San Juan Huts Day 7: the roll home to Moab

We had one more day to go. We thought it would be easy.

There are multiple route options to get from Geyser Pass hut to Moab.  A significant fraction of us were pretty beat up and mostly wanted to stick to the easy route, which meant no Burrow Pass and no Porcupine Rim. That should have been about 35 miles of mostly downhill on double track or graded road.

The fact that I took 12 pictures on day 7, when my average for every other day of this trip was about 50, says I was ready to be done with the trip. But I was in high spirits to start the day just like the rest of the crew.

Start of Day 7

We chose not to do Burrow Pass, Hazard County, and Porcupine Rim (the Whole Enchilada), opting instead for some trails none of us had been on - Moonlight Meadows and Clark Lake. Moonlight Meadows was especially fun.  After that, we contoured around on a gravel road that was under construction so we could get to some more more new trail. This caused some discontent amount my companions as we were going by map and not by GPS and also because there were a lot of miles on gravel road.  But I thought the new trail, Jimmy Kean, was rather enjoyable. I got the feeling my companions did not share my feelings. Oh well, we would be free of each other soon enough! Ha ha.

Moonlight Meadows

That soon enough part proved elusive.  At the top of Upper Porcupine Singletrack, Kenny and Karl split off to do UPS. The plan was for the rest of us to coast down Kokopeli to Sand Flats Road and meet them where UPS joined SFR.  That was a good enough plan, but we got complacent and turned off our GPS and let our instincts guide us.  What happened next was a bit unfortunate for our tired legs.  We turned left at the intersection of Kokopeli and SFR when we should have turned right.  6 miles, 30 minutes, and several hundred feet of climbing later we realized our mistake and turned around.  At least the downhill was nice from there!

I've biked up Sand Flats Road a couple of times. This time, going down it seemed to take even longer than going up!

Finally, FINALLY, we coasted into town. First stop: greasy onion rings and fresh peach shakes at a Moab institution.

We did it and we deserved those fresh peach milkshakes.

After we cleaned up and grabbed some food at the Moab Brewery, we parted ways with our biking brethren. And so that's it. San Juan Huts Durango to Moab July 2017 edition is in the books.   I can't speak for the other couples, but Drew and I are glad we had this adventure with these four unique and talented bikers.

Stats:

total miles 41.1 miles (supposed to be 35.6), 2720 feet of climbing, 8401 feet of descending. 4:20 moving time. 1536 calories burned. average speed 9.6 mph

Day 7 recap video link

https://www.relive.cc/view/1106113936

Afternotes

Drew without a razor for 7 days.

Our gear was SO dirty!

Proof that the region we biked through had seen epic rainstorms while we were out there.  Despite having rain and mud almost every day, we really were quite lucky with the weather.