Cuba, NM to Farmington, NM
Distance: 89.64 miles
Time: 5:51:13
Max Speed: 34.6 mph
Average Speed: 18.7 mph
After the roughest day of the summer so far, today was a good way to make up for it. Though, the start of the day was not too enjoyable. One of my worst fears about the trip actually came true this morning. I did not feel like riding, not at all. Getting on the bike, I felt zero motivation to ride. But, we began the ride with some good, steady climbs, climbing over 400 feet in the first 12 miles, all the way up to the Continental Divide. It was a pretty cool feeling knowing I had ridden a bike across the Continental Divide from Texas. From there, the ride went much better. I felt so much better and was enjoying riding again.
The rest of the ride was fairly uneventful. Oleg, Mike Glass, Rambeau, and I stopped at one of the rest stops and took a nice nap for a little while before continuing on. At our last rest stop, we were told we would be provided dinner at 5:30 and it was 4:30 when we had about 20 miles left to ride. Not wanting to sag (ride in the van into town), we made it a quick rest stop and booked it into town. A little while after the rest stop, we hit an awesome downhill section and were flying at 30+ mph the whole time. The wind was pretty strong and a gust of crosswind knocked us all to the side at the same time, which was pretty cool to see, but a bit jolting to experience.
The final stretch into town was a two-lane, busy highway from Bloomfield to Farmington. The shoulder on this road was 2 ft. wide or less the whole way, with 18-wheelers flying by at 60-70 mph. It was a bit frightening, but we have ridden on similar or worse roads in Austin. For fear of our safety, we had to sag into the hospital where we were having dinner. We were all rather upset about having to sag as we felt that we would be fine riding into town, we just would have had to be more careful. But in the best interest of everyone's well-being, we all had to sag into Farmington.
We arrived at the hospital in sour moods, but that was very soon changed as we were greeted by some of the most wonderful people we have met on the whole trip. We had some delicious BBQ sandwiches, potato salad, macaroni salad, fresh fruit, beans, cherry cobbler, peach cobbler, and more. It was a glorious meal, but the best was yet to come.
Oleg, Mike Glass, Rambeau, and I are staying at the house of Neal and Cathy Roberts. It is incredible! They have a pool, yoga room, pool table, inversion table for stretching out your back, and more. We were treated to some awesome New Mexico pizzas and tasty beverages. After showering and eating, we were able to use the internet to check e-mail and blog and what not. Rambeau also got the opportunity to rock out with Neal to his collection of vinyl records. Oh yes, and we went swimming before eating, which felt amazing.
Cathy and Neal have been such amazing hosts. I cannot thank them enough for everything they have done for us. We have had an amazing experience in Farmington, these people are awesome. Neal is also a mountain biker, so Oleg and I talked to him about mountain biking for a while. He even invited us to come back some time and go mountain biking with him. I doubt he was serious, but I think Oleg and I are taking it seriously regardless.
It has been a wonderful night to follow a very unpleasant ending to the day's ride. Tomorrow we ride to Mexican Water, AZ and will be camping next to a truck stop. That should be rather interesting.
Peace and Love,
Trucker Tito
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