Two Wheels on my Wagon

by Paul Howard

  With this in mind, it was with some trepidation that we embarked on the ascent of the dubiously-named Carnero Pass. It sounded uncomfortably close to carnivorous to me. Fortunately, our overriding hunger was to reach our destination for the night, the Spanish-sounding town of Del Norte. Actually, it didn’t sound Spanish at all. It looked Spanish but, like Salida, had a very Anglicised pronunciation. Del Norte, in fact, was Del Naught, not Del Nortay, while Salida now charmingly rhymed with saliva.

  A long descent through dramatic, rocky scenery took us into another vast Colorado basin. Three separate storms could be seen on the horizon. The largest, darkest, most fearsome of these, of course, appeared to be directly on our route. Yet at the last moment our fortunes improved and we turned sharply to our right. Instead of a storm to contend with, we were now confronted with a landscape straight from a Western film as we skirted the basin’s edge. Red soils and rocky bluffs made for perfect ambush territory. I began to hum the theme from The Big Country.

  A narrowing track and stony ground also made for Stephen’s idea of perfect cycling territory. He had been rather sluggish all day but he now cycled between the sagebrush as if the posse were on his trail. Trevor did a passable impression of hot pursuit, but Per and I were laggards once again.

  It was of no consequence. We re-emerged between two prominent basalt towers onto the plain only a short time later with Del Norte in sight less than five miles away. At first glance it seemed about as appealing as Rawlins, without the glamour of its historical association with outlaws (even though it was, according to the town sign, the home of astronaut Kent Rominger – fame indeed).

  On closer inspection, however, the town’s broad, bland main street gave way to a grid of tree-lined residential roads with well tended houses and even better tended lawns. The sense of homeliness was reinforced by our accommodation for the night. The map had informed us that Gary Blakely and Patti Kelly offered basic services to passing cyclists. In a moment of inspiration, Stephen had called to see if that included sleeping space. To our collective surprise, it did.

  ‘Hey, guys, come on in. How are you all feeling?’ asked Gary.

  A lot better for having arrived, was the consensus reaction. The house was a white, timber-framed, one-storey construction surrounded by manicured lawns dotted with trees and flowering bushes. At the back was a vegetable patch. Inside was equally immaculate. It didn’t look designed to accommodate four such lumbering, noisome oafs. Yet Gary and Patti were undeterred. Perhaps their sense of the obnoxious had been diluted over years of similar hospitality to passing cyclists.

  Whatever the reason, the warmth of their welcome was genuine. Along with all domestic facilities, including clean towels and hot water, Gary provided us with some more race updates. We had confirmation that Matthew Lee had won, and that Kurt, Chris and the Petervarys on their ‘Love Shack’ had also finished.

  ‘Matthew stopped by last Wednesday,’ said Gary, kindly not mentioning the fact it was now Thursday over a week later. ‘He wasn’t going to stop long as he thought there were a couple of guys only a few hours behind him, but we told him they’d dropped back so he relaxed a bit and stopped for a shower and something to eat.’

  Alan, Steve and John had also passed through a good while ago in a group of eight riders. They had all now almost certainly finished as well. Jill Homer and Jamie Thomson had been through more recently, though were too far ahead for us to consider catching them. Then there was Cricket.

  ‘She’s called the race,’ said Gary.

  ‘There are plenty of things I’d like to call the race at times,’ I said, assuming I’d missed the crucial adjective.

  ‘It means she’s pulled out,’ explained Stephen.

  All the while, Patti inadvertently emphasised my sense of cumbersome gaucheness by performing effortless and elegant stretches. It made my inability to summon the coordination to take my shoes off even more pitiful, though Patti kindly refrained from pity. She also expressed a surprising degree of enthusiasm for the South West Coast Path back home. It seemed incongruous to be talking of something so mundane while in such impressive surroundings, but one man’s backyard is another’s exotic playground.

  We asked about options for eating.

  ‘There are two,’ said Gary. ‘There’s a nice, organic place that’s great but where the portions are a little on the light side, and there’s Boogie’s diner that’s good too and might suit your needs better if you’re wanting something more substantial.’

