Leaving the hostel was slow. Not that I didn't want to leave, I couldn't wait to get on the road. In fact, even with a day of downtime, I get antsy.
In the two nights I stayed at the hostel, I managed to disperse the entire contents of my four panniers all over the room. Repacking was necessary, but slow. Thankfully, I had a little more room after jettisoning some things yesterday.
Before hitting the road, I stopped at the local REI. I replaced the store bought plastic water bottles with normal bicycle bottles. When I first started this trip, I had two 21 ounce bottles. And that worked fine for most of California.
But fearing the desert, I bought the 2 liter bladder in Rancho Cucamonga to supplement. That wasn't enough.
The Mojave desert is brutally hot, arid and void of any gas stations or restaurants to stock up on water. So I just used plastic water bottles from the store; not sustainable.
With all five refillable water containers, I can carry 4.7 liters of water. Which is enough if I can refill at some point during the day.
Enough about water; I hit Highway 180 from Flagstaff en route to the Grand Canyon.
The road reached over 8000 feet at some points, and it was damn cold. But no wind!
I passed a house along the way with dozens of dogs on the property. It reminds me of a friend from back home, Maddy, who wants to open a dog sanctuary in the wilderness!
Maddy's future dog sanctuary in the woods
After descending from the mountains, I slogged back on the Highway 64 with the rest of the tourist traffic (and buses). The moment I entered the national forest, I pulled off on a fire road and setup camp about half a mile from the road.
The sun had only just begin to set and I had enough time to actually cook dinner.
Joe