Day Sixteen: St. George - Springdale

Bob cooked us yet another huge spread in the morning: scrambled eggs, Dave’s Killer Bread toast, fruit salad, and yogurt. His friend, Cody, was also staying at their house for the night, and he joined us at breakfast and shared a few stories of his own. Meanwhile, Bob laid out a plethora of maps across the ping-pong table that detailed the route they plan on taking across the country in August. They bought the maps from Adventure Cycling, a company that provides customers with comprehensive sets of detailed route instructions for cross-country riders. We had considered using the maps before setting out on our own trip, but being stubborn, we decided to do without them. After checkin’ em’ out, we could see why going that route makes a whole lot of sense: there are notes on every opportunity for food, water, sightseeing, lodging, etc., as opposed to our highlighted Wal-Mart atlas, which for lack of a better description, just doesn’t do that. We hung out with Bob for a few more minutes before it was time for him to head out to a physical therapy appointment (he had a knee replacement not too long ago), and then packed our bags to leave for the day.

The ride began slowly. About a mile down the road, Slate realized th he forgot the atlas, so we did a quick loop around the neighborhood to grab it. He then noticed a slow leak in his front tube, which we ended up checking on over and over, before riding to Wal-Mart to grab a new tube and snacks for the day. Well, as it turns out, Wal-Mart didn’t have the tube, and the grocery department was so large that it took us about an hour to sort through goodies before deciding on the same damn things that we eat every day… whoops. We finally left St. George with packs full of food and set out for what we thought would be another day going straight uphill.

The 45-mile ride was better than expected, however, as the hills were short and steep, rather than long and dragged out. We stopped at a gas station for lunch and saw that there was a Blimpie inside—which I definitely thought was out of business—and we ordered a sandwich stuffed with every condiment on the planet. A family sitting at a table nearby jumped at the opportunity to chat with us, and they explained that they were from the Denver area, and visiting for a mountain biking trip. The father, Matt, jumped in front of me in line at Blimpie to pay for our sandwich and said, “That’s all you’re eating?!” He apparently hadn’t seen Slater at the other end of the store, purchasing a massive bag of chips and two sodas. He told us to keep in touch, and we gave him our website to send us a message (which he did the next day). As it turns out, they’re also planning a cross-country trip as a family. They were an awesome, and we love meeting people like them along the way!

By late afternoon, we rolled into Springdale, UT, which is the town just outside the entrance to Zion National Park. We stopped at a convenience store next to two motorcyclists, and when we first heard them speak, we instantly recognized their accents and knew they must have been from Barcelona. We took this as a good omen, as the two of us studied abroad in Barcelona just last year, and we both love the city. As we rode deeper into Springdale, we were happy to find a quaint little town nestled in the canyon, with one main street decorated with quirky coffee shops, restaurants, galleries and outdoors stores to walk through. We enjoyed it so much that we decided to spend the night in the town rather than going into the state park just yet, especially since we had heard that it would be tough to find a vacancy in the Zion campgrounds. We purchased a tent site next to another cross-country cyclist in his fourties or fifties, set up camp, and hopped in the pool before walking around town and finding a spot for dinner. A Mexican restaurant called Casa de Amigos was the choice of the night, which offered not-so-great service and a mediocre menu--but hey, there were chips and salsa. It didn’t take us long to lick our plates clean, and then we walked back to camp to snooze for the night.