Wednesday, May 25, 2005

Sunday 22/5/05

Another beast of a day today. 65 miles from Torrey to Escalante over the 9400ft boulder mountain.
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Not too bad we thought just 30 odd miles to the top then down the otherside to Boulder town for lunch (Boulder town is so remote it was apparently the last place in the continental USA to have its mail delivered by vehicle). When we arrived in Boulder for lunch we realised just what being remote meant, seriously high prices, I mean it was nearly $10 for a burger with crisps. Us being poor decided to leave it and fix ourselves something to eat at the grocery which was still overpriced. After lunch we thought it was just a small uphill then a large downhill to Escalante, were we wrong. We did a small uphill then a large downhill into scorching hot canyons (we had been at the snowline in birch and pine forest talking about going sledging not two hours before) then we had to climb up ridiculously steep switchbacks out for getting on an hour, dripping with sweat the whole way. It was worth it though, on the way back down on the final descent we came down a road called hells backbone, it is called this by virtue of the fact it is a steep winding road built upon the apex of a high rocky ridge overlooking canyons. It was an absolutely awesome descent, made better, if thats possible by meeting our first honest to god English people in the whole of America when we stopped to take a photo. Roger and Penny were touring from Arizona to Las Vegas, I never thought I would be so glad to hear a cockney accent! We arrived in Escalante at about 4 where we were going to stay in the state park, when we arrived though we realised it wasn't near any shops and was the same price to camp as in town so we headed back. On the way some middle aged guys stopped us as they drove by who said they were riding too, and gave us information on where to stay. They just drove to where they wanted to ride, did a loop and stayed in a cabin, not very hardcore. The camp ground was ok but as with alot of stuff in Utah food was real expensive.

Hell's Backbone Road was a death trap as its name would suggest. Heres a photo from the side of the road looking down into one of the canyons, it was like this on both sides and it had 14% downhill gradient for 5 miles! awesomely scary fun!
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