We started planning this fall and once covid-19 was hit we thought we might need to cancel. But our provider, Western Spirit Cycling Adventures, has determined that these outdoor trips pose low risk (the company says it has had no cases of coronavirus among its customers). As a precaution, we were all tested right before the trip and many of us again after getting home, with no covid detected. And, in accordance with company policies, we wore masks during shuttle trips to and from the White Rim. About half of our group arrived by plane from the coast, the rest coming from various points in the west.
For most of us this trip is considered a moderate challenge: the White Rim is a Jeep road, with only a few sections that a mountain biker would consider technical and maybe a half-dozen climbs to Breathtaking. We’re also followed by a one-ton cherry red Ford F-350 wearing our camping gear, clothing, food, adult drinks and, of course, wigs (more on that later). And we take our time. Many people hike this tour – without truck assistance – in three days, some in two and a few in the blink of an eye. A week before our arrival, Tour de France veteran Peter Stetina set the White Rim record of 5:28:23.
Yet here we are, with no deposit option between the start and the end. The three riders most concerned about maintaining the rented e-bikes, which have small battery-powered motors to provide assistance on the hills. Most notably, we are on a group trip in the midst of a pandemic, and as we gather for al fresco beers after arriving in the adventure and tourist bustling city of Moab, the collective relief is this. happening is as palpable as the excitement of heading out into the desert.
With bags and bikes on top of the truck and a shuttle, we roll out of Moab under a cloudless sky, arriving an hour later at the top of Mineral Bottom Road – 4,900 feet above sea level on the dotted roof sagebrush from Canyonlands Island to Sky District, a 132,438-acre mesa surrounded by the Colorado and Green rivers.
After a brief briefing, we’re on our mounts, descending steeply through the geological pile – golden-hued Navajo sandstone and scorched red Wingate formation, pale green Chinle rock and, finally, 1½ miles and 900 vertical feet. below our departure, on the auburn rim of the 245 million year old Moenkopi layer. We slide to a stop at the sight of the Green River and the incongruous hues of poplar leaves and brush along its banks.
The mood for hour 1 is seething. Terri Sofarelli, a medical assistant from Salt Lake City, and Peter Isaacson, a tech marketing manager from San Francisco, are so excited they’re pushing Mineral Bottom up for another taste of the descent. We also meet another guided group, preparing for the climb, but no surprise there: The White Rim secret has been around for decades.
The route, built in the 1950s for uranium exploration, was already increasingly noticed by Jeep drivers when, in May 1983, Buzz Burrell of Moab pedaled the loop (in less than 12 hours) on a Ritchey steel frame mountain bike and bucket- list ride was born.
Behind guide Tina Liss, a 26-year-old shredder from Marquette, Michigan, we follow the river that slides – silent, glassy, mouthwatering – through the rock oven. The temperature has reached the mid-80s and the desert is tightening the hydration of our body.
Twelve miles after our 16 mile day, we come to Hardscrabble, a sustained two-level climb with bogs in the middle and end.
“Unless you’re superhuman, you don’t make this hill,” Tina tells us. “So walk where you need it, and we’ll meet you at the top.” She waits to help her co-guide, a 29-year-old Briton named Adam Rosenfeld, navigate the truck through the sand traps.
It turns out neither of us are superhuman, although Terri and Robert Abbe, an investment banker from San Francisco, fake it pretty well. We are strolling upstairs when we see, rising from behind a rock joint, the telltale cloud of dust from our truck spinning its wheels.
We discuss getting down to help when the truck is in sight. Minutes later, Adam and Tina assemble the roadside cafe – a long folding table with a buffet line of plates, cutlery, and food, complete with a drinks cooler, low wooden and canvas chairs. and a hand washing station.
While the guides prepare lunch, we follow the path to a breathtaking view of the river that winds beneath the towering high desert sculpture. Rocks the size of a house balance precariously atop bony spiers, surrounded by prehistoric rubble. The vibe of Canyon Country is distinct from anything in nature, a feeling that is at once humiliating, mind-boggling, meditative and assertive.
After lunch (sandwiches, salad, fries), we descend two miles from our first camp, Potato Bottom, and pitch tents amidst the tamarisk, the black brush, the rose of the cliffs and a lone poplar, the only stroke of shade that we will have in the three camps. There is an outhouse nearby, but no running water or other modern features. Due to covid precautions, most of us are in individual tents except for the two married couples among us and the two women who choose to share.
