stevehurd

Day six was a great 64 mile ride with a gentle 1800 ft of ascents to Oro Valley, a community north of Tucson, AZ north. We are looking forward to a two-night stay at Steve Leibo’s friends, Dr. Craig Williams and his wife Becky’s home in a beautiful desert setting. We really appreciate this community […]

Today we had to start a 67 mile ride with 40 miles of direct headwinds on a road with motorists who expected us to stay out of their way. Hwy 38 East to Maricopa is a long high speed highway with very little shoulder space, and most all the motorists considered it our responsibility not

Today we completed 90 miles, our longest ride so far, including about 25 miles of Interstate riding. The hazard was more than being on the shoulder, with nothing to protect us from cars and 18 wheelers, but rumble strips, but wire filaments from steel belts of lost tire retreads. These miniscule wire filaments cost us

The highlight was a 8 mile stretch that RidewithGPS, our routing planning tool, told us was all pavement, but we could not have found a worse mud road in the entire state of Arizonia. A local told us afterwards that they had a huge rainstorm after no rain in 260 days. We also had a

We learned that you can have a rare March winter event caused by an Atmospheric River as we did this morning at 4000 feet elevation. Fortunately we got to rely on the RV SAG to drive us about 1000 feet down the mountain where it was just cold rain, and extreme high tail winds until

We started the biggest climbing day of the trip with a ceremonial dip of our rear wheels in the Pacific Ocean. Although we fretted about the climbing, which you can see on my Wahoo computer, of 4100 feet over 20.7 miles, it was not awful. This was the longest bicycle climb ever for all three

This map is a slight variation in route from the original plan. Still, 5800 ft ascent with most between 25 and 48 miles. We are planning a later departure to wait for the unusual San Diego rain fall of the past day or more to end by about 10:30 AM. I am told by locals

There are a lot of cycling clothing here. Four bibs, four jerseys, two jackets, base layers, gloves, hats, sweat bands for cold and sun protection. Also will have a bottle of Woolite for hotel sink laundry. If we were bike packing I would take about half this much.

This has been a dream for decades and a bucket list goal of mine.  I love the freedom and exhilaration of  being on the road, and the physical act of pedaling a bicycle for long hours, especially with friends and in novel venues.  I am  trying to compare this event to the spontaneity of Forrest

Route image from cycleoflifeadventures.com We will follow a similar route to this image from Cycle of Life Adventures, with some exceptions.  It is close to 3000 miles over 45 days, with a rest day every five or six days.  Doug Wayne, Steve Leibovic and I will dip our rear tires in the Pacific Ocean in