LONG RIDE, GREAT ENDING

I spent last night at an RV park in Hope AZ (the one who's community center I landed in around 10:30 am). The "tenting area" was in the center of the park and surrounded by roads. It was a nice park but as I tossed and turned for what seemed like hours I finally realized that RV parks are lousy places for tenting. A couple of nights ago I spent at the Cove, an RV park on the Colorado river, and it was the same thing: the park lights were too bright and they were on all night, there were motors turning on and off, motorcycles, cars, and RV's drove in and out and their headlights crossed and recrossed my line of sight, people stood close to the tent talking, and every single person that went in and out of the bathroom all night long slammed the door. These parks are made for motorized vehicles and the needs of tenter's are not even on the owner's radar. I think I'm going to avoid them from now on. 

I left Hope AZ around 7 am and was planning to bike to Aguila, 37 miles away. It was a cool morning and after a half days rest I felt good. The highway continued up gradually (15 miles! Although a gentle grade it began to feel endless) and it had a wide shoulder and there were few cars and most of those were respectful and the desert was beautiful. I made myself stop often and each time felt refreshed when I started out again. Approaching Aguila I was wearing down and was ready to stop. However the town is awful. Nearly every building is falling down, the few business's that exist are run down and almost every home was dilapidated with junk piled around as if the owners thought they were putting out lawn ornaments. There was no place in town to stay and as I looked around I don't want to stay there anyway. 

But the next town was 16 miles away, the sun was high and hot and I was tired. Still, there was no choice so I headed out wondering if I could make it.  

About ten miles out of Aguila I found a Christian retreat center. They did not look like they were taking in guests, but being hot and tired made me ask anyway. I walked around a bit calling out, and at last found Cynthia in her RV (her husband had gone to town) and asked if I could tent on the site. "Oh no." she said "There are snakes and scorpions around here. Come with me." She took me into the retreat center and showed me a huge bedroom with a king sized bed and a private bath and asked if this was ok. Cynthia then asked if I would like to join them at 5:30 for home made Beef Stroganoff. It was such a contrast to what I expected to be doing that I laughed out loud. 

Right now I’m sitting in the shade by the pool with excellent wifi and a soft desert breeze waiting for dinner. Jerry and Cynthie (British spelling as Cynthie explained)  are friendly and wonderfully gracious hosts. 

later: There were five for dinner and I enjoyed our conversation and stories. Dinner was fresh salad, sour dough bread and butter, excellent Stroganoff, and a wonderful key lime parfait. The company and the food beat the tar out of my anticipated solitary beef jerky, cheese, and crackers. I expect the king sized bed is going to win out over my Thermorest and tent as well.   

As I was leaving Hope this morning I saw this sign. 
I'm not sure if I should take it personally or not.  

Someone took three old steel grain silos and cut images in them. The center one is about 30 feet high.  

One or a few artists bought an old motel and made it into their workshop space.
They were closed or I would have gone in a looked around. 

This was poured into one of the bridge spans.