Arizona, South Mountain Park, Pants Hats and Mountain Lions

A business trip to Arizona offered the opportunity for a ride and a chance to check another state off the Frizbo Fifty list. Typically, I plan to arrive the evening before a meeting, but instead I book the earliest flight out of O'Hare and start researching biking possibilities in the Phoenix area.

My first concern is the weather forecast, 105 degrees in Phoenix! I know they say "It's a dry heat," but to a Midwesterner 105 degrees is intimidating. I imagine cramping up 15 miles from the car and wandering the desert wearing a "pants hat."  I learned later that the locals don't get worried until the temperature hits 110 degrees.

I narrow my research down to two bike trips. The first requires a two-hour car drive to Prescott, AZ where the temperatures were expected to be in the 80s or a short drive from the airport to South Mountain Park in Phoenix where the 80s would be the day's low.

At 16,500 acres, Phoenix’s South Mountain Park is the largest municipal park in the world and features over 60 miles of singletrack. After a phone call to the very helpful staff at Cactus Adventures who assured me, yes 105 was warm but my death was unlikely if I drank plenty of fluids, I reserve a mountain bike for 10 a.m. in the morning.

Surprisingly my flight from Chicago is early and soon I am in the rental car and on my way to the bike rental. I make a quick stop for a Subway sandwich and three quarts of Gatorade -- the first of which I chug immediately. "Man, I better get hydrated!" The guys at Cactus Adventures have my 29er ready and give me a trail map, a fill-up on my water bottle, and directions to the trailhead.

"Whew, 105 degrees!"

After a 5-minute bike ride from the bike rental, I bushwhack through a wash and onto the Desert Classic Trail. The heat is intense, but the bike generates just enough of a breeze to keep me cool -- until I get to an uphill. As soon as the path climbs, slowing me down, I feel like I entered a furnace. Fortunately, the Desert Classic Trail is generally level and as I acclimate, I start to really enjoy the ride.

Rented 29er in the Sonoran Desert

I must not have made much of an impression with the rental guys because after only 45 minutes I reach the landmark they suggested as a turn-around point. Too soon to go back. At the top of the ridge is the National Trail but the climb looks really difficult on the map, so I decide to explore the Telegraph Pass Trail which also shows some elevation and see how far I can get. Before long I am carrying the bike up a natural staircase and really feeling the heat.

I am reminded of another desert excursion in the Anza-Borrego Desert a few years back. On that occasion I was hiking by myself on a secluded trail. At the trailhead was an ominous sign warning that all hikers should drink plenty of water. So I start chugging water and continue on my hike. After a half-mile or so there's another sign warning that this is mountain-lion habitat. "If you are approached by a lion, make yourself look big, make loud noises and if attacked, fight back."  So I continue hiking, chugging water and now am continuously scanning the mountainside and boulders for an ambush. By this time I am massively over-hydrated and I need to relieve myself, but that will provide the lion a perfect opportunity for a surprise attack!

Looking back, I obviously overreacted. As it was springtime, the temperatures were relatively mild so I didn't need so much water and if any mountain lion was watching me, they would have been frightened off by the odd behavior of this strange human stopping every quarter mile and peeing in a 360-degree pattern while holding one arm over his head and shouting, "That's right! That's right! I'm BAAAAD!"

Today, the fluids are going pretty quickly. I have already consumed the two quarts of Gatorade in my backpack and am down to my 20 oz. water bottle. I have climbed quite a distance up Telegraph Pass, but it still looks like it may be a long way to the top. I can tell from the map there's a park road at the top of the ridge and from there it's a downhill ride to the ranger station and water, but I'm not sure I can make it. Just at the moment I'm about to give up, I see the roof of a car slide by above the rocks. "That's not so far!" One more push and I'm at the top!

Top of Telegraph Pass, South Mountain Park, AZ

The park road is a smooth two-lane blacktop winding down the mountainside with no traffic. After the climb, coasting with a nice breeze is magical. I glide with barely a turn of the crank down the five miles to the ranger station and right up to the drinking fountain -- no pants hat for me on this trip.

Cooling off on the way down!

The north side of the park offers fewer trails so I take to the roads to link up with the trails on the east side and then down on singletrack to the road back to the bike rental. During the trip I consumed 128 ounces of Gatorade and 104 ounces of water and didn't pee once in four hours (circular or otherwise). Say, it is a dry heat!

-- Frizbo

South Mountain Park Route

• State: Arizona
• Date: 2010-09-29
• Route: South Mountain Park, Phoenix, AZ
• Distance: 34 miles

Indiana, Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore, Riptides

On a beautiful day in early September, I drive to the Oak Ridge Prairie County Park near Griffith, Indiana. The county park is the trailhead for the Oak Savannah Trail which runs ten miles west to Hobart. From Hobart, it connects with the Prairie Duneland Trail for another six miles, and then it's a short road ride to the Calumet Trail which runs nine miles along and through the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore.

