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Help me plan a 1-month South-West cycling adventure
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I'm just trying to plan out a 1-month cycling adventure in Arizona, New Mexico and any other states nearby. I've never been to those states and the nearest I have been is to Xantusia (I live in BC). I would appreciate any local knowledge of cycling routes, places to see, and possible direction to travel. Lets start with the following assumptions and then we can formulate as I get some responses:

- I want to see sights but don't have a problem cycling 200 Km per day
- I want to start in March but if there are better times let me know
- I'd like to go from place to place directly with no vehicle support
- I'll probably camp but would also consider other reasonably priced accomodation
- I haven't picked a starting location
- I'm looking for safe cycling routes

Is the weather generally okay in March to be doing this sort of thing? Its snowing here in the Okanagan right now so I just have no concept of what the weather's like in the southern states. Any help is appreciated!


Peter Solymosi
The Tri Bike Fit Studio
Vernon, BC
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Re: Help me plan a 1-month South-West cycling adventure [solymosi] [ In reply to ]
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You might start here with these folks.

Greater Arizona Bicycling Association

I used to do club rides with the Tucson chapter.
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Re: Help me plan a 1-month South-West cycling adventure [solymosi] [ In reply to ]
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I've never cycled in the region, but have done a lot of road travel and hiking.

If it were me, I'd probably wait till April and go to southern Utah. All of the southwestern US is amazing, but southern Utah is just the most stunning.

You could get a cheap flight into Las Vegas and start by biking through Zion National Park.

Then, if you have time, there is southwestern Colorado (Durango), and northern New Mexico and Arizona.

If a March timeframe works best then Arizona is better.
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Re: Help me plan a 1-month South-West cycling adventure [solymosi] [ In reply to ]
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PAC Tour runs Arizona training camps. They don't have route maps on the website but you could probably get a pretty good idea of some of the roads they use from the itineraries. Edit: forgot the website - it's www.pactour.com

Here are also bike maps of Phoenix and Tucson that I happen to have bookmarked. I was planning something similar once but it fell thru. I also remember having a bike map of the entire state of AZ but that link is dead - probably got it from GABA, though.
http://www.mag.maricopa.gov/detail.cms?item=4643
http://www.pagnet.org/bikemap/
Last edited by: gonzobob: Dec 11, 06 15:52
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Re: Help me plan a 1-month South-West cycling adventure [solymosi] [ In reply to ]
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I've always wanted to ride parts of the Louis and Clark trail. Do they have anything like that farther south? The Grand Staircase Escalante is supposed to be breathtaking.

This may be too early for you but we're having a Zion Country Early Spring Century on Saturday, February 24, 2007. They are estimating 800 riders and the cost is only $40.
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