October 2, 2008
the gift, erin, klaus is not my friend, this is the life
Day Eleven
"There ain't no surer way of finding out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them."
- Mark Twain -
"A good friend will always stab you in the front."
- Oscar Wilde -
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I realize I've mentioned it in several other posts, but I'm not a morning person, and there are only a few things I can do before 9:00. Drool, for one. I can sometimes move food towards the general direction of my face, although it only rarely makes it to my mouth. On occasion, I can make sounds, none of which are intelligible, and most of which are made by joints and body parts other than my vocal cords. So please, understand my pain:
Up at 4:30, riding by 5:40.
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I realized something while riding this morning. Only in the sport of bicycling is it socially acceptable for one person to ask another person how their butt is doing. Or maybe a colonoscopy recovery room.
We stopped in Bylas (pop. 1,219) after about forty miles. There, we saw a woman selling some food on the side of the road. A lot of locals were coming by so we thought it would be safe to eat.
Klaus is very interested in Native Americans and began talking to the vendor. His knowledge of Indians comes from American television, a great resource if you want to learn how to give a chihuahua mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, view televangelists as they financially rape the gullible, or watch a reality show about couples who want to have a more "natural" birthing experience by delivering a baby in the Great Outdoors unassisted by modern medicine. However, information regarding Native Americans is less reliable.
He asked questions, very tactfully and innocently, such as, "What kind of dwelling do you live in?" Twila, the woman selling the homemade tamales and frybread, answered his questions and offered us a free tamale. She also introduced us to a few of her friends. One of the women, although a little shy about it, was willing to speak in her native Apache language.
Another woman came by and, when she found out we were traveling across the country on bicycles, exclaimed, "Don't leave! I have a gift for you!"
Her name is Centella, but she goes by Cynthia. When she returned a few minutes later she presented a box of jewelry.... earrings, barrettes, pins, etc. "Take one!" she told us. We each selected an item, and told her how beautiful they were.
"Let me pay you for it," I added.
Almost, but not quite before I finished my sentence, she replied, "Okay." We walked back over to our bikes to get money for our "gifts."
We bought some tamales from Twila, which were exceptional, then went to the grocery store for some other staples.
Just as we were about to leave, another guy on a bike pedaled up. We had actually seen his bike and tent yesterday as we were walking to the Circle K convenience store. I recalled Klaus pointing it out because he makes a game of guessing what country a person is from by looking at their bike, tent, and bags.
His name is Erin Coye, a 38-year-old programmer from Seattle. He had scrimped and saved his money and vacation hours for several years in order to be able to take a cross-country bike trip last year. One week before his planned departure date he injured his knee while playing tennis. He ended up having surgery on it and rehabbed by bicycling.
This year when it came time to go, he just quit his job.
Erin started in Seattle and rode to San Francisco, then through Nevada, past the Grand Canyon and the National Parks in Utah before hooking up with ACA's Southern Tier in Phoenix.
The three of us drafted the final 34 miles. Drafting with one other person is good; drafting with two other people is terrific. We rocketed through Pima, stopped for some milkshakes in Thatcher, and arrived in Safford in record time.
Klaus and I stopped at Safeway to get some groceries while Erin made a trip to WalMart. Erin is planning on staying at a hot springs resort tonight, which sounds great except that it's almost five miles off the route. It didn't even cost more than our campsite.
Klaus is working his way through all of the "typical" American fast food restaurants (McDonald's, Wendy's, Burger King...) so he and I stopped at Arby's.
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Before we go any further in this journal, I want everyone to understand that Klaus is not my friend.
This is a picture of a guy's head, similar in shape to mine, who just took off his helmet, which happens to be similar to mine. As you can see, the hair, similar in color to mine, is in tufts. This is caused by wind coming in through the helmet's MASSIVE AIR-SUCKING VENTS and lifting the hair. This creates a nice cooling effect and has the secondary benefit of giving him a very stylish coiffure which goes quite well with his snot-adorned sleeves and bug-pelted face and arms.
The picture above is clearly NOT ME but I just want to add, rhetorically, of course: Would a real friend let a riding partner walk into a restaurant looking like that? Would a real friend take a picture?
Just asking.
Speaking of hair, I'm on a mission. Although my hair has never looked like the person pictured above, it is time for a haircut. My mission is simple: find a barber shop with a striped pole. I've been looking for the last 500 miles, and the only two I've seen were closed.
I went to one when I was a kid, and every two or three weeks I would climb into Mr. Harden's chair with the razor strop hanging from the side. He would press on the foot pump six or seven hundred times until it brought me up to a level even with the mirror. Twenty minutes later my hair was incrementally shorter, but it then had hair gel in it and I looked fantastic. These local barber shops used to be everywhere, but are being replaced by chains with catchy titles and bored employees who don't earn enough money to show any interest. I will complete my mission, it's just a matter of time.
After we finished eating I stayed at Arby's to blog while Klaus rode to the campsite. By the way, I don't really write down all the time I spend blogging because you would see the word "blogging" about four hundred times a day. Klaus sometimes calls me The Blog Man.
On the way to our campsite I saw a telltale striped pole, and started to get excited. Then I noticed they close at 5:00... It's 5:07.
I continued on to the Safford Ranch Mobile Home Park where we pitched our tents on a concrete slab. We had mobile homes on three sides, but at least there was a shower.
Klaus, industrious as usual, cooked his supper while Mark, lazy as usual, had a pizza from Pizza Hut delivered to his campsite.
Sleeping under the stars (although we couldn't see them for all the lights), having the sounds of nature all around us (although we couldn't hear them because of the buzzing from the air conditioners), sleeping in a tent in the wilderness (except, of course, for the fifty mobile homes surrounding us) on the soft, cool grass (which was a foot beneath the concrete slab we were on)....
....ahhh, this is the life.
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distance: 76.4 miles
average speed: 9.1 mph
maximum speed: 32.9 mph
time on bike: 5:53:26
cumulative miles: 539
Today's ride: 76 miles (122 km)
Total: 537 miles (864 km)
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Interesting you ran into Erin Coye. I remember him from the Crazyguyonabike forums.
4 months ago
4 months ago