Day 6 Winslow, AZ to Gallup, NM 127 miles

Sorry Winslow, but I was glad to leave. It seemed like everything was broken or missing yesterday when we got to town and then breakfast was missing too! We adjusted to a continental breakfast instead of the full breakfast we were expecting at the hotel … some went to McDonalds or Safeway to augment the sparse pickings, but all survived.

Soon we hit the road. It was to be a road hazard day. There were cars, RV’s, trucks & cops stopped on the freeway shoulder along the way. Sometimes we could squeeze by on the shoulder, sometimes we dashed by in the traffic lane, and other times we walked our bikes around. There was the usual glass and tire parts … I got my first flat tire … two pieces of wire were embedded in my rear wheel. Then there were the dead animals … not sure what they were … and then a hippie. Somewhere between Winslow and Gallup, out in the middle of nowhere, there was a guy sitting on the freeway shoulder. As we rode up to him, we at first thought it was one of the ABB folks squatting down to take a picture as we rode by, but as we got closer it was a dirty, disheveled man just sitting there.

It was laundry day. Since I was one of the first ones there (okay, maybe fifth or sixth) I thought I’d make a dash to the laundry and grab it before anyone else did. Good idea, but someone else beat me to it. At least I was second in line. The downside of doing laundry was I couldn’t head out to eat when others were going, so I grabbed the Grande Meal from Taco Time, right next door. I topped it off with a couple of Klondike Bars, along with a Gatorade and a good start on my gallon of water.

The day ended with an evening briefing for the next day’s ride. Because it is such a long one (146 miles) and because breakfast is at a Denny’s 9 miles away, they needed to do it tonight instead of in the morning at breakfast.

One scary note, one of the riders, John Goodman, went to the hospital, as he was having trouble breathing and had been struggling the past few days. Gee … I’ve been having a bit of trouble breathing too … presumably because of the altitude.