Vacation
Went to Arizona and Colorado (with a little layover in Moab, UT) in September. This was the big vacation I’d been planning all year and everything went well. I spent way more money that I’d budgeted but we had a good time.
All the pictures can be seen here.
We headed out on Sept 13 at around 6:00pm, hit some traffic north of Cartersville,GA, that cost us an hour. Everything went swimmingly from there until we got close to Flagstaff.
We drove straight through for 24 solid hours, only stopping for food, gas, and bathroom breaks. The route we followed went up I75 to Chattanooga, then northwest on I24 to Nashville where we picked up I40 west. Then it was 1500 miles west on I40 through Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, and finally Arizona.
When we got within about 40 miles of Flagstaff, we ran into a massive traffic jam caused by a multi-car pileup. Everything stopped. People were getting out of their cars and setting up picnic areas in the median. We sat there for about 30 minutes, then finally jumped the median and drove back to Winslow, AZ, where we ate and tried to plan our next move. We were so close to the hotel, relatively speaking, and we were exhausted, sore, and frustrated.
I mapped out a route around the wreck, but it took us about an hour and a half. The little backwoods road took us way out into the desert and through this little one-horse town, but it got the job done. It was kind of unnerving because it was so dark we couldn’t see anything more than a few feet off the road. I was worried about hitting a deer or something.
Finally we made it back to the interstate and we were past the wreck, so we hauled ass to Williams, AZ, found the hotel and crashed. I don’t remember much about the drive from where we got back on I40 to the hotel. I was so dazed and tired by then…we’d been up and on the road for 30 hours.
We spent the next 3 days at the Grand Canyon and I got one ride in at Schultz Pass in Flagstaff. We left Tuesday morning and drove for about 6 hours from Williams to Moab, UT. Wow, the desert scenery was amazing. We drove through Hopi and Navajo reservations, through Monument Valley, and rolled into Moab at about 3pm or so.
After we checked into the hotel we just hung around town, bought some souvenirs, and ate dinner. It was nice and the weather was great. The next day, I went out to Sovereign Singletrack trail and had a good time after I finally found the trail.
We left Moab that afternoon and drove the 6 hours to Longmont where we planned to stay 2 days before heading home. I rode Kenosha Pass with my buddy, Cynthia, and her friend Rocky. It was great. We were above 9000ft all day and it was torturous on my poor sea-level lungs. I finished it, even if I looked like the most out-of-shape person on earth.
We left on Saturday and made it home sometime around 10:00am Sunday. We made GREAT time coming home but the whole trip really beat me down.
We spent so much time in the car, running on little to no sleep, that it took me about a week before I felt normal again. I think this was the last trip like this I will take. It was bad enough that we drove for 30 hours to get to Arizona, but then over a 4 day span we drove 6 hours to Moab, 6 hours to Longmont, then another 24 hours back home.
It was worth it, but very tiring. We finally got to see the Grand Canyon and some really awesome parts of this country. Next year though, I think I’ll vacation in Tennessee or North Carolina.