Today was another incredable day on the road. We enjoyed great sights, great food, and met some great people.
I'll start off with a play by play of last night, post-blog. The station we were staying in was in a valley, and directly behind the station there was a hill/cliff. Andy had earlier climbed to the top in search of cell phone service, but came up empty handed. He did however find the perfect spot to watch the sunset. We decided We'd make our way up around 7-7:30 and see what Mother Nature had to offer. Our climb was pushed back a little bit, since Back To The Future: Part III started at 6pm. Ken had been talking about how badly he wanted to see the whole trilogy at some point on this trip, and while it was only 1/3 of his wish, we still enjoyed every minute of it. I'm not as into the series as Ken and Andy are, but I've definetly become much more into it since being around their enthusiasm towards the film. Marty and Doc made it back to 1985 and we were on our way to watch the sunset. We found a nice spot with the remains of a fire pit, so we decided we'd start a small camp fire. We were surrounded by sand, had a few full Nalgenes of water, and had 3 wilderness experts on hand. It was a modest fire but it was more than enough to keep us warm as the sun went down. After we made it to the top Josh and Pat decided we needed some music, so it was decided that Josh would climb back down to the car to get the guitar, ukilali, and melodica. As if the ukilali wasn't exotic enough, Josh brought the melodica, an instrument Andy, Ken and I had never even heard of. Basically its a plastic keyboard with a tube you blow in to create the sound. According to Josh music students throughout Europe and South America use it to learn the basics of music, similar to our use of the recorder in The States. Josh and Pat jammed out for a while, playing some originals and some covers, most notably "The Year 3000" by The Jonas Brothers (video coming soon). Ken tried his hand at the melodica for a while and did some serious freestyling during "The Year 3000".
Onto today. We got up a little before 7am and started to pack up our stuff. Our gear found its way into most of the rooms in the fire house, so packing up took a little longer than usual. We got done around 7:45, said our goodbyes to Pat and Josh and got on the road. About a mile or so down the road we hit up a gas station for some snacks and Gatorade. We were greated by about 5 "Res dogs" who wander freely around the reservation, looking for a snack or at least a pat on the head. After fueling up we made our way to Keams Canyon.
There were some pretty serious uphills, which led to some pretty serious downhills. The day went by pretty quickly, partly because we felt so good, and partly because it was a shorter day than we've been used to. We made it to about 8 miles outside of Keams Canyon when the view started to get really good. Out of nowhere we were in the middle of the most vast valley I've ever seen. It was beautiful, but we couldn't enjoy it too much since we were on a downhill. Throughout the day we discussed whether or not Keams Canyon would actually be a canyon or not. We came into this trip without doing a lot of research on our route. Sure we planned it out, but we really didn't look too into each individual town. Some might consider that poor planning, but we all see it as part of the adventure. It's so much more exciting not knowing whats around the corner, and today was no different. We were less than a half mile away from the canyon and still couldn't see it. Not only could we not see the canyon, we couldn't see a town.
We were starting to think neither would exist, when out of nowhere it appeared. A beautiful canyon with spectacular rock formations, and a town right at the bottom. We made our way to the bottom to a crossroads. Left was our route and a gas station, and right was a post office, church, as well as some other buildings. Andy and I wanted to go right, but Ken was passionate about going left, especially since it meant we could get some lunch. Andy and I agreed and we went left. We made our way into a cafe next to the gas station and got situated. Ken poked around a shop, Andy cleaned out the jogger, and I took a seat. I could have helped Andy clean out the jogger, but I know how much he enjoys it. While he was going to work, Andy was interrupted by a couple of women leaving the cafe. He told them about the trip and they told him we could stay with them if we couldn't find a place to stay. Eventually Ken and Andy came to the table, and Andy had a smile on his face. Ken and I knew something was up, and asked Andy over and over again what the conversation was about. Andy finally let us know by singing "If you got a place to stay throw your hands up!". Ken and I were very releaved. We had just made it into this town, and already had a place to stay! This made lunch that much more enjoyable. We all ordered some Dr. Peppers and our lunch. Andy went with a boring double cheeseburger, while Ken and I felt a bit more adventurous. Ken went with a tortilla filled with roast beef, peppers and onions, and I ordered the Chili Burger Delight. The C.B.D. was an open faced double burger, smothered in chili, cheese and onions, definetly one of the highlights of the trip for me.
After lunch we relaxed for a while and poked around the shops attached to the cafe. I got a delicious choclate milkshake as we sat around planning out the next couple days. Andy was staring at the milkshake the whole time I was drinking/eating it. He said he wasn't jealous, but we all know he wish he came up with the idea to get one before I did.
We eventually met back up with Lolini, the women Andy had met earlier, and made our way to her house for the night. She lives in a small neighborhood right next to the Junior High and High School. Word had gotten around to a couple runners in the neighborhood, and we were welcomed in with open arms. We got showered up, and did some laundry. We just barely made it here with clean clothes, so it was a real good feeling to get the laundry done. We met up with Dennis and Juwan, both runners who work with Lolini at the school. Dennis is a long time runner who has run all sorts of distances, from 5ks all the way up to marathons. Juwan was a star athlete in college, pulling down the prestigious honor of being a Division I All-American in Cross Country. His team placed 4th in the country in 2001 and he earned individual All-American status finishing 40th overall. He has continued to run and coach at the high school here in Keams Canyon.
Lolini made us a delicious dinner, some of the best home cooking in recent memory. We had BBQ chicken, salmon, rice and carrots, it really hit the spot! After dinner Juwan gave us a tour of the surrounding area and gave us some history of the Hopi area. There were a lot of small villages on top of mountain ranges. Juwan explained that this was an effort to have the higher ground in battle. As the Spanish came through and tried to convert the Hopi, they stayed in the hills and attacked from above. We drove around and learned some more, and also devised our plan for the next few days. Tomorrow we'll start off where we left off and run about 27 miles, where Juwan will pick us up. We'll start back off there the next day and then stay with his mother outside of Hotevilla. After that we should be able to be set up with some of his girlfriends family in Tuba City. The next few days are looking much better than expected. We've been planning on camping for the next few nights, so we're all pretty happy we met our new friends.
Tomorrow should be a pretty easy day, from the looks of it it'll be pretty flat until the end.
Keep movin', and keep an eye out for some great pictures and videos coming up soon,
-Durkin
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