Arizona Trail Ez Tour – part 2

When we left off, our bikepackers were tucked into a cozy night in an A-frame in Oracle. Breakfast was procured in massive proportions, and we pulled the phase-3 pro move of ordering a giant Rudy’s breakfast burrito to go. Our fellow AZT bikepackers, Dave and Yuri, took note and followed suit. We may have started the day out with a brilliant decision, but our next decision — to carry tons of water and hit the Black Hills, was a little more dubious.

It’s such a classic spot on the AZT, Antelope Peak far in the background. It’s one of the very first pieces of AZT I remember exploring and getting that wonderful ‘out there’ feeling on. That feeling like you’re the first mountain biker to ever lay tires on tread. It still has that feeling in places!

Right after the Tiger Mine trailhead we found a water cache box made by none other than Lee Blackwell! Lee was my comrade in arms for our 2005 traversal of the AZT. A better comrade could scarcely be imagined for that hike-a-bike and adventure filled trip. I was reminded of so many small details of that trip, as we revisited many of the same places. Stories and tall tales of that adventure would come to mind and be told to Eszter throughout the trip.

Later in 2005, I came up with the idea to race the AZT, riding an ITT that formed the genesis of the AZTR750. Those two trips were quite the contrast, representing the extremes of hike-a-bike vs. bike alternates, and touring vs speed. I enjoyed both immensely.

Now, here I was, nearly 10 years later, riding a trip that was seeking to strike a balance between the extremes. A comfortable but dedicated pace, and reasonable choices between detours and hike-a-bike. The goldilocks of AZT trips. Juuuuuuust right!

It was a hot day. When a southbound and semi-crazy thru-hiker told us he had come upon the Freeman Cache nearly empty, we resolved to seek water before it. So we carried even more water when we found it, and the going was a tad slow.

But it’s beautiful desert out there, and so remote. It was tempting to take the old gasline route, which I quite enjoy, but even better are the views from the top, or as we call it, Ripsey’s little brother.

Our curiosity was piqued as we rolled up to the cache, placing bets as to its status. The thru-hiker told his rescuers about the empty cache, but he had no idea how to contact anyone at the ATA, so we weren’t even sure anyone knew it was low yet. With plenty of water on our backs, it wasn’t anxiety, just curiosity. Water caches are finite, and really not a good thing to rely on, especially as the trail gets more traffic.

It had been restocked the day before. There was plenty.

The slower riding put us right where we were supposed to be — coasting and smiling down the Boulders segment, into the setting sun.

Yes, like that!

The slower pace also put us at our best campsite of the trip. I stopped in a spot where I noticed the wind had died down, even though it didn’t look sheltered. How about here? There was a little clearing of soft soil that was completely free of sharp plants (a rare thing for the Boulders!).

The night was warm, calm, peaceful, beautiful. What a gift.

Ez! come back, you missed a turn!

We wrapped up the Boulders in the morning, then quickly discussed whether we should ride Ripsey or not, since it is easily skipped.

We had been trying to do a short bikepack on Ripsey for several weeks, so there wasn’t much to discuss — it was in.

my favorite ocotillo on the whole AZT

It was still morning, so the climb was not hot.

The climb was beautiful, and the ridge even better.

Correct life choice, going up here.

It’ll always be a special place to us; it’s where we finished our first bikepacking trip.

Where we finished falling in love.

I think before we even descended the switchback attack off the north side, we had already felt the heat of the day and come to the difficult decision of skipping the Gila. It’s near blasphemy to not include what is perhaps the best segment of the entire trail in a thru-trip. But we’ve been up and down the Gila in the past months, over the course of multiple overnighters. So we felt like we had it well covered. If you want to see photos of us bikepacking the Gila Canyons, well, they are all over our blogs!

We were excited to get to newer country — the rest of the trail north of the 300! But I think the overriding factor was the heat. It’s the lowest and hottest spot on the trail and temperatures were 15 degrees above normal for the time of year. We could have taken a siesta in the shade in Kelvin, then pushed on with cooler temps. If not for the Arizona Trail Race as a deadline, we probably would have.

Making the choice even easier was that Eszter’s rear derailleur cable was about 30 shifts away from snapping, and I had forgotten to replace the spare cable I usually carry in my kit.

The pavement from Kelvin to Superior is not long, but steep enough that it cooked us. Not a bad ride, and it got us quickly to this:

Root beer floats were becoming the theme of the trip, more so than the intended tacos!

We figured we’d have just enough time to make it to an off route bike shop in Apache Junction. But knowing Apache Junction, I wanted to avoid that if at all possible. I figured we might be able to find a cable in Superior. A few questions asked and dead-ends later, we left town to ride Hewitt Station Road, then turn off onto a new route John Schilling had suggested for the AZT bike route.

The route was a total win, and even had services on it.

Riding easy powerline dirt with huge views of the Superstitions is much preferable to busy US 60! This is my often used and very valid argument against Wilderness and bike prohibition when it comes to long distance trails. Detouring for Wilderness on busy highways is unsafe and emphatically not the experience bikepackers are looking for! We don’t need more detours, we need more land conservation options that protect *and* make sense.

Nevertheless, bikes have the advantage that they can travel paved roads rather efficiently, and we found ourselves barreling through suburban hell, en route to Two Wheel Jones. I got a little grumpy when Eszter didn’t want to phone them, or really check the directions to get there. I didn’t blame her for the fraying cable — could have happened to anyone. I think I was just grumpy at having to go so far off route and into Phoenix. It was also windy and dusty, and my eyes were not enjoying fighting into the wind. More on that later.

We made it to the shop with only minutes to spare. They gave us two free cables — one as a spare — and we were on our way. The upshot of all this was that we got Billy Rice (Tour Divide yo-yo-er extraordinare) to buy us burritos! It was great to catch up with him and talk bikepacking. He just happened to be in town on business.