  He looked at us and read our minds.

  ‘I’d go for the diner.’

  CHAPTER 25

  IT’S ALL DOWNHILL FROM HERE

  DAY 22

  There were, it turned out, two downsides to staying with Gary and Patti.

  The first was the quality of the night’s sleep. This was not something that could be blamed on our hosts. Rather, it was a combination of too much roast beef dinner the night before and too many people having consumed too much roast beef dinner trying to sleep in too small a space. The attic bedroom was simultaneously hot and cold. Any covers were too many; no covers were too few. Space was at a premium. The room had a double bed in it, which I shared with Per; Stephen and Trevor had already bagged the comfort of the floor. Moving was not an option.

  The second problem was also not the fault of Gary and Patti. We were once more slow to depart, though this time the obstacles were psychological rather than practical. Gary had been as good as his word and got up at 5 a.m. to provide fresh, hot coffee to speed us on our way, but the warmth of the hospitality and the natural desire not to leave a cosy kitchen on a cold morning combined to make us tarry. Six croissants for my breakfast alone didn’t help.

  Our sloth might also have been inspired by the prospect of what lay ahead. Indiana Pass, at a breath-shortening 11,910 feet, was the highest point of the whole Tour Divide and was only 23 almost exclusively uphill miles away. It was also probably the biggest climb on the route in terms of altitude gain in one go, towering more than 4,000 feet above Del Norte. What’s more, while the first 800 feet came in the 11 miles of paved road straight out of town, the remaining 3,300 came in 12 miles of dirt and gravel. It was clearly going to be hard work.

  At 6.20 a.m. we could delay no longer. We rode out of town past the Colorado hair emporium and ‘shoppe’, the Del Norte National Bank and a ‘drive-thru’ ATM. The morning was chill with high, grey clouds. Perfect cycling conditions.

  The paved part of the climb went smoothly. Then the real ascent began. It took just under two hours, but it seemed to pass in a flash. In spite, or maybe because, of the six croissants, I settled immediately into a comfortable rhythm. It was the exact opposite of my travails on Boreas Pass. Within minutes I was absorbed by the existential simplicity of cycling uphill. Life was reduced to nothing more than turning the pedals. The power of conscious thought seemed to disappear, to be replaced instead by an abstract concentration on the task in hand. Yet my senses were heightened. I was consumed by an animalistic awareness of the surroundings that defied conventional powers of observation and description.

  I arrived at the top a man refreshed. Five minutes later I was a man refrigerated. The energy expended combined with the thin air and the cold, damp conditions quickly reduced me to a shivering wreck. By the time Trevor arrived, still hot from his endeavours, I was clad in all available clothes and cowering out of the chilling wind.

  ‘Good climb,’ he beamed in typically laidback fashion.

  ‘It’s downhill all the way to Mexico now,’ I replied.

  Then bravado got the better of me.

  ‘I’m tempted to ride up the hill a bit just to say I’ve exceeded 12,000 feet.’

  ‘Go on, then,’ said Trevor, calling my bluff.

  I hesitated.

  ‘Not that tempted,’ Trevor observed.

  We were joined first by Per and then Stephen. Per’s knee troubles had now been transformed from acute pain to merely persistent soreness and aching. Yet he seemed to have become ab
le to accept the throbbing base beat of discomfort as simply a backdrop for the rest of the wear and tear incurred on such a long ride. Stephen, on the other hand, was now suffering in Per’s place, his knee causing him considerable concern. He had also, he revealed at Gary and Patti’s, lost 12 pounds since the race started, which was not necessarily a good thing.

  ‘I can see it now – the Tour Divide diet book,’ said Trevor.

  I gradually returned to my senses. We were sat on top of a broad, grassy pass. Around us, the San Juan mountains continued to rise above even our lofty position, their heads lost in the cloud. Patches of winter snow remained. It was a delightful setting, seemingly removed from all human influences other than the dirt road we were on.

