Mesa lake to black canyon

I finally slept most of the night last night with minimal coughing spells. It was actually quite chilly, and I imagine it must have been around 50 deg. We had a leasurely breakfast and packed slow. Somehow it was already 10 am by the time we were ready to go. Maybe we were so slow since we were quietly having regret about starting such a difficult journey.

We pedalled about 8 miles to the first gravel road of our trip (not counting the road that Kirk's house is on). We stopped at the start and let 4 "overlanding rigs" fly by us. One of them stopped and offered us some water, but since we had just filled up, we declined. Should have said yes though, always say yes to people being nice (within reason). So we started up the path, very few cars passed us and the gravel was well maintained. There were a few stretches of 8-12% grade and I had to walk some. I read about someone who advocated for walking since it uses different muscle groups and you would be less likely to get inured. I took this advice to heart today and walked alot. Around 20 miles in, we got to the "rocky canyon" area, which was decidedly rockier than the other valleys we were passing through.

Heart

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The road maintenance was almost zero: the road was soft dirt with large rocks scattered throughout. It was hard to pick a line. On the switchback portions we walked. But I was thankful it was uphill here. Southbound riders would have to ride down this. I would probably crash. At the rocky canyon campsite, I thought it was the black canyon campsite and was glad to have reached our goal for the day. It didnt take long to figure out why the mileage didnt add up, and after some planning, we concluded that we had to keep going. It was 3 pm and we had to go over two more peaks, but we didnt want to only get 20 miles for the day. If we go too slow, we could run out of food. So we pressed on. It wasnt too bad and there was an epic downhill to the campsite. It was pretty rough and my seat started to slowly anngle backwards (because of the weight of my seat pack) and my front bag, which was loaded unevenly, started to shimmy to the right. I figured if anything is coming loose, it did so on this section.
We pulled up to the camp to find a sizeable stream and an awesome picnic table! Most of the streams we have passed were dry or nearly so. We had a nice nalgene shower in the river while the "overlanding rig campers" tried to ignore us. the water was cold and we dried in a few minutes (thanks, high alpine desert place). I got a bonus seasoning packet in my ramen and felt content with the world. I sat down to write this here post in peace, hoping for no more micro worms.

Heart

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As a side note, a bikepacker pulled up the camp a few minutes ago and said he started 3 days ago a the border! He said he met another duo who started yesterday at the border! WTH. We out here trying our best to put up 20-40 miles like (insert famously bad football team?) I shouldnt be so harsh though, since we are sick and not very used to the altitude. The dude did say he lives in MT at 4800. At least I dont have a altitude headache or whatever else you get....

Mileage:30
Up:3192
Down:2579

Ride time:7