Day 5. A ride to hell with Dante.

So, of course, one of the claims-to-fame of Death Valley is that it's the lowest point in North America.



Which I figured would be a great point to start a bike ride. I mean, hey, there's a mountain literally two miles as the crow flies, 5500 feet - Dante's View. Peering over the sheer cliffs, you view the salt-filled basin and mountain ranges.

In any case, the sign said, 30 miles to Dante's View. Perfect. I had a decent night's rest, despite (because?) of the power outage, and I got an early start. Sixty miles would make a great round-trip ride through the desert; twenty miles of more-or-less flat, and a ten mile climb to the summit. I put two liters of water on my bike, two liters in my jersey, forced myself to drink a liter, and set off on my way. Hey, I was prepared.

Now, as you can see, the road wound around cliffs and canyons; a welcome change from Michigan topography.

But there was a problem, of course. When I was forced away from the protection of the canyon from the canyon wall, I would face the wind.

OK, 'wind' doesn't due it justice. Think massive wind. Unrelenting. Thirty-five miles an hour, pure headwind. For reference, I usually bike at around twenty MPH. When I'm time-trialing, I go about twenty-five.

And now, all I could manage was seven. SEVEN. On the flats. Working hard. My powermeter said I was putting down the mustard, but the wind was licking all of it up and more.

It's tough to tell grade in pictures - but this one was about a seven degree descent. I should've been doing forty miles an hour. And I was doing fifteen.

Suffice it to say - what was supposed to be a one-hour warmup for a nice mountain climb turned out to be a three hour ride through hell.

And appropriately enough, it was punctuated, halfway through, by a memorial to the namesake of the valley.

A few miles later, I stopped for a break - Zabriskie's point; a rock rising about 100 feet from nothing. I must admit it the views from the top were reasonably photogenic.

So now I'm about 25 miles into my trip. Since it's thirty miles one-way, I'm almost to my desination.

$#$%%.

What did that sign just say?

20 MILES left to Dante's View?!?

It turns out that it was 30 miles from Badwater, my starting location, to the BEGINNING OF THE ROAD THAT LED TO THE TOP OF THE MOUNTAIN. I mutter vendettas against the national park service.

And press on through the wasteland.

Why couldn't you have shown me this picture BEFORE I started?

I must admit that I was a little disheartened. The climb was completely unprotected, climbing up the ridgeline of the mountain above. The wind - which was blowing south when I started - turned to the East, so it was an almost perfect sidewind.

After another two hours or so of climbing, I reached my destination. Dante's view.

Telescope Peak, Over 11,000 feet, juxtaposed with the lowest spot in North America.




By now, every tortured exhale was steaming. My sweat was freezing. I usually take my time at the top of a mountain, enjoying the view, taking pictures, drinking some water.

Not today. I'm cold beyond belief. It's time to get down to the valley. The least enjoyable part of any climb - the descent.

I take off down the hill, and stop every ten minutes to warm myself up; breath into my hands. When I pass by the memorial an hour later, I finally start warming up. I stop, rinse the salt off of my face with the last of my bottle. Twenty miles to go.

Keeping in theme with the luck of the day, the wind had stopped. I had no tailwind to carry me back. Pedalling becomes difficult. I have no blood sugar, how hard I can go is limited by how quickly my body can process bodyfat. I finally coast into the car. I rest for a few minutes and load it up.

It's time to go. That's enough of Death Valley for me.