The Salt Lake Loop - Part 3: One day of hell, two days of bea

My route this time at the beginning, the program putted it always to the top everytime I tried, I don't know why...

The following three days I intended to make it to the other side of the Colorado River again and to complete with these three stages the Salt Lake Loop which would have taken me about 11 days then, one day faster than I expected. But I wasn't finished yet and like I experienced the days before you never know how far you could get, especially with the wind which is totally unpredictable!

Campsite before the big pass

For this day I was ready now to face the big pass up to the Colorado plateau before the road would descent again until I would have crossed the Colorado River. With lots of optimism I got on the road again, climbing up the first 600m/2000ft and was totally happy how fast it went until I got to the top of the first, lower pass and "BAMM"!! (Noise the wind made when it punched me in the face!) Just that moment when I passed the first summit to cross a small valley (north-south straightened) for the final ascent I got suddenly and out of nowhere the strongest headwinds I had on my whole trip so far. And I'm not exaggerating at all! The winds must have been there that day before, I think that the valley in which I climbed up the pass, just gave me shelter along the way so it hit me with full strength when I came out of the valley!

Between the passes, you can see the steep climb in the background

Nice little lake in the same valley

Slooooooowly and with painful cramps in my calves I fought myself against the wind/storm across the valley to the other side. The wind was even that strong that you could see white crestwaves on the small lake I passed and I could see them for a long time as I was not going faster than 10km/h (6mph) in a flat part! That was so demoralizing and even more when I saw the steep grades on the other side, still in the direction of the wind!
And as I feared the winds even blew during climbing up the final grades which was definitely the hardest climb on a pass I had so far in my life! I was sometimes not even going 5km/h (3mph) and I really thought about just walking my bike uphill as that would have beon maybe faster.

What made this climb even perfect have been all the dead animals again on the street! Must have been some kind of wilderness area or something I was riding through cause in this part it was just horrible! Literally every 500m/1600ft I passed a dead deer or moose lying on the shoulder of the street. For that many animals I passed I could call myself an expert meanwhile, telling you the exact phase of the rotting-process this animal would be going trough in the moment. The best thing about that was that the wind was blowing the smell directly in my direction and as I was just going like 5km/h I could smell it for minutes!

Dead deer on the street

Alright, enough about this first part of the ride this day. At 3pm and just 40km later I reached the summit of the second pass!! Well it was actually just called "Summit" so the pass who almost made me cry didn't even have a name! So here would be my suggestions: Hells Pass, Devils Pass, Desolation Pass, Stairway to Hell, Pass-away Pass and "Impassible" Pass are just a couple of them:)

When I looked back I saw that the landscape around here has been actually pretty nice but I just wasn't really in the mood to give it a look.
Just 20km later (Downhill Ride:) I passed two small towns on the high/plateau where I got myself some food and a new flag as the one I bought before, was way to big for my bike! Just 15km later I lost this flag again during strong winds (not from ahead but still strong enough).

Cool rock formations near Torrey

Cycling in into the evening

Every store just sells these kind of gas containers which don't fit to my stove!

Once I passed Torrey another small town I suddenly got into the Capitol Reef National Park. I totally missed that one on my map so I didn't know much about what to see, what saved me probably lots of time cause this Park still slowed me down enough to get through before nightfall. I simply had to take pictures every couple hundred meters, it was just so beautiful to watch all these red and white-mixed rock formations all around! No further information on that, just enjoy the pictures:)

After the first couple of stunning views the road let into a small valley which crossed the Reef along this little creek with another couple of cool views. I was glad that it started getting dark at some point otherwise I wouldn't probably made it out of the park in time!

Cycling into the little valley

"swiss-cheese" - rockwalls:)

Right after leaving the park there was a campsite marked on my map somewhere close to the river and as it seemed to be in the middle of nowhere I decided to give it a look and cycled half a mile away from the street to the spot where the campsite should have been. "Should have been" because there actually hasn't been any kind of a campsite, just dirtroads leading into the river. There we just one place, big enough for a couple of tents where surprisingly a car was parking already and a group of three people sitting next to it, playing cards. Cause there was no other place around I asked them if it would be alright pitching my tent next to their car and so I soon ended up playing cards with them:) The two boys and the girl, all from different places in the US were on some kind of volunteering-thing what is about maintaining and building hiking-trails in the south of Utah during the summer. A work that I can just appreciate as a passioned hiker!:) They now had a couple of days off and just found this place surprisingly as I did. It became a fun evening, with some talks and drinking games with the beer they offered me (first beer experience in the US cause I'm still not 21!). Well it's hard to get drunk with the Utah-beer which is not allowed to contain more than 3% alcohol but it was a fun anyway even without getting drunk:) They told me lots of interesting, funny and weird stories about their work and the way they live there and I gave them the link of my blog so they can read what I wrote about them now almost three weeks afterwards:)

The campsite next to the river

They actually gave me a tip for a restaurant-chain called "Denny's" where you apparently can get Pancakes all you can eat for 4$!! If that is true I think I found my place to eat breakfast for the rest of my trip:) But to be honest I never saw a Denny's before, hopefully I'll find one soon:)

The next day was actually the total opposite to the day before. It was pretty casual riding, little hills, no steep grades, not to hot, not too windy and the landscape, except of the last part, nothing special, desert like all the time.