Oak Savannah Trail, IN

Northern Indiana is surprisingly well-endowed with bike trails. Griffith also connects to the Erie-Lackawanna Trail and the Chesapeake & Ohio Greenway. The trails are well-marked, but a map is useful to navigate the city streets between trailheads. A young girl in Hobart sees me consulting my paper map and helpfully explains, "The bike trail is by the Dairy Queen!" I imagine the Dairy Queen is the center of her universe, but her hint is not helpful as I have no idea where the Dairy Queen is either.

Calumet Trail, IN

At the end of the Calumet Trail there are a couple of the nicest beaches anywhere. Mount Baldy is a massive living sand dune with beautiful views of Lake Michigan and a steep face perfect for running down. But if you want to avoid carrying a bike up and over sand dunes, go to Central Beach at the end of Central Avenue. It's a short walk from the end of the pavement to the water and Central Beach rarely has the crowds and litter one finds at the nearby state park.


On this day, the sun is out and the wind has pushed the warm surface water to shore so it's a delightful temperature for swimming. The storms from the day before, however, have kicked up the waves -- I mean, they are rocking! -- so despite a sizable crowd at the beach, no one is in the water. With good reason, Lake Michigan can be dangerous on days like this. Riptides can sweep even the strongest swimmers away from shore. Many people mistakenly try to swim against the current, leading to exhaustion and drowning. The trick is to swim parallel to the shore until you are free of the current, then swim back to land.

Central Beach, Indiana Dunes

As I eat my lunch, a group of twenty-somethings come along and immediately head into the water. As I watch them enter the waves I wonder if a riptide sweeps them out to sea, will they know what to do? I contemplate a rescue plan of creating a flotation device by filling my spare inner tube with my portable CO2 pump.

I learned about riptides firsthand during a family vacation to North Carolina in 2006. We were staying at a beach house on the Outer Banks. After a near miss by Tropical Storm Beryl, the sun was out and the surf was up. Looking to test our boogie boarding skills, we scouted the beach for the biggest waves and were really enjoying ourselves when we heard faint cries of "Help! Help!"

At first, we ignored the yelling until we saw a girl swimming in who was obviously upset. I then realized that there were many people out beyond the breakers calling out for help. I told Matt and Lauren to fetch the rest of our floaties (we had quite a collection by then) and I immediately swam out with the raft.

I first came upon a young girl, maybe eleven years old, swimming in while crying. I gave her my raft. Next, I came upon a boy, a few years younger, and attempted to rescue him with a life-saving stroke I learned years earlier in Junior Lifesaving. What worked in a pool thirty years ago proved useless in a real emergency. I realized I couldn't do anything without the raft the girl was swimming away with.

"Wait," I called out. "We need the raft." She hesitated and then kept going. I asked the boy, "What's your sister's name?"

"Michelle," he answered and then we both called, "Michelle, wait!" Finally, she stopped and waited for us -- probably one of the bravest things she's ever done. When I got them both on the raft, the boy turned to me and said, "Please save my dad, he's a really nice guy." The girl just continued to cry.

North Carolina's Outer Banks on a calm day

I looked out to sea and saw just a head bobbing in the big waves well offshore. He was struggling. I knew I couldn't do anything without a raft, so I told the kids we'd have to get him together. They were brave as we paddled back out. As we got closer, I could see his head going under water with each wave. "Hold on one more time! You can do it!" I called out. 

We finally reached him with the raft. As we paddled in, the father said with desperation in his voice, "Don't leave us." When we were within shouting distance of the shore, Mona called out, also with desperation in her voice, "Matt and Lauren are still out in the surf."

"Crap, while I'm saving this family, my own children are drowning," I thought.

It turned out after I left Matt and Lauren at the beach, they had collected the remaining floaties and headed out to do their own rescuing -- Lauren with the River Rat inner tube and Matt with two boogie boards.

As a rescuer swam by Lauren, she offered him the inner tube, "You're a faster swimmer than me." He accepted the raft and later we saw him bring four people back to the beach with it. Moments after giving up the tube, Matt arrived with the extra boogie board for Lauren and that's how I found them -- calmly paddling in on the boogie boards.

Back on the sand, I asked a rescued teenager if they swam out too far. "No," he answered. "We were just pushed out into deep water!" A textbook description of a riptide! A few minutes later the beach patrol arrived. In the end, no one was hurt. If we count the four people on the inner tube, the Frisbies saved seven lives that day.

The Outer Banks sand was too hot for this pampered dog's paws!

Self-congratulations aside, I think the sister and brother probably would have made it back to shore on their own, but the dad was in real trouble. I also learned that you can't save anyone without some kind of flotation device which is why, years later, I find myself contemplating filling my spare inner tube with the portable CO2 pump.

Central Beach, Indiana Dunes

Back at the Indiana Dunes, after fifteen minutes of watching the twenty-somethings have the most amazing time among the waves without being swept away, I strip down to my biker shorts and take the last swim of the summer.

Route

Ride Summary:

• State: Indiana
• Date: 2010-09-04
• Route: Griffin to Indiana Dunes, Central Beach
• Distance: 60 miles