Day 6ish - Nice bright colors.


Babies are death - or at least are the beginning of death.

Somewhere in A Movable Feast Hemingway reportedly makes reference to "the senseless death of a young child". I say reportedly because I don't know. It has been so long since I read it and I doubt I would have remembered the reference at the time anyway - me busy dragging round Typewriter Heights, Paris on knuckles that could barely climb the stairs. A valuable death?

After a brief miss of the Grand Canyon on the south side we listened to religious radio on Navajo land, slid into Page Arizona across the hot asphalt of mid-day, and poured selves out into the air-conditioned supermarket through a wall of heat between vehicle and store door.

Remembering a previous visit to Page, we'd gone slow on the beer - ecstasy, however, was available at the church of the Navajo and so - while not drunk - we were in fine form to enjoy a visit with local color. We started well by poking our heads into the tourist info center once we'd loaded up with fresh beer and I think some food.

Lake Powell Utah A young man, about 20 and happy to share his wealth of worldly experience, was holding the fort and talking with his girl friend. Slack jawed tourist info boy took time out to tell us that he really didn't know about any roads going the way we were planning to go and thought we might want to "...turn around and go back where you came from" - impudent kid.

Undaunted, we rolled quickly on without incident. Crossed the bridge at Lake Powell and headed toward Utah - past trailer sites and year round storage in an area where you wouldn't think people had anything to store - probably lockers used by vacationing visitors who found it easier to store their boats locally than take them home to their crowded yards in some far off suburb. Suburb of what city I didn't know but I guess it could be Phoenix - Lake Powell being a water refuge from the desert.

Once into the fresh beer on the other side of Lake Powell we quickly found the road we'd been looking for - a direct line from Highway 89 to Highway 12 via Georgetown, Cannonville and before that, Kodachrome State Park, Utah.

The road was well marked, had been graded since the last big rain, appeared well used, and may have even had the mileage to Kodachrome indicated on some home made Arrow sign. If anything, there was too little risk involved in pursuing this path.

Anasazi view Nonetheless, Billy Bob decided to fuck up. Less than two miles in, the wash board was starting to wear on him. As the thumps and bumps piled up in rapid succession along his spine he began dedicating his mind to calculating and, rather than observing the rule that prohibits turning back on a road before reaching its end, Billy Bob figured that 2 hours of pavement would be easier and more rewarding than one hour and forty five minutes of thrashing about and worrying about the bikes falling off the back of the truck.

Perhaps because of the heat, perhaps because of the beer, ecstasy and rotten sausage Billy Bob had a vision of Eve, choose to exercise his will and bit the apple big time, despite my vehement protests. Rather than following faith and going with the tried and true rules of the road, Billy Bob "knew better" and choose to violate the fundamental cannon against turning around. More than that, he refused the obligatory bourbon salute that may have mitigated the impact of his rash decision.

The first of the three-part consequence for his blasphemy was visited upon us immediately when Billy Bob backed the truck into a dirt wall at the side of the road while turning the truck round. The second part followed days later when we learned the turth about Utah and Mickey's big mouth beer. The third part of the road god's wrath would be experienced days after that.

There was no question that the bikes got bent by Billy Bob's three-point turn around on the wash board. The question would be how bad.

We drove in stony silence for the remaining two-hour detour to Kodachrome. We did not stop for lunch near the White Cliffs; we didn't poke around the side of the road going through a pass near the Pink Cliffs; we didn't take any pictures of the Vermilion cliffs. I was pissed. I sat and stewed and got pissededer.

The good thing was - with bent bikes, we didn't have to justify not riding them anymore.

next day
earlier in Day 6
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