Day 9 – Monday 02nd May 2011 – Albuquerque NM – Las Vegas NM (not Nevada!)

Opening the curtains this morning revealed a partly cloudy sky with storm clouds lurking. Little wind was evident. After the hotel breakfast, we loaded our luggage and were on the road just before 7am with an air temperature of just 3°C so we were wearing full winter clothing.

The route out of town was circuitous and we ended up back on the road we started on at one stage. The road also sloped upwards from the start. While for the past few mornings, biking directly east into the morning sun made the road hard to see, with today’s clouds, this was not a problem. After just a few kilometres, the first random snowflakes began to fall on us.

Heading up the first modest climb out of town, we passed two riders who had left about 30 minutes ahead of us. With total vertical climbing of around six Te Mata Peak climbs and cold conditions with no strong tail winds, it was going to be a long day for all of us.

The climbing was largely unrelenting for the first 20 odd miles but was mostly modest but continuous gradients. At least the effort required kept us warm.

The snowflakes came and went with blue sky and sunshine opening around us and causing the temperature to rapidly rise, hitting a maximum of 14°C before plummeting again as the sky closed in. The first sag at 35.7 miles took over two hours to reach. From there, we had a brief downhill run before starting to climb again. Fresh snow was evident in the surrounding mountains and tree tops.

Lunch was at 77.6 miles at a fire station and we sat there under blue skies and in mild temperatures.

The fire crew was called out so they locked the station and left. Shortly after we left lunch, the sky started to close in and we soon had light snow again falling on us. The snow increased and we soon had snow on our handlebars and all over us. It then snowed even more heavily so that we could barely see. The conditions were not particularly unpleasant but the lack of visibility meant we had to control our downhill speed carefully and we limited ourselves to about 50km/h. In the midst of the snow flurry, we could not see any clearing in the sky and I thought it could well last all the way to town. However, it gradually started to ease off and by the third sag at 113 miles, we were again under blue skies with impressive looking cu-nim clouds.

From there, it was a further 22 miles of rolling country to the hotel at the far side of Las Vegas which we rode in little to no wind and we arrived first at around 4:15pm after 8hrs 24m on the road over a distance of 135.4 miles (217.9km). There was fresh snow outside the hotel door.

The luggage van arrived about 5pm and we quickly unloaded this.

As the hotel was not within walking distance of any food establishments, we ordered Dominos Pizza on-line and this was promptly delivered and devoured prior to most riders reaching the hotel.

Breakfast is at 6am tomorrow with rap at 6:45am and luggage load at 7am for what is a shorter day on the road with much less climbing. The forecast is for another freezing morning which should warm up to modest temperatures, be mostly fine and with tail winds! No snow is forecast.

Numbers for the day:

Departure time: 6:59am
Distance: 135.4 miles (217.9km)
Riding time: 8hrs 24m
Average speed: 16.1mph (25.9km/h)
Maximum speed: 91.7mph (147.5km/h) on Flightdeck but 49.5mph/79.6km/h more likely
Vertical climbing: 8,219ft (2,506m)
Temperature range: 19 (inside)-3–14-4-12°C
Arrival time: 4:15pm
Weekly (Monday – Sunday mileage) to date: 135.4 miles (217.9km)
Total kilometres ridden to date / approximate kilometres to go: 1,572km / 3,990km
Rolling last seven days total kilometres ridden including today: 1,174km