Hopkins 4K for Cancer

July 18, 2006

Caliente, NV
107 Miles

The next two days into Las Vegas would cover 250 miles of desert terrain through some of the sparsest areas of the country. This day, although long, received little hype, and was nothing more than a precursor to the even longer ride the day after. It was also the most trying day for the 4K as a whole, in which we dealt with heat, sickness, and car trouble. But we pulled through, and set ourselves up for our longest ride of the trip.

Leaving Cedar City, we saw the land monotonize before our eyes. Utah had been hot desert, but there was something amazing in the landscape every day, whether it was canyons, green mountains, or rock formations. Now the land was nothing more than dry mountain ranges, going north to south, with dry valleys of shrubbery in-between. This was Nevada, and the land looked more and more like this with every pass that we went over.

We reached Caliente after a long, hot day with little support. We stopped in a park there where members of a local church had prepared us a wonderful dinner and brought it to the park This is where we were supposed to camp, but with the 155 mile day looming in front of us, we opted as a group to start climbing the 11 mile climb out of Caliente and shave off some mileage. After about 3 hours of rest, and no showers, we took off up the hill. We saw some beautiful desert scenery as we slowly moved up into the highlands, the sun setting fast in front of us. We reached the top just as it was getting too dark to see, and pulled off into a dirt road inlet. This would be our campsite under the stars for the few hours before we all attempted the Vegas Challenge, now cut down to a measly 144 miles.

-Ryan t