As Deni and I were talking last night, we decided that today would be the only day that we would have time to ride from Heber, AZ to Payson, AZ. (about a 52 mile ride). Neither of us had ever ridden 52 miles in one day,
Heber, AZ, Deni's home town, is in the White Mountains in Northeastern Arizona and sits about 6,400 ft above sea level. We couldn't leave from Deni's parents house (as the road to their house isn't paved) however we started out from our Brother-in-Law's house. We began the climb from Heber to Forest Lakes just after 9:30am. The first 18 miles were a constant uphill with a constant wind blowing at us. We took turns at the front, allowing the person in the back to draft and save energy. For the next 18 miles, we climbed from 6,400 ft to 7,700 ft. The ride was slow but steady and we made felt good about the ride. Most of this ride was a 2 lane highway (1 lane each way) with no shoulder (there was about 12 inches to the right of the white line). For the most part, people were kind and went around us like they were passing another car (which they should have been), however we had a few close calls that scared both of us. We had a truck with about a 20 ft trailer decide that he didn't need to go around us and probably came within a foot or 2 of hitting both of us. That probably doesn't sound like it was a close call, however when you have no where to go on the road and a truck is buzzing by you at 60+mph, it feels much different. We stopped in Forest Lakes to refill our water bottles for the remaining 34 mile ride. A few miles past Forest Lakes we hit the top of our climb at 7,700 feet, Shortly after we came to "the Rim".
I wish I would have carried my camera with me and taken pictures throughout our ride, however, since I didn't I found this picture of the view from the top of the Rim.
From the Rim, the road widened to 4 lanes (2 each way) and for the next 2 miles we rode in the middle of the right hand lane in speeds in excess of 30 mph downhill. With a 6% decline, we should have been going much faster, however the wind was constantly blowing in our faces the whole day. Over those 2 miles we dropped about 500 ft in elevation. Over the next 11 miles we had a combination of uphill and downhill and dropped about 2,000 ft. From looking at a map, you'd think that it was an easy downhill coasting all the way, however it was anything from that. We had long climbs and quick descents. It was fun but tiring.
Our plan was to have Deni's sister, Lori, drive our van to Payson to pick us up. We told Lori to leave about 12:30pm from Heber, as we should be close to Payson by the time she drove to Payson. We made it just past Sun Valley before Lori caught up to us. Matter of fact, Lori caught us about 2 or 3 miles before we reached our final destination in Payson. I had asked Lori to pull over to give us a drink when she saw us, so she pulled over. Deni flew past her and I stopped to get some Gatoraide. Deni didn't know that I stopped and kept pounding up the hill. I finally caught up to her and we rode into Payson, AZ together.
Total mileage for the day was 51.6 miles in just over 4 hours. It was my longest ride to date and I was glad that Deni had ridden with me the whole way.
