Day 1: Monday, 8 April 2013: Out with the truckers and the kickers and the cowboy angels

April 8, 2013

My ace support team sometimes likes to accompany my little bike rides, but this time she declined the opportunity to hang out with rocks, sleep on the ground, and dine on camp meals seasoned with wind-blown sand. Thus, I made my own travel plans, intending to drive down Sunday, stay in the town of Joshua Tree overnight, leave my car at the motel, ride four days, and end up back at the motel in Joshua Tree. Reservations didn't quite work in Joshua Tree, so on Sunday night I ended up at a motel in Yucca Valley, about six miles away.

Howling wind woke me around 5:00 on Monday morning. It sounded like a ravenous monster was about to rip the roof off the motel. That should have been my first clue.

Later, when I walked—slanting against the wind—next door for breakfast, gusts had blown down the restaurant's big sign. I was the only customer. When I asked the waitress why the place was empty, she replied with a shrug "Too windy to go outside!" That should have been my second clue.

The wind had not abated when I checked out of the motel and mounted up. The Surly was already sagging, wallowing, and pouting due to an overload of drinking water. More about that later. Adding the wind to what was probably the heaviest load I've ever carried on a bicycle meant I definitely had my hands full as I circled around the block to pick up the four-lane highway from Yucca Valley to Joshua Tree. Those six miles, fortunately, were mostly downhill. Moreover, the gale was out of the northwest, which meant it was mostly at my back. As soon as I started east on Highway 62, I sailed along at 20-25 MPH with minimal effort on my part. My biggest concern was, now that I had this baby rolling, how could I bring it safely to a stop?

Indeed, as I entered the town of Joshua Tree, without slowing down I rolled right past the storied Joshua Tree Inn, which I had already scoped out Sunday evening.

One of three park visitor centers is located a few blocks past the Inn and a block or two south of 62, right in the town of Joshua Tree. I paused there to have a look around, take some photos, chat with a Ranger, and confirm that after entering the park itself the next supply of drinking water would be at Cottonwood on the far southern edge. Other than the isolated Black Rock campground that's not connected by road to the rest of the park, the only two sources of water within the boundaries are at the entrance station above the town of Joshua Tree and the Cottonwood Visitor Center at the other end. Otherwise, no water available, not even at campgrounds. And—hey, this is the desert!—nowhere along my route to collect and filter water from streams or ponds. That's why I was carrying enough water for two days, which would get me to Cottonwood where I planned to refill my bottles with enough H2O for two more days in the desert.

Do I need to remind anyone how much water weighs?

From the visitor center the road rises immediately toward the southeast. Much to my delight, this seemed to put the strong wind almost square on my back, providing a major power boost for lugging enough water to sink a battleship. With thick dark clouds—down the valley, toward Twentynine Palms, it looked like it might be pouring rain—and a surprisingly cold temperature—must have been wind-chill—I pedaled uphill to the actual park boundary, about five miles beyond the visitor center.

When I pulled over at the entrance station to pay my $5.00 fee, I couldn't miss a big handwritten sign on the window: High winds today, 70 MPH. That should have been my third and final clue.

"Is that right?" I asked the Ranger. "Seventy miles an hour?"

"Well," she replied, "I can't promise you anything, but the latest intel we have says strong winds for the next seventy-two hours with gusts up to seventy miles per hour tonight. I just had a report of a woman injured when the wind blew her car door shut on her arm, so you be careful up there."

I decided not to debate her, but seventy MPH couldn't possibly be right. Pig-headed and clueless, I pedaled up the hill mumbling to myself about how the Ranger probably confused winds for 72 hours with winds of 70 miles per hour. Actually, it turned out the Ranger knew a lot more about breezes than I did, and—as it would transpire—I simply missed all the clues.

Meanwhile, I kept grinding upwards. As the road twisted and turned, the wind sometimes helped, sometimes tried to push me into the sand, and sometimes tried to push me into the other lane. Thankfully, not much traffic. The scenery soon turned into the iconic landscape of rounded rock formations and remarkable trees with spiky limbs like upraised arms. This is the high elevation Mojave Desert, probably the most scenic and interesting part of the park. From about Intersection Rock onward, visitors are in the real heart of Joshua Tree, a spectacular visual environment that looks like it was created by a crazed cartoonist with a palette of tan and brown.

I stopped for lunch at Cap Rock, the scene of the incineration of the body of Gram Parsons. That gruesome incident didn't lessen my appetite for peanut butter and honey. A family from Dana Point arrived by car and spent some time talking to me about bicycling. They soon took off, and Cap Rock was quiet except for the constant wind. With no one else around, I sang a little country song into the wind and left a small token for Gram.

Beyond Cap Rock, the road turned more to the east and I picked up a giant tailwind again, carrying me up Sheep Pass and racing down the other side toward Jumbo Rocks and Skull Rock. The entire stretch of road from the entrance station to Skull Rock and beyond features dozens of paved turnouts for admiring the scenery and snapping photographs, and I took advantage of many of them.

From Jumbo Rocks in particular the road descended fairly steeply, making the pedaling easy but the stopping difficult. Beyond Skull Rock I blasted downhill to the main intersection in J Tree. Turning left, the road leads due north and downhill to the park border and Twentynine Palms. Instead, I turned right and rode about a mile uphill to Belle campground.

One of the smaller campgrounds, Belle nestles among some beautiful formations of stacked rocks. It was nearly empty, so I found a site that offered as much protection as possible from the wind. A friendly but slightly disoriented Dutchman driving from San Diego through the States for the first time wandered over to warn me his tent had blown down last night. He seemed a little shocked at the strength of the endless gusts, but these conditions came as a bit of a surprise to clueless me as well. Pointing to the rearview mirror clipped on my glasses, the Dutchman wanted to know if I was wearing Google Glass. Ah, no.

After setting up camp, I hiked into the desert and spent the remainder of the afternoon exploring massive rock formations and climbing around mounds of boulders. The wind was stronger than ever when I returned to the tent.

Could the Ranger really have been right when she told me the forecast called for seventy MPH tonight? I don't have a clue.

Today's Conditions

Yucca Valley → Belle campground

Time: 8:00 - 1:30

Distance: 34 miles

Climbing: Approx 1961 ft

Weather: Cold and cloudy morning; clear and cool afternoon; roaring wind all day and night