Last couple weeks have been cold for the desert. Days are ideal, and nights make me squeal, when I'm riding from class to work at midnight, 30 minutes away and it's a freezing cold desert night. The long johns have come out. The thermals have gone on. The nose picking finger hole in my left glove needs to get stitched up, sad as that may be. But winter is upon me. I wore my cowboy boots to work last night, the ones with the toe holes, and my feet got that cool air conditioning. It was nice, since my thick wool socks had been makin' 'em sweat.
I know, I know, I know, Eww, so back to the whole "Payson" story. It had been about a couple weeks since I'd been able to take an exploration of the area, so of course I was antsy. I got out a map of Phoenix and the surrounding areas and started looking for long unaccompanied roads. I saw cities and neighborhoods turn from suburbs to rural, and the more vacant the territory surrounding a long road looked, the better I knew the scenery and ride would be. Then there it was, mountains and lonely roads heading to far out towns, out past other lonely junctions, and into a great exploration. I put my finger on a town called Payson. And I went to bed early and excited.
I woke up that next morning, and my head and body said stay down. Stay in bed. Like getting up was pushing a barn full of hay off of me, and maybe some barn spiders had moved into my head and made cobwebs or something. I was just knocked out. I closed my eyes. When I re-opened my eyes, t'was a whole hour later. Damn! I said to myself "force yourself out of bed, and walk around." I made it to the kitchen, and still nothing. So I walked out to the pool, and forcibly dunked my head (which I would never otherwise) And I then dunked my arms, and then I took my feet out of their toasty wool lair and pissed em off real nice by dunking them in the ice cold water. "BBBRRRRRRRrrrrrrrr!!!!" is an understatement. It was definitely a drastic measures to get drastic results kinda morning.
I dried my soaking hair off, and sat, or more like curled up into a ball on the love seat and closed my eyes. When I woke up, another hour had passed. And this time, doggone it, my head was still dead, and my body was following suit, so I said, "I'm going to do this today, whether my body likes it or not." Now, I've gotten on my bike, tired and hungover, and all sorts of out of it before, and this time will be a rival to those for sure. So I gathered my things.
Sitting on the bike, letting it idle awake, warming the gaskets and expanding metal, I checked my route again. It was pretty easy, take 101 to Shaw exit and just head east. Make a left at the 87 and just keep riding. And then there I was moments later, riding out through Scottsdale, disappeared into and over the mountains that frame the eastern side of Phoenix. It was a beautiful, warm, sunny desert afternoon. Not too many cars on the road, lanes to myself, dipping through little suburban canyons, past civilized outcropping of gas stations and shopping needs. I momentarily toyed with the idea for gas, sitting next to a pump, I checked the route to Payson. I saw that it was only 60 some miles of winding desert road, so I knew my tank would make it. I pulled back onto the road. Along the route there was an Ironwoman competition happening, so there was some heavily directed traffic at the main junction, but that was about it. And as much as I would have loved to watch some tough ass women do their thing, I had a ride to do, countryside to see, a world to explore, and all before the sun would go down and leave me high and frozen.
High and Frozen I was indeed. Payson is some 5000+ elevation gain from my desert floor. It is also the mountains, with forest and all the things that go with forests like, cold moist air, and snow. Lucky for me, the snow was not part of the equation, but I bet had I stuck around to find out, well, I'd have indeed been stuck. Man it was cold up there. I went from sleeveless to fully layered in an hour. And the sun was sinking over that mountain range I'd just come, so I had to ditch this Payson town.
It was getting too late, cold, and dark, for my sunglasses and remote route exploration, so I ditched the plan to take the 188 to Roosevelt Lake back over the 88 to Apache junction. In fact that'll be the next story you're tuning into read about. So I just traced and raced my steps back down the 87, gunning for that warmer and lower elevation. I rode further down the 87 than the turnoff I'd come in on, and ended up making a right on a McDowell road. This brought me to lower central Phoenix, just a couple blocks off from where my work was. I browsed the area for an atmospheric coffee shop, deciding on Jobot Cafe. It had all the elements: Old house turned coffee shop, chairs and tables on the front lawn, and indie music on the speakers. The coffee was really good, the lady at the counter was awesome and talkative, the atmosphere and patronage, was a book reading, comfy chairs, free wifi kinda joint. Thus I'll just have to go back, I say.
After I finished my coffee, I rode to work (I work nights). I just love that place.
Now, I know the desert around here seems to some people like, nothing, vacant, boring. But to me, it is years of wild west exploration, indian and cowboy battles, and habitation, acres and miles of opportunity, people living and dying at its feet. Survival at its finest. And I love that feeling I get when I can just look for miles and miles, with decorative red rock mountainous outcroppings, shaping my imagination on the horizon. The sound of the coyotes yipping and yapping at night. Crickets chirping endlessly, and the open sky forever, deep blue, stars twinkling just inches from your eyes. And I'll always love the desert.
See you on the road!
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| This little thang fell out of my hair in Payson. |
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| Desert for days! |
