Day 37-38: El Paso and Radium Springs, New Mexico

We ended up with a pretty nice place to sleep in Van Horn under a pavilion on a cement slab in a park that was next to a carnival that was playing terrible music all night and was a little buggy.... And there were angry clowns dancing around our tents all night so we couldn't sleep. And one of the angry clowns may have stabbed John. It was only a flesh wound. No, but really the spot was pretty good. It was dry and out of the wind and most importantly cost only free dollars.

The next morning we woke with intentions of only riding to Fort Hancock (where Andy sends the postcard to Red in Shawshank Redemption) which would have been about an 80 mile day but with great winds at our back we were able to blow passed Fort Hancock and make it all of the way to El Paso averaging over 16 mph the whole way. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to break my other record of 125 miles, but it was still quite the day of riding. Also, just after leaving Van Horn we passed into the Mountain Time Zone. So for you East Coasters I am now two hours behind you.

We were lucky enough that our warmshowers hosts (Ben and Sarah) were able to take us in a day earlier than planned and we biked right to their house in beautiful downtown El Paso.

They treated us to a nice spaghetti dinner with delicious dinner rolls and we were able to get some much needed showers and laundry completed. Ben and Sarah were really great hosts and we even went out to get some beers with Ben at a local bar where we met some other riders doing a ride for Testicular Cancer Awareness... They gave us some nice bracelets too.

We left El Paso on the 19th at about 11:00 a.m. and rode through the day as we watched the storm clouds rolling in from the west. Luckily, we didn't get too wet during the day and rode 74 miles to just on the northwest side of a small town called Radium Springs. Much of the day we spent on Route 28 which took us through beautiful Pecan Orchard country and it ended up being a really nice ride.

Also, we finally got out of Texas but unfortunately the road we were on did not have any Welcome to New Mexico sign.... Sad panda.

We had the option to stay in a state park right in Radium Springs, but we thought $20 for a patch of dirt and no showers or water was a little too much. We ended up riding about another 5 miles out of Radium Springs and camped off on the side of the road on a really nice grassy patch that overlooked the road. I tried taking a picture this morning but my phone died in the process so you will have to take my word on it that it was not a sketchy place and was one of the better nights of rest we have had on the road. (Much better than Van Horn with the angry clowns)

We were back on the bikes before 7:00 a.m. this morning (Day 39) and biked about 14 miles to Hatch and have been posting up at a small convenience store eating breakfast burritos, drinking coffee and charging our devices. Tonight we are riding into a town park that allows people to camp for free in Hillsboro and then we take on Emory Pass the highest peak on the Southern Tier trail at 8,228 ft. tomorrow.

Happy Easter all.....