned. We were not smarter than the camera, and it did not update every 10 minutes like we had thought, but pretty much whenever it felt like it. We have heard from several people that there was a sighting of our bikes and trailers there, but not us. What also didn’t help was that there was no cell phone coverage for either of us up there. Trust us, we did make it up and hopefully this picture can support our claim.
Our weather for the climb up was great, which helped to make it easier, though was a completely different story on the way down. After about two minutes of flying down the other side of the mountain, it decided to hail on us, which made for an extremely cold ride down. This weather pattern was not limited to just our descent, but turned out to be a continual rain for the next 40 miles…awesome. Despite our best efforts to stay dry, we were both soaked and didn’t really feel like setting up our tents in the rain. Once we rolled into our final town of the day, Gunnison, we decided to spring for a motel room to try and dry up all of our gear. We quickly realized that Gunnison was booming this night and not one room was available in the whole town, which included about 15 hotels/motels. What reason could possibly explain such a shortage of rooms? The monster truck rally was in town….
Anyway, while we were trying to decide what to do for the night in the check in of the Super 8 Motel, we were fortunate enough to run into Dan. Dan worked at the motel and offered for us to stay at his place for the night if nothing turned up. He worked at the motel part time and also in Crested Butte, where he is able to get in 100 days of skiing a year. His flexible schedule allows him to do what he really enjoys, which is spend time in the outdoors. After only a few days in Colorado, we are both really blown away by the relaxed attitudes and passion Coloradoans have for the outdoors. We have both been to the state before, but never quite experienced it like this.
Dan is a very intense back country hiker and has already climbed 32 of the 54 14ers in Colorado in just two and a half years, which is very impressive. He turned out to be a very nice, laid back guy, who was nice enough to offer us a place to stay for the night in his trailer.
We roamed around Gunnison, had a great dinner at Katie's Kookery with live music, and enjoyed some beverages at a local bar. Gunnison quickly rose to be one of our favorite places so far on the trip. It is a great little mountain town.
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