Thursday, September 20, from Bluff UT to Cortez, CO:
You never know.
We awoke in Bluff, UT around 6:00 and packed The Little Darkness without incident. We walked to the convenience store next door to check if it might serve a decent breakfast. I'd stopped there the afternoon before and thought it looked a little sketchy, but Janie had assured me that the woman at the motel said it was great.
The hand lettered sign hanging above the counter offered pizza and burgers. The smaller signs next to the metal holding trays behind the glass offered sausage wraps or bacon wraps, nothing else hot was available. There was a circular wire rack of single serve cereals and the typical convenience store shelving of grocery items and cooler display units. I asked the cook if she could make breakfast wraps without meat. She said her batch of scrambled eggs was empty, it would take ten minutes to make more. She reluctantly agreed. Delicious food on a chilly morning.
Two men sat at the booth next to ours. They spoke German. One struggled to tell me they were on the way to Monument Valley, had been to the Grand Canyon, and would soon fly to San Francisco. I remarked to Joe that we periodically hear foreign languages in Iowa City, a college town, but it's far more common on this trip. Joe, who was away from home two hundred nights last year, much of it in Europe, said that Europeans are fascinated with the American west. They want to see New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, the Grand Canyon, and the American Southwest.
On the road before 7:30 and biking out of Bluff. The sun was bright in my eyes. Cautious to hug the edge of the road as I heard vehicles approach and pass. Crisp morning, temperature in the high forties, and I had on several layers - jacket as well as biking sleeves. The temperature would almost double, at one point reached mid nineties before dropping to the high eighties in Cortez, CO, our destination.
Jody, in his early morning, fight off the cold, cycling clothes.
Jody, rolling out of Bluff, UT, early in the morning.
Janie, rolling out of Bluff, UT, on The Fish.
I kept looking for the Ismay Trading Post that JR Lancaster, the artist we'd met yesterday, had mentioned. I know we biked right past it, but none of us ever saw it. I did see a dark brown horse grazing beside the highway, next door to the Whitehorse High School on Montezuma Creek, UT. It's four legged companion was also unfettered, several yards away from the road. A semi truck passed me on the opposite side of the road, right next to the horse. The horse kept nibbling the sparse grass, unflinching despite the lumbering truck. I stopped to retrieve my camera. The horse looked up and backed away. Either camera shy or especially wary of the unusual, a man on a bike.
I caught Joe and Janie after another hill. It wasn't particularly long or steep, just tough. Janie said she'd walked The Fish up it. I understand. Maybe the altitude. Maybe we'd spent all our energy on yesterday's ride. Maybe it was just so many hills. Maybe it was the approach to Colorado. Maybe it's Wolf Creek Pass (elevation 10,857) or North La Veta Pass (elevation 9,426) looming up (I mean UP) the road. The scenery changed, almost from the moment we entered Colorado. Utah's wide open vastness of rock and ruggedness closed in. The rock walls came closer. Stretches of irrigated green appeared. Miles of barrenness gave way to tidier ranches next to other tidy ranches. Grapevine and orchards, farming. And still the hills. The route made a left tun onto a busy highway on the outskirts of Cortez. A slow climb amidst traffic, through a construction zone. Another turn as the highway became Main St. Our destination was at the opposite end of town.
Showered, napped, and drove to Mesa Verde National Park, nine miles east, then forty five minutes winding through its switchbacks to the visitors center an it's wondrous displays of the ancient Pueblo people. Our biking legs don't handle hiking well, and the Payne-N.-Diaz family was visiting, so we drove and gawked at the more accessible viewpoints. Spectacular scenes, particularly with late afternoon sunrays striking at such sharp angles. An added treat, glad we got to see the home of the ancients.
The story of fire in Mesa Verde.
Janie, overlooking one of the abandoned dwellings at Mesa Verde.
Perfect light, in the early evening.
It is already fall in the high country.
The skeletons of burnt pines stand tall amongst the scrub brush.
Men go abroad to wonder at the heights of mountains, at the huge waves of the sea, at the long courses of the rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motions of the stars, and they pass by themselves without wondering.
~Saint Augustine
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