rebekahlynn
racer x
Baja day 4: It was a second rest day/optional ride day. Since we'd done nothing but maintenance the day before, we definitely wanted to ride. We decided on doing Window Rock East (I think?) where you enter from the Bola side and head towards the dry lake bed that is off of Hwy 1 into Bola.
We went up and down a lot of steep terrain - though none of it compared to Day 1 :laughing We got off track a few times and ended up in a very rocky sand wash that I struggled with. I tipped over a few times and needed to take a break at one point- see "exhausted I might die face". I was too hot! Luckily getting back on track also meant slightly easier terrain so I continued living.
We finally came out to where we could see the ocean. We had a lot of daylight left so we decided to go down to the beach. Turns out it was La Gringa beach. Portraits were taken (naturally). Tom and the guys decided to try a steep, very deep sand, hill climb. They all made it - I made it halfway before giving up. I saw a few of them struggle at the very top where it looked deceptively like dirt, but was really just even deeper, brown sand. If they struggled I knew my chances were slim. Plus it had taken me like 5 minutes to pick up my bike on the hill so I was pooped.
Play time over- we all set out towards where we entered the beach. When I got there I noticed "baby" Daniel (we call him that because there are two Daniels, and one is older, one younger) and Tom had stopped not far from the base of the hill climb. Wiles went to check it out and radioed that Tom had crashed but was fine. Of course I had to check it out for myself, so I rode over. Tom was going an "enthusiastic" speed down the beach when he hit some sand dunes that bounced his rear up, up, up in the air before plowing his body first face into the sand. He was SUPER lucky he only ended up with a bloody nose and chunk of skin missing over his lip. He broke his shoulder last September mountain biking, but apparently it healed up good as new, as the crash didn't hurt it at all. We've had a few injuries over the years on the "rest days", lol. At least he was in his gear!
We set out from the beach after Tom adjusted his rear shock a bit, to compensate for not having heavy bags on his bike. We rode deep sandy whoops for what felt like forever n ever before coming out to the dry lake bed. The dry lake bed was a fun 70mph zoom for me to the highway. From there we slabbed back into Bola, about 20 miles to the hotel.
We got back and I set a chair outside for Tom to take off his boots n gear. This led to a bunch of others pulling up chairs, and we ended up in the parking lot drinking beer and eating chips. A few times someone remarked on how there was a beautiful ocean just on the other side of the building... but we stayed in our parking lot circle :laughing
At some point towards dusk the question started being asked, Where were Will, Cris and Trevor? Drew had left them on the Window Rock trail headed West, around noon. That plus the fact that we didn't see them as we headed East, was a little worrisome. We knew Cris had an Inreach Delorme, but also knew that he didn't have anyone's contact information in it. No one had Cris' either (it was his first year with us).
AHA! I had a moment of brilliance and checked the Emergency Contact List we'd put together of all the riders information. We do a small survey yearly to gather this info (thanks Scott B!). I had the pdf in my phone and sure enough Cris had entered his Garmin email address in his e-info. I messaged him from my Delorme and we learned a bike was down and they were lost in the dark. After much group input and suggestion, and back n forth with Cris, we gave them as much guidance as we could as to how to return to town. We didn't know whose bike was down, we didn't want to bog the Delorme conversation down with non-essential talk.
Not knowing if they would be back in two hours or four, we set out to dinner. The restaurant in town was expecting our group of 14 and it would've been very rude to not show up. We all rode into town on our motorcycles and sat down to dinner. Not long after we arrived we heard bikes approaching. Will and Cris had a Beta and WR between them, but I can't remember which Cris rode but he arrived two up with Trevor on back. Trevor's clutch had gone out and though he had clutch plates, when they went to do the trailside repair, a bolt fell in the case. Knowing they couldn't fish it out without a magnet they came back in the dark two up. Major props to Cris for riding Trevor out of there - so many miles of sandy whoops - it was what I had ridden earlier that day and I cannot imagine riding it at night, much less with someone on back. The guys joined us for dinner and we made a Rescue/Recovery plan for the next day. There is never a shortage of people willing to help! :gsxrgrl
IMG_4338 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4340 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4345 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4348 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4350 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4374 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4386 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4366 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4368 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4355 by Bex, on Flickr
We went up and down a lot of steep terrain - though none of it compared to Day 1 :laughing We got off track a few times and ended up in a very rocky sand wash that I struggled with. I tipped over a few times and needed to take a break at one point- see "exhausted I might die face". I was too hot! Luckily getting back on track also meant slightly easier terrain so I continued living.
