Tucson For Dummies

 

We recently learned of ways to “do” Tucson if you’ve got the guidance and direction of an entire fleet of professional triathletes/cyclists/massage therapists at your beck-and-call (ie, Izzo’s Epic Camp, Bruce’s EH Camp)…but here’s a thrilling perspective on doing Tucson via the rookie route.

 

Chapter 1:  Pack Before The Night Before

This is something I highly recommend, but never do.

 

 

Chapter 1-A: Pack the Night Before after a few drinks

Heather and I left all of our packing until the night before. I finished my packing at 11pm and was in bed by 11:20pm.

She began packing at 10:30pm and arrived at my place at 1:30am. We were picked up by a car service at 4:15am. If you don’t feel like doing the math, that’s a whole 2:45min nap for Heather before we had to leave for Newark Airport.

 

Chapter 2: Travel When Totally Exhausted

We got onto the plane and after a brief stop in Minneapolis, arrived without a hitch in Tucson early morning on Saturday, but it felt like Monday afternoon to us due to lack of sleep and time change. It’s better that way. Annoying people are not noticed as much.

 

 

Chapter 3: Snakes and Bike Boxes Scare People in Tucson

We took this kind of beat-up old ambulance-taxi to our hotel. It was the only taxi that would take us. They saw the bike box and hid behind cacti.

 

 

Chapter 4: We Feel Dirty

As we exited the airport and drove towards the city of Tucson we both said “ugh…I don’t think I’d want to live here. Too much dirt”  It looked like a sea of Cover Girl foundation. 

 

We checked in and began unpacking the bikes. I decided the day before we left (Friday) that it would be fun to test out a new bike. I called Competitive Cyclist in Little Rock and asked them if I could test out their Colnogo Extreme Power.

 

They said sure…I can get that to Tucson for you by Tuesday.

 

I said I needed it tomorrow.

 

They laughed.

 

I begged and promised things I dare not share. It worked, and my demo bike was waiting for me in the lobby.

 

I couldn’t get the back wheel on and so we went next door to Miles Ahead Cyclery.

 

As I was passing time with the 2 guys who worked there, the owner…an older Jersey Shore born-&-raised guy, started talking to Heather and gazing at her “longingly”. She was signaling to me for relief, but I didn’t pick up the signs. Finally I did notice the look of pain and loathing coming from Heather’s crystal blue eyes…and offered to buy the book that the owner was pushing on her (along with his gray-haired chest).

We left the bike shop and decided to do food shopping.

 

The highlights of the food list were:

Oreos

A Fine Cabernet

Milk (I’m convinced Heather is part bovine…she consumes A TON of milk)

 

Chapter 5: Where Are We?

Being the Catholic Angels that we are, we get directions to a nearby church and hit 5pm Mass.

We enter the church and everything looks all backwards and weird. There are big movie theater screens on the walls, the altar is in the middle of the room, and there’s a rock band. We jam out and clap enthusiastically to biblical songs we thought could only be sung to a turn-of-the-century organ, and hightail it out of there.  We are both left wondering if that counted as our weekly obligation.

 

Chapter 6: Monday…Let’s Crush Some Lemmon!

We wake up and both go for a quick run, then hit our buffet breakfast to fuel up for our ascent up Mt. Lemmon. It’s 4 miles to the base from out hotel, then we start to climb. As I pass mile 1 marker (with 26 more to go!) I eagerly call it out to Heather…”look..we just slayed a mile!”

She tells me I’m going to get slayed by her size 11 foot if I keep pointing out mile markers, so I hush up.

After a few stops for pictures (Heather is part bovine, part Japanese) and water/snacks, we make it to a crossroads. We can either go to Summerhaven (which would give us 25 miles) or to the top of the mountain (27 miles).  We decide to haul it up the steep 2mile climb to the top and were so glad we did! With our bodies shivering from the temp drop, we walk into the yummy German restaurant & eat a tasty lunch.

We head back down the mountain and I try to hang on to Heather for a about a millisecond. Picture a space shuttle at launch…the rocket catapults up….it’s launch engines are attached and think they’re going for a ride, but they soon get spit off the ass of the space ship and sadly fall back.  (I am getting WAY too dramatic with this)

 

We meet at the bottom and wish we had time to do that again…the decent of Mt. Lemmon was absolutely the best part of our trip! We are starting to love Tucson.

