A Tiny Lizard, Basking in the Sun

Short Version:
BASE jumpers welcome us to another great ride. Bike death. A high-speed crash. Lovely Wife scares the Weatherman.

Long Version:
Amasa Back had been on the must-do ride list of everyone with whom we'd had Moab-riding discussions, and we arrived at the parking area full of piss and vinegar and ready for some serious ride action. BASE jumpers were cascading groundward from the nearby peaks as we pulled in, and we watched them carefully folding and packing away their gear as we breakfasted and had a crack at drying out the still-sodden tent and associated items whilst awaiting the arrival of our partners-in-ride for the day.

Don and Christie and Mark and Lori arrived within minutes of each other, and before we knew it we were off, riding up the road to the trailhead proper, then walking our bikes down the far-too-sketchy-for-that-hour-of-the-morning rock staircase to the bottom of the cliff, where Kane Creek burbled noisily across our path. A long but mainly gentle-grade climb punctuated by uneven rock sections brought us to a high plateau of slickrock, where we played competitive route-finder before lunching at the cliff-edge overlooking the potash manfactory and Dead Horse Point. Apparently parts of the original 2001: A Space Odyssey were filmed in the area, which fits well with the general otherworldliness of the terrain surrounding Moab.

Back down the sloping plateau and then onwards to our turning point at Pothole Arch. Mechanical failure impacted my enjoyment of the run back down to Kane Creek: my free-hub died, leaving me with the options of derailing my chain and coasting back or pedalling the whole way to avoid massive chain entanglement. I chose the latter, and discovered that pedalling down hills makes one go even faster, regardless of the terrain. Who knew? Scary stuff in some places, although not as scary as the realisation halfway down that we'd lost Lori.

We found her, eventually, back up the trail a ways, mildly battered and bruised, and bleeding impressively a little bit, and then we were off again, eating up the miles as we blasted downhill over the rocky terrain we'd ridden up a few hours earlier, to the creek where a tiny lizard basked in the sun. The Weatherman had arrived there well in advance of the rest of us and had set up to film us incoming at speed. He'd not banked on Nene's race-face and pace, though, and her high-speed and vehement arrival spooked him so much he fell over, down the bank, narrowly avoiding a bath in the creek at the bottom. Humour value: High.