Mike by Bike

This part of the ride had been on my mind for a while, the highest point on the southern tier at 8228ft and one of the toughest climbs. From Silver City the ride would be 60 miles with 5000ft of climbing, no way could I do that in a single day so i would ride to just before the final ascent, camp and then tackle the final climb and descent early the next day.

Having driven part of the route the previous day I knew what to expect out of Silver City. Roller coaster hills with short steep climbs and fast descents, the promised tail wind didn’t materialise but I quickly got into a rhythm and reasonable progress.

Along the way were a few interesting sites. The kneeling nun is a monolith near Santa Rita that when viewed from a distance appears to take the form of a human kneeling.

Then there was the Santa Rita Pit Mine, one of the largest open pit copper mines in the world. The views from the observation platform were pretty awesome

From here the road kicked up and stayed up for the rest of the day, the winding nature of the roads and the now strong winds made going pretty tough and I found myself walking again. Eventually I made it to the 1st campsite, closed due to flash floods. A couple of miles up the road the 2nd was open but terribly exposed to the elements. I pushed on not knowing if the next would be open or any better than the last and by now my legs were pretty dead. Thankfully it was open and much more sheltered so I decided to stop here.

I met Rob and Jen who were touring the area in a very cool VW camper van. They were awesome, sharing their food with me and lending me a blanket to keep me warm as the temperature plummeted, I was at 7000ft at this point. It was a very uncomfortable night under canvas but coffee and oatmeal got me ready to go. If you two read this thanks for everything.

As I was leaving I was joined on the road by Frank who was riding the same route. We rode to the pass together averaging around 3-4mph, it was.much easier riding together, I’m sure I would have got off and walked if I’d been on my own, herd mentality apparently. Anyway we made it and it was an amazing feeling.

The views weren’t bad either.

The descent was around 10miles and a lot of fun, 2 days to get up, 30 mins to get down. I have the video on the gopro but can’t upload it here, will try and get it onto Facebook at some point.