Stalling for time...

So we seem to have ended up at the gates of Phoenix (in the smaller town of Fountain Hills) much ahead of our intended schedule. But no matter, there's a very nice library that keeps us apart from the sweltering heat all day, and we can ride to our intended campsite during the cooler nights.

First, we'd like express our extreme gratitude to Devin and Laurel for hosting us for the two nights we were in Payson- it was hard to leave such hospitable (and comfortable) accomadations.


Devin's Arsenal.

Unfortunately though, we didn't leave Payson well enough prepaired, and got in a bit of jam over two (yep- one each, within ten minutes of each other) blown out tubes, which left us with just a single working spare...
Once again, pumping away:



We made the decision to continue directly to Phoenix rather than take the scenic route towards Roosevelt Lake. The lake route would have taken us on a dirt trail that we feared would bring about more flats and leave us stranded, so on we went on the "Beeline" highway.


We did manage to find a rather cool place to camp though, at the end-of-the-line so to speak, off a side road.



Fountain Hills is nice enough, although last night we nearly had to pay a whopping 20 bucks for a lousy dirt campsite. Luckily the ol' "we don't have any cash" trick played out in our favor, and got the night for free.