Winter trip to AZ

I have an aunt in Canada who has a house in Arizona. She has been spending jan-feb down there lately and asked if I wanted to come and visit for awhile. I've spent some time here before, like two years ago when we drove all the way from her house in Toronto. That first time, I basically spent a month and a half sitting around drinking by the pool, and got a little heavier and out of shape than I wanted to be. I feel like it slowed me down for the entire bike season. This time, I wasn't going without a bike, so thanks to bikeflights.com I was able to send one down here for not too much money. The guys at Missoula Bicycle Works were also nice enough to give me all the packaging materials I needed and let me use a workstand and their tools to get the bike boxed up.

So it made it, and I've been getting in some cool rides in the Phoenix area. Since I'm in the north part of Scottsdale it is easiest for me to head north toward Cave Creek and such, where there are lots good places to ride. The first big one I did was to Bartlett lake, which is about a 70mi round trip with nearly 5000ft of climbing. Possibly a little ambitious for so early in the season and I was not feeling so great by the end. For anyone looking to do this ride, there is a fountain at the top before you go down to the lake which was not working, and then at the lake there is a store with drinks and snacks. Their potato chip selection is not very good though, and if the store is closed I think you could still probably sneak around the balcony to the back where they have water fountains. The sheriff's office thing probably has water too.

I might not have made it home without a double double and fries.

https://www.strava.com/activities/478526454

The last time I rode it, I went with my friend Luke, who lives here but was in Missoula for a summer, and also Mike Longmire, who is from MT, but lives in OR and was in town for a few days. Mike is 62, just beat cancer, and is still really fast.

https://www.strava.com/activities/502305950

On the way to that lake there are some good loops and neighborhood hills to climb. There's also a road that goes way out east and lets you come in to the north side of fountain hills and back into Scottsdale:

https://www.strava.com/activities/480749763

It's called nine mile hill, but I was going down it instead of up. I think that direction is better, because once you get back into Scottsdale from Fountain Hills you have to ride on Shea for awhile which is 6 lanes with no shoulder. Headed west (clockwise loop) you are going downhill and can basically keep up with traffic. The other way I think would be a little nerve-racking. If I really wanted to try riding up that 9mi hill I would probably go down, and then turn around and climb back up.

So most of my riding has been up in that general area. I've been to bartlett 3 times and it is probably one of the best rides you can do around here. Going the other direction, there are the north mountains and camelback in the middle of the city, which have numerous steep climbs to do on their edges. We got most of them on this ride and the one the day before:

https://www.strava.com/activities/499169794

If you go a bit farther, to the other side of downtown Phoenix, there is south mountain, which has paved roads to the top along with lots of hiking and mtb trails. I rode there one day on my own, and it was fine but most of it is getting through the city. Once you are there the climb only takes about 30min. So after all the urban riding on busy streets I got to the top and was thinking "wait, that's it? now I have to go all the way back." A nice thing is that once a month they close the roads to cars, so the bikes have it all to themselves. I did that with Luke and one of his friends, and we left from his place which is a lot closer. Then we went to a brewery. Most of my rides end up at a brewery or in-n-out.

https://www.strava.com/activities/486713462
https://www.strava.com/activities/504995205

That's most of where I've been. I really wanted to go to Tuscon for a few days to try Lemmon and see some other friends but did not make it. I've also heard good things about apache junction to tortilla flat. In addition to the road riding I've done some hikes and a bit of mountain biking on some old bikes in the garage. I did put some new tires on them and even set them up tubeless, because going mtb riding in the desert gets you a lot of flat tires.

Not the ideal ride but ok for short loops with my aunt. If I had my own MTB here it looks like I could get in some really interesting and long rides. Maybe some time I'll be able to drive down and bring more than one bike and stop in Utah on the way. I do have some books and stuff sitting in the garage here so I need to do it eventually.

I've been pretty good about not eating junk or drinking too much beer, and will be back in MT in a few days. This has gotten me a nice jump on the riding season and things get pretty busy in march and april, with group rides, speedwagon, rocky mountain roubaix, and the MT hell ride (shortened and rescheduled after being cancelled due to fires last fall). Then there is a big new MTB series so I will have lots of racing to do. Thinking about going back to Butte for the 100mi mtb race as well.