Thanx to the crew at Bikes & Beans in Oak Creek (especially Craig for the crash spot). A great shop with a good cup of coffee.
Sedona was the start to a long slury of red rocks and countless canyons. We got in some good scrambling around Cathedral and Bell rocks and then pedaled up to Flagstaff and out across the sprawling plateaus and crumbling ridges of the Arizonian Navajo Reservation.
The Irishmen and I dropped into the very top end of the Grand Canyon Park at Lee's Ferry and had no problem poaching a campspot on the clear, cold Colorado river. We gave the North Rim a miss, concluding that this was a damnn big canyon in itself and climbed out to drop back down to Page on Lake Powell.
Out and around to the east toward Monument Valley we pedaled a few hundred more miles of Navajo land (Where we we're treated friendlier in villages and spyed with much less speculation when asking for a corner of property to sleep on than in other places).
Monument Valley was Faneffintastic in its disrobed and bold rock scenery. Miles and miles of huge and random craggy spires slowly eroding them selves for the masses. I really did feel like an ant crawling through this enormous Mars like rock garden.
In Mexican Hat, Utah we met Jay a cyclist from New York. He had left the Bay Area about the same time as us and rode across Nevada. We waded in the silty San Juan river, traded travel stories then said good-bye to go our seperate directions.
On we rode trough towns like Blanding and Monticello. We met another Dutch cyclist named Yap, who had just ridden out fron the east coast.
And then One sunny Morning we stumbled into The Mecca. The longer and arduous the journey is all the more to confirm ones faith. I could easily find myself living happily in Moab. Every few places downtown seemed like iether a coffee shop or a bike shop. Everywhere you looked were Mtn. bikes, There are hundreds of miles of legal single track trails and the weather is perfect most of the year long. I now believe the hype and have proven my faith. I willl be back to sample those trails, possibly spin some wrenches and sip coffee from the anodized Grail.
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