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MacDuncan

A great 30 hrs - and a river

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Had a yearning for the river, Ca side. 

Our quick trip had a some goals: *warm desert riding, *exploring new to us terrain, *finding some signs of the mysterious Hyduke road, * Seeing Valley of the names, *riding to Lake Ferguson, having a beer at Picacho dock, * sipping a cold one after a nice ride by a desert campfire, * Looping Picacho Peak, *no biffs or naps - yea right - haha, and thanks to dstss- ride the slot.

Loaded the truck and trailer early Monday afternoon, and zipped over to a bud's house to load his gear/bike and then beat the eastward traffic out of town.  Another reason for the rush was that the weather report stated High Winds over the local mountains in the evening.  I try to avoid those when I can.  We made good time and it wasn't too windy until we passed McCain Valley.  Then the winds started howling.  A cautious drop to the the desert floor where the wind was wicked fast....  But nice... straight from the west, and the windmills in Ocotillo were going full speed...  but a tail wind was so nice that I barely used the gas pedal and let the wind push the truck and cargo trailer faster than it might normally have gone  :).   Around Gordon's Well, the winds turned to a breeze and it was again icing on the cake as we had hoped to ride Monday evening and didn't want to get pelted.

A smooth sail into Senator's Wash, where one might normally find hundreds of folks, but the season closed a day earlier and we were the only the second ones there with hundreds of campsites to choose from.  We took the prime spot with a view of the Wash.  Great for evening lounging and morning coffee:

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We rushed to potentially avoid riding in new terrain at night and dressed quickly to set our sights on reaching Ferguson Lake before sunset.  We stopped to take a pic from the overlook.  Super nice, and a great view of Martinez and Fischer's too (I think):

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A nice loop and then a little organization to prepare dinner and a campfire.......  Yet,  as I looked over my shoulder, I saw a dust storm approaching from the north, it was a little breezy at the time, but this wall of dirt seemed to be headed our way, dang!  It looked like one of those Sahara Desert Hollywood scenes, so we quickly secured all things and in about 2-3 minutes later, the wind hit us with 20 - 30 mile per hour gusts of dust.  No options at this point, so we brought the campfire inside and let the winds howl until about 5 am:  (It wouldn't have been a good night to have been tent camping!)

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In the morning, we decided to drive the entire rig closer to our destination goals for the day so we could save gas and wear and tear on the bikes from the commute that wasn't part of our goals, so we headed over to Picacho road and went a couple miles on dirt up to the Massive Power lines.  I had seen rigs parked there before and it was also convenient that the parking was right along the main road, seemed a bit safer, and the Power lines are within about a hundred yards from the Y that lets one choose the Valley of the names instead of Picacho road.

We loaded up and headed out.  I had heard of the Valley of the Names before and had assumed that some folks had taken some rocks and spelled out names of family or friends that were sentimental to them....  But WOW, I had never thought it would be that impressive.  There were likely hundreds, if not thousands, of well taken care of, as in no sign of vandalism or disrespect, names along a fairly long stretch of road.  It was like riding through a memorial.  We rode slow and were appreciative of the opportunity.  If you look closely (zoom) this non-descript pic shows just a very small sampling of the area:

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Very nice, we wandered out the north and found a super nice road that I had hoped was Hyduke road, but hell, who knows, I will find out some day  :)

We finally found our way back to Picacho road and then followed dstss's tour guide suggestion to turn away from out intended destination to see if we could find the slot canyon.  We did, so nice!  Thanks again dstss.

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After riding the slot, we again found a nice road out of the slot and zipped to the river at Picacho.  It was such a nice ride and it is always a treat to pull up to the river from being in the hot dry rocky terrain and seeing massive amounts of water.  We treated ourselves to lunch and a cold one:

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As is often the case, it is always best to visit Taylor Lake when in the Picacho area as the views are so very nice. I have kayaked back and forth from here to Picacho many times. If you ever get a chance, do so! Hmmm, seems like I have this same pic many times... but still like it:

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Our next goal was to find roads near the Picacho Peak, I have never hiked that area yet, but have always wanted to.  This time, we would simply see how close we might get to the peak on bikes.  The terrain in the area can be quite challenging for this casual rider, so although we might want to test the limits of our abilities, this would be a bad place to biff bad or to have an unwarranted mechanical.  We both took a nap, but our safety gear had made it a non-descript experience.... except for our increased alertness to avoid dropping into a canyon that could be very hard to get out of!  Some road choices were far more challenging than others.  We took one road that looked very promising, but right when we got up to the top of what we could see, while hitting the throttle pretty hard to navigate the climb, spooky... there was an immediate 80 foot drop off on the side that we thought we would be riding....  so glad we stopped to take a peek first:

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From here, we rode really nice undulating roads for quite awhile, so very nice, as my confidence came back after my biff and I began to let it roll.  I could wander out there a bunch.  If you get a chance to ride further east than Borrego, it is well worth it!  I may try to post a top-down overview of the loop later.

A great trip, and a tailwind on the way home too - oh my  :), and was only gone from the house less than 30 Hours! Cheers.  

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Great RR and Pics MacD! :good:Thanks for sharing the adventure! :smile_anim:

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Glad you guys had a great time, excellent rr as usual. Thanks for taking us along ?? 

 

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Great write up.  Glad my directions didn't get you lost. 

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7 hours ago, Dress4Less said:

Great RR and Pics MacD! :good:Thanks for sharing the adventure! :smile_anim:

x2

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Glad you made it out! Thanks for the RR

:good:

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