  Just how far this was from the truth was revealed less than 5 miles later as we descended into the erstwhile mining town of Summitville, the highest town in the whole of Colorado and still above 11,000 feet. Ahead of us, above the town, were the scars inflicted by 140 years of gold mining in the area. Worse still, however, were the invisible scars inflicted by the most recent mining operations, which only ground to a halt in 1991. The process of using sodium cyanide to leach gold from a pyritic ore had gone so badly awry that water in the whole of the surrounding river drainage had been declared unsafe for human consumption. The guidebook described it as ‘too contaminated for human ingestion even after filtering’.

  The nearby hamlet of Platoro, on the other hand, had a reputation as a pleasant pitstop. We rode on, enthused. The description of ‘pleasant’ turned out to be accurate, but that of ‘nearby’ proved well short of the mark. We had conveniently ignored the density of the squiggles on the map, which in turn disguised the fact it was more than 20 miles away. Somehow we had also overlooked the presence of two four-mile climbs. To miss one climb may be regarded as a misfortune; to miss both looked like carelessness.

  Yet the riding between the two was through some of the most picturesque mountain scenery of the whole trip, with grassy meadows and clearings complemented by streams and wild flowers. When we finally arrived we were also rewarded by a warm welcome at the Skyline Lodge.

  ‘Ah, you must be in the race,’ said a wiry, long-bearded man leaning on the porch.

  We confessed as much.

  ‘Everyone else has been through,’ he explained, pointing to a list of times and dates by the bar. ‘We check them in and check them out again.’

  A serving of peach cobbler with cream and ice cream, the best dessert since the pies in Lima, a cup of tea and the opportunity to phone home completed the picture of loveliness. The waitress then burst the bubble by explaining breezily how everyone else had eaten more and more speedily.

  ‘You can tell you guys aren’t in a rush.’

  The slight on our consumption levels came as a much bigger blow than that on our credentials as racers.

  From Platoro we rolled gently down the valley of the nascent Conejos River for 20 easy miles. Our plan was to call in the last short day of our ride and spend the night where the valley met the main road in the equally small hamlet of Horca. That would leave six more days to meet Per’s deadline.

  The plan seemed sound. According to the map, Horca had a motel, a restaurant and a grocery store. We let ourselves become excited by the prospect of an early night, laundry and cool beer. In spite of the heat, I began to salivate – about the beer, not the laundry.

  The map was wrong. Horca, which was pronounced more like a killer whale than a peddler, was in fact a damp squib. The motel had closed and the cabins were for sale. The restaurant was not open and, to judge from its dingy exterior, would have held no appeal anyway. What passed for the shop was little more than a moribund collection of out-of-date tins and jars.

  Things were looking bleak. Sleeping rough would be tricky enough near a main road. But the biggest concern was the lack of food. The cupboard was bare, which was difficult to swallow, and the next services of any kind were more than 100 miles ahead. Even then their existence was questionable.

  The miserable man at the till when we arrived had been replaced by his equally miserable-looking wife, inspiring Stephen to exercise his Southern charm. The rest of us had no desire to cast aspersions on his talents, but we had already started calculating whether we could subsist on snacks for another 12-hour day plus dinner that night. Perhaps inspired by our lack of faith, Stephen came back triumphant.

  ‘She says there’s a caravan site with cabins two miles down the road, and she thinks it has a shop.’

  There was, indeed, a caravan site with cabins, and it was two miles down the road, but the shop offered little more than chocolate bars. Still, two out of three wasn’t bad. Unfortunately, it being the eve of America’s national holiday, no cabins were available. Even a space to pitch our tents was looking distinctly questionable until the owner asked where we’d come from and where we were headed.

  ‘Canada to Mexico,’ said Stephen.

  That seemed to do the trick.

  ‘Gee, that’s some ride,’ he said. ‘There’s a pitch over by the entrance that won’t be filled until tomorrow morning. They said they’d be coming early so I kept it free tonight, but if you guys say you’ll be out before lunchtime . . .’

  We assured him we’d be gone before breakfast, though the prospect of missing the ‘Fifth Annual Ponderosa Caravan Site Pancake Breakfast and Duck Race’ caused a twinge of regret.

  ‘John Bryant’s famous sourdough pancakes,’ murmured Per sadly as he read the notice.

