Tuesday, July 2

Tuesday, July 2nd:  I woke up this morning at 5:00 am and I was on the road with my bike by 6:00.  We headed east out of Payson, AZ.   Payson is about 5,100 ft elevation and the temperature was very moderate this morning.  I think the high was about 80 degrees which is almost 40 degrees less than what we experienced in the desert.   The route today had a very sharp incline up to 7,500 feet.  It was six miles with about a 6 degree incline.   It was slow going up that mountain but once I made it to the summit it was mostly level or downhill into the the city of Heber.

 The landscape is beautiful with lots of pine trees and red rocks.   I biked the 52 miles to Heber and made it by 11:30 am.  We are staying at the public school here.  We had a choice of either setting up our tent on the football field or sleeping in the gym.  I chose the gym.     A thunderstorm came up at about 3:00 pm and we all sat under a canopy and watched a spectacular lightning show.  Another storm came through right at dinner time and the rain made everyone scramble for cover.  The temperature tonight has dropped at least 20 degrees.

The flags in Arizona are flying at half mask in memory of the 19 firefighters that were killed on Saturday.   They were fighting a forest fire about 2 hours from where we were staying in Payson.  We have been praying for the families of all of these brave firefighters who died in this tragedy.

As of now, our route into Colorado is going to change.   The state of Colorado is recommending that we not go up Wolf Creek Pass because of the recent fires there.  The road is open but the air is still filled with smoke and they don't recommend bike riders come through this area.

Tomorrow we bike 77 miles to St. John's, AZ.  We are about to start our evening meeting.  I'll try to post some more pictures with this blog when I have better wifi access.