With a few hours before dinner, we follow a sandy path to the Green River. It’s wide and soft – the Green, like the Colorado, is heavily taxed upstream for irrigation, and it hasn’t rained here since July – and we wade through the life-giving water to clean the dust off the trail.
We must have a good time because when a silver canoe drifts its occupants, a 60 year old couple, have only one question: If we camp near here, will you keep us awake all night ?
It’s enough. People come here for the peace and quiet, and we’ve already pulled a reprimand from the guides for triggering a little bluetooth speaker (Grateful Dead, of course) in violation of a park service rule aimed at to preserve the soundscape of remote regions.
Don’t tell my Deadhead friends, but I’m supportive of this rule and all the off-grid on this trip. We had lost cell reception on the way, and I didn’t miss it for a second. As Western Spirit co-owner Ashley Korenblat will tell me later, total detachment “frees your brain to think instead of swinging from crisis to crisis.”
We’re about as far away from the crisis as we can get, washed in a golden sunset and the first pulse of a front that will deliver a streak of crystal-clear days, with highs around 70. Over dinner. ratatouille and pork tenderloin, I ask Adam about the typical Western Spirit clientele.
“About this,” he said. “People my age don’t have the disposable income for a guided trip, and people much older than you usually won’t,” although the company has guided 9-year-olds and adults in the end. 70 years old. the white rim.
The next morning, after coffee and breakfast, we pack the camp and get together for our daily meeting on the map.
“Today,” Adam informs us, “is uphill,” with 23 miles and three steep climbs, a revelation that catches a apprehensive glance from Barbara Colombo, a photographer and gardener from Boulder, Colo., Who barely made it. trained for this trip. “When you pass me, shout encouragement,” she told me. “It really helps.”
We roll in a pack at 9:30 am but we disperse quickly, becoming a sort of mobile cocktail, with riders moving forward or backward to meet old friends and take a break for photo ops. The relaxed pace is one of the hallmarks of a trip like this, which Western Spirit classifies as “introductory / intermediate”; the company also offers complete sufferings, including one in which much of the driving takes place on a single track trail above 10,000 feet. After a few hours of gradual ascent, the guides stop us for lunch next to a massive slab of slippery rock.
“Come on,” Adam said as he led us on foot to a long fissure three to four feet wide and 65 feet deep, probably started in the dinosaur era by freeze-thaw cycles and opened even more by millennia. . A few hundred yards later, the platform ends in a view of the river as it curves, in the shape of a moat, around a 250 million year old rock citadel topped by a large white edge piece.
It would be the perfect place to kill a few hours, but we have some hills to climb. I strike first – with a victorious howl that I’m now sure I’ve erased the soundscape of – and down a plunging descent beneath the brown chimneys and ramparts. The second features a double-edged movement that forces everyone except Adam to get off their bikes. And the third is a frantic four mile ascent that culminates in a steep heartbreaker – pedal too fast and you twist, too slowly and you stall – that only Terri and Adam clean up.
Our reward is the camp, a garden of rocks, junipers, rabbit scrub and shadscale in front of a mezzanine overlooking a colossal pool of canyons and plateaus, ripples and folds, castles and kingdoms. Over beers and bourbon, we read poems – Lucy Lerner, director of the Telluride, Colo. Film festival, asked us each to bring a favorite – as the sun’s rays and shadows give way. dazzling Jupiter, Saturn, Mars and the Milky Way in a moonless sky.
The following night, after a thrilling 43-kilometer day of descent through primitive stadiums of hoodoos, arches and kneeling cliffs, the wigs pop out. Terri had them packed and we threw our last night out with shimmering rainbow white, hot pink, psychedelic manes and even a green Marge Simpson.
I always smile the next morning when we pass four young bighorn sheep that got stuck between the road and a cliff. Before the final climb of Shafer Canyon, I ride in front, in a silence broken only by the breath of a crow above my head. It flies uphill, towards the belly of the snake, which makes it look easy.
Where to stay
Best Western Plus
Canyonlands Inn
A centrally located Moab hotel with an outdoor pool and hot tubs and within walking distance of restaurants and shopping. Rooms from $ 89 in winter to over $ 300 in high season per night.
What to do
Western spirit
Cycling adventures
Guided tours on White Rim Road run from March to May and September to October, with a maximum of 13 people per trip. The company guides dozens of other road bike and ATV trips across the West for intermediate and advanced cyclists. Starting at $ 975 per person.