 

Chapter 7:  Hot Tub Happy Hour

Our hotel had a happy hour every night, and who are we to decline free beer? We arrive with hot bikini’s and an even hotter biker’s tan. I look like a total loser. This is reinforced by a couple from New Hampshire who point out my sunburn, and join us in the hot tub. They then look at Heather’s Irish skin and tell her she’s in trouble, but will probably end up with a tan by the end of the week.

 

Heather’s response: “yyyeeeaaahhh….no. You’re wrong. I will be white at the end of the week.”

 

The woman ends up being a teacher. I disclose that Heather’s a teacher. The woman latches onto Heather like a starved leach, and I shut my eyes, drink my beer and dream of pizza.

 

We get pizza that night and go to bed.

 

 

Chapter 8: Heather’s Worst Ride Has a Positive Side, and His Name is Fritz.

We wake up…surprise..sunny and beautiful out! We head over to the pool. Procrastination met up with us, shared our lane, and basically was kicking our butts. We decided to let it win, and we hit the showers after a brief swim.

Breakfast at the hotel then off to do a ride that would take us over Gates Pass…a supposed humdinger of a climb.

 

Here’s how the day went:

I had a cue sheet

I have bad eye sight

Heather tells good stories

I followed her stories better than my cue sheet

There was a road on the cue sheet that was closed due to construction

We ended up in a landfill

We weren’t ready to be buried alive

We rerouted better than a tom-tom and we were on our way to Gates Pass

We stopped to get refreshments at mile 68.

Heather was talking to me when all the sudden a gofer ran up to her.

She screamed

I laughed and gave him a name that I kept to myself (Fritz)

I stalled by trying to talk to Fritz

Heather stayed focused and got us back on the bikes

We climbed Gates Pass from the steep side.

It was steep

My butt hurt that day and Heather hated that ride.

She drank a ton of milk that night to cure her depression from the ride.

I drank a ton of wine and just stared at the cue sheet wondering why we ended up with 91 miles when the sheet said it would be 85. I know I can read. It doesn’t make any sense.

 

 

 

Chapter 8: It’s Not About The Bike

We decide to give the bikes a rest today.

Heather wakes up and throws “JUMP START” on. VH1 has a morning video show called Jump Start.

She knows every song and is asking me if the storyline of Madonna’s new video with Justin Timberlake makes sense.

I think long and hard, and finally respond “Do you think Justin would date me?”

It doesn’t answer her question, but it’s important to me.

I get my running stuff on while watching USHER “Make Love In A Club” to some woman…I never saw his hands during the video. They were buried under that woman’s dress.

Anyway – I run from our hotel to Sabino Canyon and up phone pole (or something like that) trail. It was diabolical. I loved it. Thanks Bruce for suggesting.

Heather ran on her own and was a very good girl about icing her hip!

We ate breakfast, and went over to TriSports.

An hour later we’re on our way back to our hotel to prepare for our massages.

Unprepared and pressed for time, we have to ride our bikes to Rubs.

I tell the receptionist I have good news and bad news.

Good News: We’re here and we’re really nice people

Bad News: We need to safely store our bikes and we’re as sweaty as cheese left out in the sun.

After a few phone calls to the back of the establishment uttering things like “uh huh…I know…well…I didn’t know they’d come by bike” she tells us to leave the bikes in the lunch room.

It worked out perfectly for Heather b/c her therapist was snacking there, and she just took her from the lunch room to the treatment room.

After an hour rub at Rubs we rode back and did a little light spin to work up an appetite.

Dinner at a nice joint nearby and a few drinks later, we were back at the room.

 

Chapter 9: Tom Said This Would Be Easy

I had never done it before (I Swear!)

Heather hadn’t either, but I was skeptical.

Tom had and said it was “easy”.

That was the kiss of death.

As we stood over the seat of her bike trying to attach the xlab back water bottle cages on, I had an epiphany.

We should have ridden to TriSports and had THEM do this for us.

That didn’t help us at the time, but I thought saying that about 12 times in a matter of minutes would make things magically attach.

I went to bed and Heather was still up trying to successfully screw stuff.

We woke up and I noticed 2 things:

The water bottle cages were on her bike

They were fastened with my black patch tape.

I was ok with that compromise, and we brought the tape with us “just in case”.

 

 

Chapter 10:  BRUCE IS TRYING TO KILL US

“Go to Sonoita” he says….”And take a right in town and ride down to Patagonia…YOU’LL THANK ME FOR IT”.  Famous last words, but like 2 stooges, we decide to take Bruce’s advice and do this ride.