A cheap motel later, and we were back on the road. Or in this case, the trail — the Apache Trail. The Apache Trail travels along the Salt River from far east Phoenix to Roosevelt Lake. Lee Blackwell and I went to great lengths to avoid having to ride it on our AZT thru-ride, but the truth is, it’s the only reasonable option for detouring around the Superstition Wilderness (at least as of this writing!).

I’m not quite sure why we were so against the idea of a big dirt road ride. I mean, there’s Tortilla Flats, serving up very tasty food and at speeds even the most impatient bikepacker can deal with (despite the place being packed with retirees).

And then there’s the views.

You don’t get to ride your bike in places like this very often. It was windy on this exposed piece of trail / slickrock, but I couldn’t resist the pull of some techy ledges a midst a day of road riding.

When I time trialed the route in 2005, I rode most of the Apache Trail in the dark. I could sense the immensity of the place, but had no idea it was like this!

I called it the Grand Canyon of dirt roads. It’s about the closest thing I’ve seen to a road in the Grand Canyon.

There’s a fair bit of traffic on it, even on a weekday, but everyone is touristing (no active ranches and only maybe one residence?) so the speeds are slow and everyone seems respectful. The only thing it maybe has against it as a bike route is that it’s full of climbing! Big, big rollers. That’s what the quadricep group is for, right?

We dropped down to Apache Lake hoping to take a swim break, but the wind and clouds were making it anything but ‘too hot’ so we could only get our feet and knees into the water.

It was one of my favorite moments of the trip. So much good riding behind us, so much excitement about that to come. We’d hit our stride, and were enjoying our stride while completely stationary, feet dangling in the water, watching a bald eagle take control of a pack of turkey vultures. My feet had adjusted to the insoles and I was now very glad I had taken the pain to break them in.

The last stinger on the trail took us to the top of the Roosevelt Dam — an impressive structure I only saw the outline of previously. We were in full tourist mode, checking out all the plaques and viewpoints. It was lovely.

We went off route to check out the Roosevelt Marina, having seen a fork/knife symbol on one of those plaques somewhere on the trail. When we got there we couldn’t find anything that looked like they’d offer us a fork, or a knife! I figured there was probably something down at the actual dock, but it looked completely empty and dead down there, and they sure weren’t advertising anything. I eventually recalled coming to a similar conclusion with Lee, as we looked for food or services. Too bad my memory isn’t infinite!

I didn’t really remember what campgrounds were open or had water, either, but we did eventually find spigots at Cholla Bay. For some reason we eschewed stealth camping nearby, even though it was the first place we’d found out of the wind. Instead we pushed on until there weren’t too many options left. The wind only seemed to intensify after the sun left us, so eventually we gave up fighting it and found a spot with some cover. As we made dinner we noticed that all the broken sticks around had thorns on them. This isn’t going to work! We found a more open spot with only small grasses growing on it. We set up our pads and bags, throwing them out cowboy style. I was off in the bushes brushing my teeth when Eszter said,

“Oh no, there’s goatheads here!”

“There’s a goathead on your sleeping pad!”

“WHAT?!”

How my sleeping pad made it through the night, I’ll never know. I did a pretty thorough goathead paranoia check, and determined probably NOWHERE was safe around here. But, still, I expected to wake up on the ground in the middle of the night.

We picked our bikes up to carry them away from the campsite in the morning, thanking our lucky stars that all of our inflated gear was still inflated.

We then continued along Roosevelt Lake and up the Tonto Valley, a pleasant morning’s cycle. I was surprised to find there are a bunch more services than I remember. Cafes, grocery, motel — all good to note. We ate a big breakfast at the Butcher Hook, continuing our theme of french toast. It’s one of the simple and necessary pleasures of touring — big days of riding need big meals and breakfast is one of the most important ones!

I learned the beauty of the small time, old timer’s cafe, from Lee on our AZT trip. I was too much in a hurry and focused on the goal to appreciate it back then, but boy do I love mixing with the crusty locals and ordering up a big plate of greasy food now.

The middle section of the AZT 750 route is not bikepacking, it’s bike touring. Which isn’t at all a bad thing. You can cover some ground, and there seems to always be a cold drink to be bought when you need one (like at Jake’s Corner).

We passed “All Bikes” and wondered at the piles and piles of bikes. Maybe my fancy Lenzsport I was riding might one day end up in a pile like that. The resting place of a happy bike, it would be.

The Rye Cafe was all shut up — the whole town seemed to be dead. Good thing Payson isn’t too far.

Just a steep 4×4 climb’s effort away. I was happy to be leaving the lower deserts for good, looking forward to cooler temperature and better air. I was having a lot of trouble with my eyes. It took Eszter pointing out how bloodshot they were at the bike shop in Payson for me to realize I should really do something about them. My weight weenie plan for dealing with my contacts in motels wasn’t quite panning out. Ironically, camping with my contacts was working out better than the motel stays!

Since I had the hard constraint of being internet connected the following evening, we decided that rather than push on to Pine and take a zero day, we’d stay in Payson. We could easily get organized for the second half of the trip there, and then take a “nero” (near zero) day to Pine the next day.

A few items we picked up in town: eye drops and contact solution, a $4 orange hunters hat, lithium batteries, freeze-dried meals, and the most delicious carne asada burritos of the trip from Alfonso’s or Alberto’s or somesuch. We weren’t expecting too much, but boy we were blown away. Wash it down with a little horchata, step outside the cheap motel and enjoy the sunset, then call it living!

I could hardly contain my excitement at rejoining the Arizona Trail the next day. I knew it was some of the hardest miles of the trail, but it had been so long since I’d been on them. Too long. On to the northern half of the AZT!