  The campsite was a gem. The owner, ‘Uncle’ Jack, said we could use the laundry and provided clean towels for the showers, all for the princely sum of $5 each. He also introduced us to just about every other camper, the regulars among whom had, like him, earned the honorary title ‘uncle’.

  The conversations followed a similar pattern.

  ‘Hey, Uncle Herb (or Uncle Chuck, or Uncle JT), how ya doin’? Listen. D’ya hear what these boys are doin’? They’re only cycling from Canada to Mexico,’ said Uncle Jack.

  ‘Is that so?’ would reply Uncle Herb (or Uncle Chuck, or Uncle JT).

  ‘It is so. Go on, young man, tell him what you’re doing.’

  We did, and a whole series of uncles demonstrated more enthusiasm for cycling than their pick-ups, trailers and quad bikes could ever have implied was possible.

  The evening passed quickly in a series of chores, most related to trying to maintain what was a rapidly disintegrating relationship with the concept of cleanliness. It was reasonably successful. Our food situation had not improved markedly, but we would at least smell more presentable. Trevor revealed the extent of his hidden depths by unveiling a previously unworn cycling top.

  Dinner was a picnic made up of random ingredients from the Horca shop. The determining factor was items that had not passed their sell-by date, or not by much, at least. Per had found jam and I had found Spam. With stale rolls we contrived main course and dessert.

  ‘Mmm. This Spam’s all right,’ enthused Per, though his appetite was by now so vast as to betray a certain lack of discrimination.

  ‘Ah, yes, canned in 2005. That was a good vintage and it has matured nicely into a full-bodied Spam with hints of forest fruits and a good finish,’ I explained.

  ‘Pardon?’ said Per.

  ‘Never mind.’

  NEW MEXICO

  CHAPTER 26

  INDEPENDENCE DAY

  DAY 23

  In spite of our impressive prevarication pedigree, we couldn’t quite contrive a way to remain at the Ponderosa Caravan Site until the promised pancake breakfast. More Spam and jam was a less than satisfactory alternative, but it was better than nothing.

  The day began cold and sunny with a long climb up State Highway 17 to La Manga Pass. I had another puncture. Stephen’s knee was hurting, so we finally conquered the pass some time after Per and Trevor. A pick-up drove past with a screeching, burning rear wheel leaving a trail of sparks and smoke behind it.

  ‘That looks how I feel,’ I said.


  ‘I wouldn’t want to go down a pass like this in a car like that,’ replied Stephen.

  We passed the ghostly remnants of a gas station at which we had dreamed of having fresh coffee and pastries, then turned off the paved road. Three miles later we crossed into New Mexico.

  The Land of Enchantment wasn’t quite what I had been expecting. Of course, it was ridiculous to think that there would be an immediate change. The border between New Mexico and Colorado was typically American in its arbitrariness, following a straight line drawn on a map rather than geographical features on the ground. Yet it was the last state on our journey and its name confirmed its proximity to the finish. Accordingly, it had assumed such significance in our journey that I had been lulled into thinking we would immediately be surrounded by cacti and desert.

  Instead, we continued to ride through some of the most beautiful semi-Alpine scenery of the whole trip. The brilliant sunshine and the azure sky provided a perfect backdrop for the bounty of wild flowers: dog roses, potentilla, dandelions, wild irises, Michaelmas daisies and geraniums, to name only those I could recognise. The forests that framed the meadows were made up of cottonwood trees, aspens, spruce and firs.

  Even better than the immediate scenery was the fact that for almost the first time in the whole ride to date we were cycling along the top of the mountains rather than simply scaling passes between them. We rode for some 20 miles at more than 10,000 feet along Brazos Ridge. The panorama on all sides was spectacular.

  The only problem was the exceptionally demanding terrain. It was punctuated by short, steep ups and downs. It was also incredibly rough going. When the trail wasn’t among boulders it was stony and rutted. Progress uphill was juddering and tenuous. Progress downhill was juddering and dangerous. As usual, Stephen seemed unperturbed and recouped on the descents what he had lost on the uphills due to his sore knee. Per’s rigid forks meant he was shaken, though not, he insisted, stirred.