Friday Evening, 15 September
Day 6
Another big climbing day, leaving Cottonwood, descending to the Verde River Valley, then climbing again to 7000 feet and riding the winding roads through pine forests of the Colorado Plateau. Same wind that blew us up Mingus Mountain yesterday became headwinds when we turned southwest. I remember this day fondly from when I rode this tour eleven years ago. This year I didn’t get to do the climb because it was my work day.
Instead I made Pop’s Macaroni Slop for lunch. I sort of invented this recipe fifteen years ago. I thought it tasted great but Martha informed me it really sucked. Then she taught me how to make it right. The riders love it and I get credit for it.
Rider Stories
Waukegan John got to ride 15 bonus miles after he turned the wrong way at an intersection and rolled 7 1/2 miles downhill, had to turn around and come back into the wind. That gave him 132 miles for today.
I chatted with Indiana Chris at Lunch. Turns out the guy I thought was his brother is actually his dad. That means we have a father-son team, in addition to a brother-brother team, and three married couples on this trip. Unusual for Pactour.
Orlando Chris told me how he has never climbed hills like he has in the past couple days. I asked him how he trained, and he said the highest hill outside Orlando is 30 above sea level. He goes up a and down a lot.
Steilacoom Paul collapsed in the parking lot at lunch. He still doesn’t know I took his picture.
Crew Snapshot
To start the day, we stopped at Walmart and bought fourteen bags of ice. The nice old lady who was standing guard at the door wouldn’t let me leave without seeing a receipt first. She said people try to rip them off regularly.
Tech Note Postscript
I’m beginning to hate WordPress. The layout of this page sucks. It looks right in edit mode, then is jacked up in display mode. I want to ditch WordPress and just write html and everything will be exactly where it’s supposed to be. No I’m too tired. Long day tomorrow.
