Day 21: Escalante, UT to Torrey, UT

Today's Mileage: 64*
Total Mileage: 1273

Wesley and I bid farewell to Alpine (who made it a full third of our route across the country) and Fox (who conveniently joined us for the two most beautiful days so far), and we were on our way.

Still in the Escalante-Grand Staircase National Monument, we descended into a deep and beautiful canyon. There were no guard rails anywhere, just red rocks and excellent panoramas. And as with most downhills, this one was followed by an uphill: THE steepest, most insane uphill I have seen to date. At one rest point I stopped to watch a couple cars going up the steep grade and confirmed that this nightmare of a climb was not all in my head. I managed to make it up four painful, beautiful miles to the top, where we rode the crest of the mountains for a long stretch. The road was narrow and winding, but the views made up for it.

When I got to Boulder, our midday stop, I was unable to do anything before I put in a 30 minute nap. Then I managed to eat lunch and get my (shaky) legs back on the bike. But it wasn't long before I realized that my legs would not cooperate. The first 5 miles were uphills disguised as downhills (confirmed by Wesley) and I could barely make the bike move. Perhaps I was spoiled after two days with the SAG wagon, or perhaps my legs had just had enough over the past few days... but I had to call it quits.

I debated hiding my bike behind a tree and crawling into a hole for the night, but decided it would be wiser to hitch a ride to Torrey. Luckily, the second car to pass picked me up. Brian and Anna were very kind and loaded me up with all my gear. They pulled off at all the scenic overlooks so I got to enjoy the ride.
I was so glad not to be Wesley, who climbed 3500 feet over the course of the last 37 miles. He was happy to claim his new top speed of 47.1 mph on the descent into Torrey - yikes!

We camped at a grassy little site and Wesley gorged on a huge sandwich and a whole pint of ice cream: well deserved!

*Yeah, I guess 32 of these miles don't count for me, but I'm putting 'em in here for Wesley anyway!