We finally came out to where we could see the ocean. We had a lot of daylight left so we decided to go down to the beach. Turns out it was La Gringa beach. Portraits were taken (naturally). Tom and the guys decided to try a steep, very deep sand, hill climb. They all made it - I made it halfway before giving up. I saw a few of them struggle at the very top where it looked deceptively like dirt, but was really just even deeper, brown sand. If they struggled I knew my chances were slim. Plus it had taken me like 5 minutes to pick up my bike on the hill so I was pooped.
Play time over- we all set out towards where we entered the beach. When I got there I noticed "baby" Daniel (we call him that because there are two Daniels, and one is older, one younger) and Tom had stopped not far from the base of the hill climb. Wiles went to check it out and radioed that Tom had crashed but was fine. Of course I had to check it out for myself, so I rode over. Tom was going an "enthusiastic" speed down the beach when he hit some sand dunes that bounced his rear up, up, up in the air before plowing his body first face into the sand. He was SUPER lucky he only ended up with a bloody nose and chunk of skin missing over his lip. He broke his shoulder last September mountain biking, but apparently it healed up good as new, as the crash didn't hurt it at all. We've had a few injuries over the years on the "rest days", lol. At least he was in his gear!
We set out from the beach after Tom adjusted his rear shock a bit, to compensate for not having heavy bags on his bike. We rode deep sandy whoops for what felt like forever n ever before coming out to the dry lake bed. The dry lake bed was a fun 70mph zoom for me to the highway. From there we slabbed back into Bola, about 20 miles to the hotel.
We got back and I set a chair outside for Tom to take off his boots n gear. This led to a bunch of others pulling up chairs, and we ended up in the parking lot drinking beer and eating chips. A few times someone remarked on how there was a beautiful ocean just on the other side of the building... but we stayed in our parking lot circle :laughing
At some point towards dusk the question started being asked, Where were Will, Cris and Trevor? Drew had left them on the Window Rock trail headed West, around noon. That plus the fact that we didn't see them as we headed East, was a little worrisome. We knew Cris had an Inreach Delorme, but also knew that he didn't have anyone's contact information in it. No one had Cris' either (it was his first year with us).
AHA! I had a moment of brilliance and checked the Emergency Contact List we'd put together of all the riders information. We do a small survey yearly to gather this info (thanks Scott B!). I had the pdf in my phone and sure enough Cris had entered his Garmin email address in his e-info. I messaged him from my Delorme and we learned a bike was down and they were lost in the dark. After much group input and suggestion, and back n forth with Cris, we gave them as much guidance as we could as to how to return to town. We didn't know whose bike was down, we didn't want to bog the Delorme conversation down with non-essential talk.
Not knowing if they would be back in two hours or four, we set out to dinner. The restaurant in town was expecting our group of 14 and it would've been very rude to not show up. We all rode into town on our motorcycles and sat down to dinner. Not long after we arrived we heard bikes approaching. Will and Cris had a Beta and WR between them, but I can't remember which Cris rode but he arrived two up with Trevor on back. Trevor's clutch had gone out and though he had clutch plates, when they went to do the trailside repair, a bolt fell in the case. Knowing they couldn't fish it out without a magnet they came back in the dark two up. Major props to Cris for riding Trevor out of there - so many miles of sandy whoops - it was what I had ridden earlier that day and I cannot imagine riding it at night, much less with someone on back. The guys joined us for dinner and we made a Rescue/Recovery plan for the next day. There is never a shortage of people willing to help! :gsxrgrl
IMG_4338 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4340 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4345 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4348 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4350 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4374 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4386 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4366 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4368 by Bex, on Flickr
IMG_4355 by Bex, on Flickr
) Daniel, Scott B, Wiles, myself, and Baby Daniel generously contributed to cover the $100 shortage. All of our other dinner reconciliations had been flawless so we are thinking our bill included some stuff for the No Wimps guys that were sitting down the table from us. It would’ve been easy for the waitstaff to assume we were all together. Anyways, once the bill was settled the guys moved the party to the pool room which of course, had its own bar. I had already had my weight in margaritas so I decided to call it a night. Good night! 
