After contemplating the risks of moving south this year (Arizona has been a Covid hotspot!) we decided that we would continue to be cautious and head to the desert. Social distancing has been fairly easy to do during the summer months in Spokane, but winter here is long, generally cold and gloomy, with short days and cloudy skies. Our desert home affords us the opportunity to spend much of our time outdoors. We can cycle and see our friends outside.

We decided to once again cycle much of the way supporting each other riding solo while driving our Sprinter van and camping along the way. We meticulously planned a route through the Cascade Mountain range of Washington and Oregon into California. From there we intended to travel across the “Loneliest Highway In the US” in Nevada. Alas, Mother Nature foiled our plans! Much of the route through Washington, Oregon and California went up in flames in September destroying some of the small communities where we had planned to stay. These fires brought horrible air quality to our region forcing us to stay indoors for many days. The losses in 2020 continue to mount, making it difficult to stay sanguine in the face of it all.

The air quality has finally normalized and at least some of the fires are contained. We decided, however, that it was too risky (and likely not very scenic) to travel via our original route. Consequently, we planned a new route and hope to make it through our journey before snow hits the high passes or new fires emerge (not to mention civil unrest!). For the first few days we will follow the same route as earlier this summer: south through western Washington, across Lolo Pass in Idaho to Montana, south (past the site of the famous “scissors incident!”…watch out!!). Here we will diverge from the prior route and head south again into Idaho. We will travel south through Idaho, through or around the Sawtooth Mountains depending on the weather. We enter western Nevada and traverse south through a very sparsely populated area of ghost towns and few services. We plan to visit Great Basin National Park. From there we enter Utah and will cycle through Zion National Park on our way to Arizona and the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.

Riding through northern Arizona will be limited by road closures in the Navajo Nation which has been hit hard by COVID. We hope to make it through Sedona, south through Globe and finally our reach desert getaway.

This route should take us once again along some incredibly scenic roads though sparsely populated regions. With the shortening day lengths, we will need to drive a portion of each day but look forward to some gorgeous vistas, challenging climbs and chilly weather. Hopefully we can manage to avoid nasty politics, COVID, and whatever else the world has to throw at us.

Our dogs, Jack and Star will be traveling with us once again. Star doesn’t like travel and will need to be coaxed and molly-coddled. Jack has already been hanging out in the van each day as I pack, ready to go and making sure that we aren’t leaving him behind.

We are sad to say goodbye to our Washington friends and family and hope that visits aren’t too far off in the future. We are even sad to leave our local wildlife. We also miss our cycling friends from around the world who we can’t visit or travel with for the time-being (as we are the pariahs of the world 😦 ).

We hit the road tomorrow. Hoping for strong legs and good luck. See you all on down the road!