Girl Math ~ Mountain Style

7 ladies + 7 days = 215 miles + 21,000 vertical feet from Durango to Moab via MTB

Day 1 Durango to Moab - Colorado Trail

At almost 60 years old, what was I thinking when I said “Hell, YES!” nine months ago to join a friend’s 50th birthday extravaganza to mountain bike from Durango to Moab via the San Juan Hut system?

As the departure day came closer, the challenges of going off-grid while planning a conference, juggling kids, and caring for my elderly father beckoned me to stay. As did fears that my aging, aching knees and back would make the trip miserable. In the two weeks before, others in the group faced COVID-19, vehicle breakdowns, last-minute bike repairs, flight logistics, and needy kids starting the school year with muddled husbands. Only one dropped out.

It was like the universe was blocking what we all needed most … but once we packed the last tube of sunscreen, topped off our water bottles in the parking lot at Molas Pass (10,910 feet) between Silverton and Durango, and headed out on the Colorado trail, Mother Nature held us in her heart and propelled us along an epic adventure of beauty, friendship, and bliss that tested every ounce of our physical and mental capacities. 

Credit: Denise Bertsch

For fun, here’s the trip by the numbers, our version of “Girl Math” (see below if you don’t know what this is).

1: Mechanical - a broken seat post lever
1: Band aids used out of our major first aid kit with pain killers, antibiotics, Sam splint, pocket mask, etc. 
1: Spare derailleur hangers carried per person, none used
1: Flat tire, but not on a bike - it was on the mini-van in Ririe, less than an hour from home!
1: Reservoir to skinny-dip in
2: Number of freezing cold Coors Lights given to us by a local rancher after a huge climb, day 4. Best Coors Light ever tasted. 

Credit: Denise Bertsch

2: Number of extra spokes we each carried, praying someone knew how to change them
2: Spare tires carried with packaging attached (so we could return them) 
2: Giant tubes of shared Butt Lube used

Suddenly, you’re ripped into being alive. And life is pain, and life is suffering, and life is horror, but my God, you’re alive, and it’s spectacular. ~ Joseph Campbell

Credit: Karen Maloney

3: Number of beers allocated to each person per hut (except for the one in Utah) 
3: Bears we saw, one a baby who ran right in front of two riders going 20 mph on a gravel road.
3: Days riding above 10,000 feet in elevation
4: Minor crashes
4: Naps
6: Full Moon lit, starry nights

from my good friend and mentor, Lyn Dalebout

“The only hope of accessing deeper meaning is to radically expand your perception of the possible” Matteo Pistono from In the Shadow of the Buddha

6: Average liters of water I drank per day (beers not included) 
200: calories per hour we tried to consume while riding

“I am losing precious days. I am degenerating into a machine for making money. I am learning nothing in this trivial world of men. I must break away and get out into the mountains to learn the news." ~ John Muir

The very basic core of a man's living spirit is his passion for adventure. The joy of life comes from our encounters with new experiences, and hence there is no greater joy than to have an endlessly changing horizon, for each day to have a new and different sun. If you want to get more out of life, you must lose your inclination for monotonous security and adopt a helter-skelter style of life that will at first appear to you to be crazy. But once you become accustomed to such a life you will see its full meaning and its incredible beauty. ~ Jon Krakauer

3000 ft: Average vertical gain per day
5370 ft: Most Vertical feet gained in one day (6) 
7473 ft: Most Vertical feet descent in one day (7)
12,600 ft: Max elevation, day one on the Colorado Trail
4025 ft: Final elevation, Moab

30: Average miles ridden per day
18 Miles, shortest day; it took us 10 hours!
38 Miles, longest day
7: Average hours hut to hut

Me in my happy place Credit: Cynthia Riegel

Man is the most insane species. He worships an invisible God and destroys a visible Nature. Unaware that this Nature he’s destroying is this God he’s worshiping.

~ Hubert Reeves

100: Estimate of the number of times I “hiked a bike”

And this was the DOWNHILL hike-a-bike

1: Number of times I wanted to cry on the trip
1: Number of times we had a conflict
6: Number of times I’ve randomly started to cry since being home

Credit: Karen Maloney

“We should just go back into the woods” ~

Quote of the trip after I pulled a young woman out from under her airbag after witnessing a car accident on the way home on the freeway in Idaho Falls. 

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The great American visionary physicist John Wheeler posits that we live in a participatory universe. What we think, what words we use, what we believe, what we hold as beliefs, and what we observe shape the universe's unfolding. We are each causal. We are not victims of the unfolding of events or bystanders. We are participatory. ***

What a privilege it was to participate in this adventure.

*** This thought was mined from a lovely private email shared with me …

The team in Silverton the night before we launched. credit Jannine Fitzgerald

Girl Math is a reference to the funny, scary young women explaining spending choices on TikTok.