The cute guys at Miles Ahead Cyclery draw us a map on 2 sides of an 8.5x11 sheet. I spent a good amount of time looking at that map. I wasn’t going to be intimidated by the lack of mile markers/street signs/etc.

We got lost right off the bat, but soon got back on track.

 

After a long climb, Sonoita appeared in the distance…elevation 4,985ft. We stop for drinks and snacks. It’s 11am. I ask the country market worker if there’s food in Patagonia or should we wait to have lunch on our way back through Sonoita…”DON’T ASK ME!” she whips back as she’s chopping some kind of jerky.

(but I just did you crazy rancher lady)

 

She calms down and says there’s pizza.

We soar down to Patagonia and stop at the pizza place. Closed M-W. Awesome.

 

We’re told “Home Plate Diner” has cheese burgers that will make us want to “find a tree and get lazy”. Sounds kinky…let’s do it.

We order burgers and cokes and sit outside.

 

Mid bite we overhear a man explaining to another man how you can justifiably shoot a human legally. I want to continue listening so I can finally call Nancy Grace and ask her an intelligent question.

Here’s how it works: “If that guy shoots at you…and I am standing here and feel endangered, I can shoot at that guy, kill him, and I am found not guilty of murder”.

 

I guess Heather and I thought it made sense, but honestly, it’s a little heavy for lunch talk. Not to mention the only weapons we have on us are fired up CO2 cartridges and MAYBE if we take our skewers out of the wheels we could use them to poke eyes out.

OR Heather could talk them to death and I could make them read something I write while we escape, but we were both too tired.

 

We hop on our bikes and head back to Sonoita for one more refuel (This time Heather encounters the crazy rancher lady as she’s fixing the toilet. I’m not sure what she was saying to heather, but it was NOT English)

Back en-route to Tucson we hit a serious downhill mixed with crosswinds.

Heather crushes it. I get crushed.

We meet up at the bottom and with about 25 miles to go have to stop one last time for cold drinks.

 

One of the FUNNIEST stories of the Trip!

 

Heather heads to the bathroom at the Circle K. She tries the women’s…taken. She knocks on the men’s…no answer…handle is open. She opens the door and heads inside. She still has her helmet on.

 

Sitting on the toilet is a strapping man…naked as a jaybird!

 

It gets better.

 

He stands up!

 

She sees his dangling Suguaro Cactus and she runs out!

 

I am sitting outside near the bathroom drinking a big gulp.

 

Heather flies by me and goes out to her bike.

 

I decide to hit the bathroom

 

The man comes out, and sees ME in biking gear. He thinks I’m the cyclist who likes peep shows. I have no clue what just happened so I say “howdy” to him.

 

Heather fills me, and we laugh our way back to the hotel.

 

All in all…142.5 miles! EPIC…although I know Gordo has that trademarked. Uber-Epic might be still available…I’ll go with that for now.

 

 

Chapter 11: Where’s a Guy When You Need Him

We both realize packing is our weakness. If I had a coach, I’d seriously consider getting this into my training plan.

I pack and take apart my entire bike aside from the pedals. Couldn’t get them off.

Heather starts to dismantle her bike when I fall asleep.

We wake up Thurs morning, and Heather flicks on Jump Start. We’re both not moving from fatigue and Mariah Carey is pleading with us to “touch her body”.

Heather asks me if I think she did a good job with packing. I look at her stuff and she starts laughing. She hasn’t packed one thing! I give my best Yiddish “oi!” and figure out that we’ll have roughly 18 minutes from when the bike shop opens till when the taxi will be at our hotel to take us to the airport.

 

In those 18 minutes we need to:

Have the pedals taken off

Heather wants to buy a jersey

I want to get measured for a bike

Walk back to our hotel, pack our bikes, and carry all of our bags to the lobby

 

We squeezed in one last run, shower, and trip to the lobby computer to make sure we were in-fact supposed to be flying that morning. I was 99% sure, but not 100.

 

 

Chapter 12: All Good Things Must Come to An End

Despite being late to the airport, having our plane get struck by lightning just before landing in Minneapolis, and Heather having an inexplicable inflammation in her ankle…we got back home safe and sound!

 

 

Heather is a trooper for putting up with my fly by the seat of my pants lifestyle and I thoroughly enjoyed the trip and was grateful to have her there to haul my lazy butt around on every ride.  She is great singer, storyteller, and the only person I know who does not need an OUNCE of caffeine to get her through the day.

 

(sorry this was so long!)

 

The End!