Day 13

Today is a little more of what I would imagine or hope for days on this trip to be, and I BEAT YOUNG MARK TO CAMP. I got a taste of many things today from the revenge of Geranimo on our group to meeting my very own (in my dreams) cowboy at the local ice cream shop.

We started out early, and took quite the detour through town as our warmup. I was slightly frusterated, mostly at myself for not going the route I was going to go (which would have saved a few miles). After we finally got on the route I was feeling good for once. I pushed the pace a little, and I felt great. There are more trees now, and I remember coming to a big valley of trees! I've never been so happy to see the green in place of the brown desert.

We soon rode through the Apache Indian Reservation, and it seemed kind of run-down. There was significantly more liter on the highway there than anywhere else. I was wondering why. Does the government not clean these areas of the highway? Do the people in the reservation litter more? Do people passing by litter more in reservations?

We stopped at the conveneince store on the reservation, and everyone we talked to there was very friendly. A couple of the guys seemed like they may have already been drinking, and it was only about 10am. We also met a girl biking the same route as us, and we chatted with her for awhile. One thing that really caught my attention was that she was smoking cigarettes! Biking coast to coast and smoking? It seemed like an oxymoron to me.

Feeling good, we soon came to the town of Geronimo, where we took pictures by the sign mocking him.

About 100 feet after we had stopped, one of the guys got a flat. After fixing it, a different guy found a scorpion in his pannier. We decided that Geronimo's spirit lives on, and about 2 miles later, another guy got a flat.

With about 5 miles to camp, we found a local ice cream joint that has been there since 1968. I ate a chocolate shake and some onion rings (I can't remember the last time I ate those was, but they looked so good!).  This is where I met my cowboy (Eric - don't read the next part).

I had just ordered, and in walks this tall, lean gorgeous young man in his cowboy hat and boots with one of the biggest belt buckles I've seen. On the buckle it said "Black Bills Champion", and I thought to myself 'I like successful men'. He inquired about what we were doing, and I tried to make some small talk with him. He lived on a cattle ranch near by and owned a bunch of horses to keep his cattle in line. I was still to awestruck to ask him to take me horseback riding (one of my goals for the trip). He ordered his slushie, and we parted ways. . . . Frosty continues to make fun of me for this, but I think he was just jealous he didn't meet a cowgirl for himself.