Through Capitan to Roadside Rest Stop for Repairs

Great burger place in Capitan.

According to Cougina, it would be an easy day. Once again, uh, not. Once again, uphill and into the wind. Once again, all the land but the one site we found was privately owned. Still, it was another day in paradise. Stopped in Capitan and (after several days of trail food) had a wonderful burger and hand cut fries. Can’t remember the name of the restaurant, and can’t find it on Google, but here’s a photo.

We got into the first real mountainous country of the trip. Not fields surrounded by mountains, but the kind of country where all you can see is ridgeline after ridgeline. This started about the time we entered historic Lincoln (not yet the town of Lincoln).

17 mi down the road, we did find a beautiful roadside rest stop in the Bonita river canyon, and stopped to camp and make bicycle repairs, which Cougina describes as follows:

Clothespin repair.

Clothespin trimmed.

“Unfortunately, since leaving Tucson, I have had a rather constant and very aggravating problem with my rear derailleur. Now, in no way am I claiming that I had Diore XT’s or anything like that. However, I did have the unit overhauled before leaving Tucson, and have been aggravated ever since. The photo shows me actually going so far as to drive a clothespin in to fill the gap, in order to try to achieve the lower two gears on any front ring. Unfortunately, it didn‘t work for long. It’s impossible to carry the proper spacers on the road, so we do the best we can. I’ve been messing with this for long enough to do Ethiopian engineering when necessary, but even that has failed... However, perseverance and determination will always tell in the long term. We are actually considering a hard core ride to our destination in Houston, but it will require some assistance from an unknown friend.”

Man logic vs. woman logic:
     Aggie: But I rode your bike in Tucson, and it wasn’t running worth a darn then.
     Cougina: But I had paid to fix it!
     Aggie: But it wasn’t fixed… Oh well, all the more fun…

As you can see, the camp was beautiful, except for the dead animal whose scent we picked up after dark when the wind shifted. We isolated it to a trash barrel in the morning. More fun!

THINK GREEN
BLESSED BE
AGGIE and COUGINA