I left wherever I slept last night late. Certainly too late to arrive in Yuma AZ by one. Or two. Maybe I arrived about two. The serendipitous thing is I’ve been semi on the lookout for when the correct alignment of geography, fatigue level, sense of urgency and daylight occurs which will as per the prophecies, mark when the next chain cleaning and lubing will occur: Zeke is solemnly proclaiming the realms did in fact align today; the trailhead actually had a Park Tool stand provided to hang a bike. Destiny cannot be avoided my children.

Plus, my extreme case of feffing resulted in the good fortune of riding with a certain M J from Minnesota who is also down here as a break from the cold. The short of it is a car pulls up and out comes a bike with a coil shock (!). What can this mean? (Coils add weight typically for linear progression I think maybe something else regardless which mean folks who luv the downhill, generally.) Perhaps these trails are zestier than believed. Then I see it’s a Mongoose, not necessarily known for having a championship down hill race team that I’be heard of and I frequent pinkbike.com. And this guy fricking rides it. Bald tires to boot. No front brake I was told. No way that fork even moves. Plastic pedals. I’m jealous of the kickstand. He is a strong rider and is a road cyclist too. So he’s ridden here, has a plan and thankfully the patience needed to deal with my slow self. And at last we are off and folks these trails offer minimal traction with all the continuous pebbles through cantaloupe sized stuff coating the trail unless it was just sand; it is so loose. Maybe this is what fatter tires are for. Not my trail buddy: at most he is ridding on something half the with of my tires probably being generous but no matter as I am witness to the way he can plow through it on those no kidding hands down bald tires because he has literally worn away the tread. Front and back. Word of the day is slippery. Much of the time the trails are rather narrow too. Confidence drainingly so. Because of the literally right there 45 degree drop offs. Which had almost zero vegetation. Like Haleakala, so desolate. Above 75 F while we were out for those 3 hours. In the summer? Wow it must be a scorcher. To summarize, he did have a big ride in mind and didn’t get a flat.

🚌

The camp spot is reached by driving up a fine dirt road that has no less than three 2-4 acre sized levelish places on the road’s north side. Apparently quite popular, as even the high one where the larger vehicles may have an issue reaching, where I am, has quite number of “boondockers”; the lowest is packed!

The spinach, cheese, onion, avocado and red pepper thing with those 2 eggs was scrumptious. The accompanying bread fried in coconut oil well paired.