I felt bad tying my guitar to my bike this morning. Last night I noticed that the neck is pulling away from the body of the guitar. It still plays ok but buzzes occasionally. I feel bad to have brought it on this trip. It seems a little weird to describe my bike and guitar as having personalities, but they’ve been through thick and thin with me and I can’t help but feel that they are somehow more than mere possessions. So I feel guilty to have forced my lovely 12-string acoustic on such an arduous trip that it never asked to be on. It’s survived cold, heat, damp – all the sorts of things that you shouldn’t expose a beautiful instrument to. And now it’s sick and it’s all my fault.

We got up late this morning, we cleaned up the cabin and said our goodbyes. I started to miss them before the dust from the car in the distance had even settled (oh crap, spouting more clichés…). I couldn’t help but admire and feel attracted to Lindsey and her car trip. Here she was doing something that I had always dreamed of doing. Driving across the US in a car with no fixed plan or route. I wish I’d met her while living in Oakland, turned out she only lived down the road from my old house.

As soon as I got on the bike this morning I was in a constant struggle against strong headwinds. It was tiring and slow going. It was right on the border of being too cold to just wear a t-shirt and too warm to wear my rain jacket. Bored with riding again, I had long breaks at roadside rest stops. Spent an hour chatting with James, who lived out of his pickup and cleaned and maintained the toilets and lawns at one of the stops. His mower had a flat tyre and he was hoping the wind would keep blowing so that he wouldn’t have to rake up all the leaves.

Another hundred metres past that stop and I stopped for another half hour coffee break at the Hole in the Wall. Some guy built a house into the side of a rock and had also built some fabulous sculptures out of number plates, old tools and scrap metal. By lunchtime I’d barely done thirty miles. It was sad. I remember when I was with Norbert we’d asked each other questions like; “What would you prefer; this biting, cold, terrible, snowy weather or sunny warm headwinds?”. Of course, at the time, I’d answered warm headwinds, so I shouldn’t be complaining.

Last night I woke to the sound of a huge rat rummaging around inside my tent fly. In the morning I wasn’t sure if it was just a dream.

It was windy as hell today so I stayed put. My shin feels like it could do with some more rest after yesterday’s effort. I washed some clothes and they were dry within thirty minutes of hanging them out. A guy at the gas station said it was the edge of a bad weather front that hit San Francisco a few days ago. It’ll start clearing by the weekend.

I spent the morning cleaning my bike and chain. I walked down to the library after lunch. Luckily it was still open I guess. A lot of the other libraries I’ve been in have had their government funding and opening times cut. It’s great that education in this country is considered so highly within the current government’s administration. Election time in a few weeks.

I’d planned to get an early start this morning but instead woke to the soft pitter-patter of snow falling on my tent. It was a peaceful sound after having just survived one of the worst night storms of my trip. As my tent only consists of the one pole, I have to face it into the wind, otherwise it acts like a sail and collapse over the top of me. It’s pretty scary when this happens in the middle of the night. I have two guy lines tightly tied to the picnic table, trying to hold the tent in position. The idea of getting out of my warm sleeping bag in the middle of the night to recover and re-secure a tent peg in the bitter wind and rain isn’t so appealing.

I slept in for a while longer, finally getting up after nine when five pounds of food decided it wanted out. Did some sewing repairs to my clothes and gloves then lay in the tent reading my latest book, a Graham Greene novel. After lunch and a coffee I relocated myself to the library’s warm confines.

I got to watch an awesome red sunrise. Reminded me why I used to enjoy the early morning riding. The road was a nice gradual fall into the Glen Canyon which is where the Colorado river passes through and turns into Lake Powell. It must be amazing to raft down the Colorado, it passes through some amazing landscapes.

I passed through red rock canyons, huge pillars stretching up to touch the blue sky. By the afternoon I was riding through yellow canyons which turned into sandy hills before reaching Hanksville. I was tempted to push onto Capitol Reef National Park but I was starting to feel a little nauseous from all the Snickers bars I’d eaten.

A.J. was there to meet me at the campground, take my camping fee and tell me his life story. It was a long story…he was an old guy, and it ended with him telling me he’s had three heart attacks, is on a pacemaker, takes 22 pills every day and needs to use a skin cream to counter the effects of the pills. He works at the caravan park during the summer, but when it closes in a few days he’s heading back to Texas. He’s moved around a lot because, according to him, no one can put up with him much.

While I was cooking dinner, Bill and Debra, a couple from Alabama, showed up in their rental car. We got talking lots and they ended up giving me some much needed fresh fruit and a bunch of AAA maps.