Sconed.

Darkness again for our emergence into consciousness. We rolled off the elevated concrete pad and onto the bicycles. This morning was desert in the most traditional sense. Dusty, dirt, and mounds of sand. A little scrub brush clung to life here and there but the big player out of Hanksville is dirt. We did some mild climbing and saw a series of appealing signs about fifteen miles in. “Mesa Organic Farm.” “Fresh Baked Breads.” “Organic Salad.” “Coffee.” We pulled off the road and had a try at their front door but to no avail. We even saw a guy stomping around the back but he wasn't very business savvy and decided not to open for us. He seemed to be unaware of how much bicyclists consume in the way of calories. Another couple of glum miles and we were in Cainesville, destination: the Rodeway Inn. That truly is about all Cainesville has for business. We ate our snacks on a bench which was on a lawn in front of the hotel. We went inside to fill our water bottles and eyed their continental breakfast. It was slim so we contented ourselves with Tomato Basil Wheat Thins and peanut butter and rode on.

We continued climbing again and the Fremont River, which had barely been a trickle down the road, began to appear more impressive. The dirt transitioned to a river valley walled in by massive cliffs on either side. Fifteen miles or so of gradual uphill and we arrived in the Capitol Reef National Park. We stopped and saw petroglyphs inscribed into the rock face. We saw a guy with four Cervelos in the back of a truck and apparently the area had played host to a stage race the day before. He got 2^nd in his division and his daughters 1^st and 2^nd in theirs. They were heading to Oregon for the girls to compete in Nationals. Impressive. He was dialed into the racing scene of course, and gave us the Tour update.

Capitol Reef has been the site of human settlement for more than a thousand years, first Native American and then by isolated Mormon farmers. The Mormons planted trees here, some several thousand that bear fruit in a number of orchards. Apples, peaches, others I can't seem to recall. Unfortunately, nothing seemed to be in season, but when they are ripe, you're welcome to eat as much as you'd like. We rode a bit farther to the Visitors Center and refilled the bottles and took in an eighteen minute interpretive film on the park. The movie featured a few shots of the ocean and shivers went up my spine. It will be a wondrous occasion when we take sight of the Pacific. We moseyed over to the cash register and I spied a number of what looked like delicious baked breads being displayed under glass. I asked about the morsels and whether they were for sale. “Well, not these ones. But you can go down the road to the Griffith House.” There was some wavering if we'd go the mile out of the way but there was later much rejoicing that we did.

The Griffith House is a remaining structure from the Mormon settlement and features a portion of its square footage as museum and the other as bakery. Fresh and homemade. They have scones, pies, homemade ice cream, bread loaves, homemade salsa and jams, deluxe root beer – a tremendous find. I started off with a raspberry scone and vanilla ice cream. Extraordinary. Probably the finest baked goods within a two hundred mile radius. I went back for a second round and spoke to the woman working there about our trip and the people we had met and the highs and lows crossing the country. She gave me an ice cream for free and Jordan an orange cream soda. I went back a final time to fill a water bottle and was overjoyed to receive four scones for the crew to enjoy.

We left Capitol Reef to a few light raindrops and arrived in Torrey. We found an outfitters shop and Jeremy and I picked up a few Clif Bars while Jordan bought a camping silverware set. He broke his fork/spoon combo some days back. We rode further into town and stopped off at the grocery store where we spoke to a guy from Holland on an RV trip. They'll rent those things to anybody. But really, he was quite nice. We saw a storm off in the distance and were just about to start riding when we felt some drizzle and got back underneath the store's awning. It cleared again and the pedaling resumed. We did a bit of climbing before hitting a snafu. One of Jordan's pannier rain covers blew off and got sucked into his rear wheel, locked it up, and sent him skidding to a stop. No injury to Jordan but a section of tread burned off his brand new tire. (He had just replaced his previous.) Found remedy with a bungee cord and we continued climbing.

It started to rain on us but thankfully without too much severity. The ascent, however, became fierce. Up, up, up. Desperately searching for a plateau or a lessening in the grade to rest on. The final two miles were at an eight percent grade before we arrived at the Singletree Campground. It was raining when we pulled in and raining when we set up camp but the weather did clear and soon the sun was out in force. This afternoon weather is fickle. We went and spoke to a very nice couple from Provo, Utah and stomped around the campground a bit. This was a real campground. We were in the mountains with trees and grass and scenery. No camping in a parking lot tonight. There were a number of signs advising visitors to store all food inside their car or hard-shelled RV. Right, store our food in the car. No bear lockers were available so we hid all the food up in a tree and hoped for the best. I'll let you know how that went in the next update. We concluded the day with a delicious dessert of raspberry scones and reflected on an excellent stretch of sightseeing and baked goods.

Hanksville in the morning.

Taking a pee in the dirt.

Dirt Magurt.

You're minuscule in this country.

His white jersey is really dirty.

Look closely, petroglyphs.

Exiting Capitol Reef.

Blocking wind. Breaking wind.

Singletree Campground.

Surly.

Exploring. Tired legs make for short hikes.

Now that's what I call a campground.