Boquillas + Bike Rides

Continuing to play catch-up with recent events: on Friday I went to Boquillas. Graden, Beau, Amy, and Mike and Nancy Coe was the group I latched onto for the day. It was so much fun to meet people in person that I'd been talking to across the river all this time. One of them, Esteban, was very gracious and gave us a town tour. Finally, my Spanish seemed to come back: as we walked through town I was asking him all sorts of questions and listening to his answers and things were FLOWING! Yay! Just in time for me to leave. Oh well. I explained to them that I would not be in the crossing because I had gotten summer employment elsewhere, but that I would hopefully be back in the fall. Esteban said that there might be a party in October to celebrate the crossing being open again, so perhaps I'll get to see that when I return.

On Sunday Alyssa convinced me to join her in Terlingua to go mountain biking with a group from Desert Sports. The morning started out nice, but it got to be a pretty hot day. I started off by saying that I wasn't a very good mountain biker, but at the end everyone was telling me that I was pretty smokin. "That's some pretty technical stuff for out here," one guy told me, "I would say if you can ride that you're pretty good." So maybe I shouldn't say that I'm not good, but rather that I'm scared out of my mind when I am riding. Still, my goal was to not fly off the bike that day, and I achieved that. Although I learned the hard way that a bike that's a bit too tall for you has its downsides when it stops and you keep going and land on the top tube. Ouch! All in all we rode 24.9 miles through the desert and my legs and arms are covered with scrapes from the mesquite and other spiny plants that we pedaled through.

Last night was my last Burger Bike for the season. I could really feel the day before's mountain biking as I got started - particularly in my knees, which I had failed to do my exercises for the previous day - but I pulled through. In fact, I think I've pretty much become a cycling powerhouse. I thought I was doing poorly most of the time, but kept pumping it up and working on my cadence... by the time I got to La Kiva Hill I was powering up and maintaining speeds above 5mph (more like 8-10mph) and I still managed to make a new record for myself by the time I got there. 1 hour, 54 minutes. Wow!

At the Starlight last night Alyssa and I met up with Paul Wiggins, a local silversmith who has made some nice pieces for Alyssa in the past. Based on a sketch I did of the Sierra del Carmen skyline, we each commissioned him to make bracelets for us. This is easily going to be the most expensive piece of jewelry I will have ever purchased, but it will definitely be worth it. I gave Paul the park address to get a hold of me once I get into town. Hopefully soon after I get to Bodie we'll be in touch!

Today I'm finishing up my laundry and working on the finer details of my trip. This evening I'll be up in PJ for yoga, and I'll probably stop by the Chino Court Crew for the last time before I go. Tomorrow will be spent rearranging and packing my stuff and packing it into my car so that I've got proper access to things I need access to and whatnot. For the first time I will be carrying my bike on top cross-country because I will most likely be putting it to use when I'm in Gila for those few days. I doubt if I'll get another blog entry in before I go, so the next time you hear from me will probably be either somewhere along the way to Bodie, or once I'm finally settled in there, which should be by next weekend, amazingly enough.

Until next time!