Does that mean your car will break into pieces?:)

This day was the first day since Denver that I met some other cross-country bikers and even five (two separate groups) this time. The first has been a couple, she, riding the whole way from Boston to San Francisco:) and he (living in SanFran) joined her near Moab. We had some nice talks while sitting in front of a small farm shop enjoying the super delicious self made bread and cheese the old man sold there:)

Probably a place for dirt-races:)

The second cyclists I met have been a group of three young men riding from somewhere in Virginia the whole way to L.A. They also experienced very strong headwinds the last couple of days and as someone told them it's apparently really unusual to get that strong winds in this area and it has been probably beacause of some weather front up north in Idaho. However the winds almost stopped now and so I didn't care anymore at all:)

More desert impressions

In Hanksville, the only village I passed that day I refilled my waterbag with almost 10liters (2 1/2 gallons) cause if I read my map right there would be no water supply on the next 230km/143mi till Mexican Hat which included a 1000m/3300ft climb up from the Colorado River.

Dinosaur in Hanksville

About 30km before I reached the Colorado then the road lead into a small canyon and as I was cycling further this canyon got deeper and deeper and the red rockwalls looked that much impressive that it was hard paying enough attention on the street:) When I finally reached the Colorado River then I passed by a small landing point for rafts, the perfect spot for a short swim! It was soooo refreshing aafter a couple of hot days in a row without a shower or anything!

Looking back to Capitol Reef

Approaching Colorado River:)

Water, finally!

And an amazing spot as well:)

Little later after crossing the Colorado River I found a nice spot right next to the street and although the sun didn't set yet I decided to camp here and start the big climb out of the canyon the next day after a good sleep:)

Crossing the Colorado River

Beautiful wilderness campsite close to the Colorado

Well, overestimated the size of my pot a little bit :) (but j ate it all!)

The climb the next day was then way less exhausting than I expected. Although the road was going uphill almost 1000m/3300ft the whole climb stretched on a distance of almost 70km what meant an average steepness of just 1%. Still it slowed me down a lot but I could at least enjoy all the nice views on the way until I reached the summit around 3pm.

Beautiful landscape in the Colorado Canyonlands

Crazy, the colors!

On the summit I chose the shorter and way more interesting route via the Moky Dugway to Mexican Hat. A narrow and steep gravel road which goes down a almost vertical 1000ft/300m high cliff. The quite hilly road with some very steep grades in it is totally worth it to take considering the stunning views I got when I reached the top of the Moky Dugway:) but you should definitely go from the top to the bottom otherwise it would be probably a horrible exprerience!

Smoking for free:)

I'm definitely going the right way:D

Let's go!

It was a positive and negative experience then at once: It had lot of cool views from where you could look in the distance (I could even see Monument Valley already) and the narrow road in front of me. But actually it was a wasted descent. As a bicycle you can't speed up at all because of the rough gravel (I don't understand why it's gravel actually, it would be totally easy to pave and would make it way more save to ride as well) and so I had to break the whole way down what gave me some bad cramps in my fingers once I got down.
But anyway, it's still a great experience and definitely worth it to see - at least one time- even with a bicycle:)

Stunning views from the top of Moki Dugway!

Once I got down it was causally downhill the whole way to Mexican Hat. Mexican Hat is a small town named by a rock formation next to the road which looks "kinda" like a Mexican hat and is basically a balanced rock on the top of a small hill. Even more impressive were the other rock formations around the city, which seemed like waves in the rock or like some zick-zack rock walls. Must be some geological fault or something but however it developed, it's super impressive to look at.

Beautiful rock formations near Mexican Hat

The actual "Hat"

When I got into town then I could crave for a super-fresh honeydew melon, I actually didn't know why, but as like someone above heard my wishes the gas-station seriously offered some fresh fruits and exactly one honeydew-melon!! Together with some fresh-cooked noodles, a muffin and an ice-cold drink it was the perfect dinner after a long day:)

A honeydew melon, I can't believe it!:D

The perfect dinner!:)