Distance: 93 miles                Total Distance: 343.1 miles

Ride time: 6hrs 51 mins       Including stops: 9hrs 47 mins

Ave speed: 13.5mph            Max speed: 27.2mph

102°F at 4pm

Another wake up call at 2am this morning!  Drove back to Quartzsite so that Keith could begin cycling at the same point that he had stopped last night.  14 miles on the Interstate this morning left Keith with 4 punctures by the end of it!  As I am sure you can imagine, Keith was a little annoyed by this!!

Midges and Mossies are getting us all down, they are completely relentless! 

Keith saw his snake this morning, although unfortunately it was as roadkill.

Temperature is still in the 100s by midday so we decided to stop in Congress, Az and get a motel as otherwise we will be boondocking on the side of the road which will be completely unbearable as we will have no A/c in the RV. 

As it happens the only motel in town is the “Smallest motel in Arizona” with just four rooms and only one available!  Therefore Keith and I booked into the motel and Pam & Brian boondocked in the car park of the motel!!

We were in bed at 6:30pm, before sunset which was slightly weird and had a wonderful nights sleep, which apparently can’t be said for Pam & Brian who were sleeping (or not!) in the oven.  It was actually cooler outside than in!

Day Three                         Thurs 24 July                       Brawley to Quartzsite, AZ

Distance: 111.7 miles          Total Distance: 250.2 miles

Ride time: 7hrs 32 mins       Including stops: 10hrs 40 mins

Ave speed: 14.8mph            Max speed: 33.7mph

105°F at midday

Due to the heat we have all decided that we need to start a lot earlier , and therefore this mornings wake up call was at 2am!  After a better nights in a hotel bed, Keith set off at 3am and we followed on behind at 4am.

We had a road pit stop in the sand dunes as dawn broke to fix the rear bike light and refill the bottles.  Finally after a second pit stop, dawn broke at 5:45am.

Scenery of the day is sand dunes, where Return of the Jedi, Patriot Wars and Stargate were filmed, among others.  By 6:55am temperatures started to rise, and we hit border control for the state of Arizona. 

At around 11:30am, Keith hit the Interstate part of the day.  At 1:35pm we met up with Keith at truck stop (Interstate services), Quartzsite, Az and decided to call it a day, due to the heat being around 100°F and getting hotter.

Drove 30 miles up to Hope, Az for our prebooked RV site, where we finally met up with the Science in Sport energy foods, and were warned that we may see scorpions and snakes should we be out after dark.  Lets hope not!!

Day Two                             Wed 23 July                        Borrego Springs to Brawley, CA

Distance: 58 miles                Total Distance: 138.5 miles

Ride time: 4hrs 10 mins         Including stops: 5hrs 58 mins

Ave speed: 13.8mph              Max speed: 35.1mph

113°F at 4:30pm

Alarm went off at 5:30am this morning, although by the time we had breakfast and got sorted Keith didn’t get on the road until 7:45am.  Today was extremely hot with no cloud cover at all. 

Spoke to the Long Beach hotel and confirmed that the Science in Sport goods had arrived and therefore arranged for them to be shipped to Hope, AZ tomorrow, which is where are next RV site is booked.

At 1:20pm we saw Keith stopped in Brawley grabbing some shade under a canopy.  He was about 30 miles short of today’s riding distance, but the sun was so hot that it was discussed that he would have a break and then possibly do some more riding later in the evening. 

We went shopping for bits for the RV while Keith rested and tried to cool down, but at 7:20pm he was still boiling hot and so we decided to call it a day and check into a hotel in Brawley to start early the next morning.

Keith bedded down at 9pm, having had some early tea previously, while Pam, Brian and I made some tea in the RV in the car park of the hotel!  We ate out on the camping chairs in the car park, and were took by surprise when the driver of the truck we were sat next to, came along and moved the truck so that it wouldn’t spoil our dining experience while he worked on it!

Day One                            Tues 22 July                        Oceanside, CA to Borrego Springs

Distance: 80.5 miles            Total Distance: 80.5 miles

Ride time: 5hrs 46 mins        Including stops: 8hrs 25 mins

Ave speed: 13.9mph             Max speed: 47.8mph

100°F at 7pm

Keith set off at 10:35am from the beach at Oceanside for his first day of cycling.  We set a marker of 15 miles ahead where we would meet to check on him.  However we managed to go food shopping in Oceanside and get completely lost and missed our first meeting.  Luckily we had walkie-talkies and made contact with Keith and arranged to meet a little further up the road.

The rest of the day went very smoothly, and we met up with Keith 3 times during the day to replenish his fluids and energy bars.  Still no Science in Sport energy goods, so using Gatorade powder instead, although we have been given hope that it will clear customs tonight and therefore reach the Long Beach hotel tomorrow (it’s original destination).  We hit the first RV park at around teatime and therefore had tea, showered and went to bed at around 10pm.

Preparation Days

All went smoothly getting to the airport hotel on Friday night and with checking in for the flight on Saturday.  Thankfully we had all of our bags on the carousel at Los Angeles airport and managed to collect the bike box at the “Odd-sized Luggage” area.

We sailed through Immigration and Customs, collected the car and were in and out of the airport in 1hr 30mins.  Definitely the quickest either of us have ever been through an US airport.

From the airport we drove to Long Beach, where we stayed for two nights.  We were hoping that a large box of Science in Sport Energy Bars and Drinks powders were going to meet us at the hotel, however it appeared that they were having a much harder time getting through customs than we had!

Pam & Brian (Amy’s parents) arrived at the hotel on Sunday afternoon, so we all went for dinner to catch up with each other.

Sadly on Monday morning we left the hotel, with still no Science in Sport goods, despite numerous calls to Fedex, so we headed to the RV depot to pick up our 30ft home for the next 6 weeks!

After several hours of waiting and watching instruction videos, we finally drove out of Long Beach at 5pm and headed for Oceanside, a 1hr 30mins drive down the coast.