Silver City, New Mexico!

As my last post stated, I rode a grade-A tailwind out of Safford, AZ yesterday for about 10-15 miles before setting up camp for the night a little ways away from the road.

I woke up early with the sun this morning. I was up at six and took about an hour to pack up; Clayton had kindly told me as I departed about Arizona's aggressive "killer bee" population, and I spent about 15 minutes actually packing and 45 minutes running in sporadic circles every time something buzzed within 50 feet of me. I packed up wearing only my boxers and shoes, so this must have looked pretty freakin' insane if someone were to look over from the highway.

The wildlife in this area is amazingly dense, and because the roads are not often traveled the animals tend to come close to the road. As I ride, I hear constant scurrying away from the road through the bushes. I happened to see a coyote at about 150 yards, and stopped to take a picture. He looked at me and howled. I howled back. He howled a return. This call-and-return continued for the better part of three minutes until HE got bored and wandered off.

I rode about 120 miles today, with a whole lot of vertical. There was a total of one mini mart between Safford and Silver City, so I figured I better make it pretty far. I crossed a State Line, a Time Zone, and the Continental Divide today. All in all it was a great day but by far the hardest I've had thus far. To reward myself I am staying in a motel tonight, and will probably get a slow start tomorrow. Cheers!