Fight Like Susan

Today I woke up with the intention of going on a long challenging ride. My plan was to push myself pretty close to what I felt was my limit. More or less, I wanted to go on an epic ride.

Then I read Fat Cyclist, and found out that Fatty's wife, Susan, had passed away last night. My motivation evaporated.

For those who don't follow Fat Cyclist, in addition to being a bicycling information, tales and humor blog, Elden (Fatty) kept us updated as to how Susan was doing as she battled cancer. He also is using it to help in the fight against cancer, in raising money for LiveStrong. In the end, even though I've never met either Elden or Susan, having followed the blog for as long as I have, I felt like I've sort of gotten to know them, even if just a little.

So, after scrolling through some of the comments people have left for Elden, and leaving one of my own, and a little prodding from Exegete, I left on my ride, only now I was riding for more than just the reasons I woke up for.

So, I'll skip what I have discovered to be my definition of an epic ride, and how I suffered and fought the last ten miles home, and just say it was a great and rewarding ride, well worth the effort.

Walnut Canyon.

Walnut Canyon.

Yup, Walnut Canyon.

The Peaks and Mt. Elden from Walnut Canyon.

Go ahead, guess where this was.

I'm not sure I can ride over this... or hop it either.

Yucca fruits!

If you're still here... My route today took me on the Arizona Trail, skirting aong the rim of Walnut Canyon, then veering away to the Walnut Canyon Monument road, where I turned onto the pavement and pedaled on the hard stuff back through town because I had a growing headache. While I was on the trail though, I took some side trails to a couple viewpoints, which is where I took the pictures today.

Mileage: 35.7