expedition_retirement: (Bicycle)
2025-04-22 12:23 pm

The bike tour ends - Sabino Canyon

 The morning following our final ride of the bike tour, we met early to catch our shuttles up to Sabino Canyon, where we would ride the sightseeing tram up and down the canyon, before our shuttle took us to the airport to end our tour. In order to avoid delays that might cause people to miss their flights home, the hotel prepared carry-out breakfast for us, which we ate in our room as we finished our packing and got ready for the day. We then carried our luggage out to be loaded, and boarded our shuttle.
Sabino Canyon
Sabino Canyon Recreation Area is part of the Coronado National Forest, and is accessed on a out-and-back roadway up into the canyon. While you can walk up the road (and it appears that many people do), you also can buy tickets for the tram tour, which allows you to hop on and off the tram at a number of stops along the road. The tram is a zero-emission electric vehicle, with open-air cars and a headset audio narration. The entire ride up the valley and back took about an hour. Because of our schedule, we didn't have time to hop off at any of the stops and explore, which is a shame because it appeared that there was plenty of exploring that could have been done. This is another place we need to come back and spend more time at.
Sabino CreekSaguaro at Sabino Canyon
But even just riding the tram up and back was stunning. The road follows the Sabino Creek along the bottom of the canyon, so that we found water and greenery here inside this desert. But beyond the valley floor, the steep sides of the canyon hosted a forest of saguaro cacti, remining us that this valley is an oasis in an otherwise harsh environment.
Saguaro at Sabino CanyonSaguaro at Sabino CanyonSaguaro at Sabino Canyon
After our tram tour was completed, we re-boarded our shuttles for the ride back to the airport, the end of our packaged tour. We said farewell to everyone from the group, made our way back to the car and spent the rest of the day driving north, through Phoenix, and on towards Page, Arizona (with a stop in Sedona, one of our favorite places in that part of the country, for dinner), where we would spend the next couple of nights.
expedition_retirement: (Bicycle)
2025-04-21 04:22 pm

Bike tour: Day 5 - Saguaro National Park (East)

Saguaro National Park
Our final day of riding took us from our hotel, back to the Tucson Loop and eventually out to the eastern portion of the Saguaro National Park. Here, we would ride around the 8 mile long Cactus Forest Drive, a one way, one lane road through the heart of the saguaro forest. The speed limit is 15mph, so we were moving right at the pace of the other traffic, which made for a very comfortable riding experience. And the scenery was out of this world. There were so many scenic vistas to enjoys, with a diversity of desert landscapes. But the star of the show was all the giant saguaro cacti. It was hard not to spend hours lingering along the way enjoying all the views, but our tour guides were waiting in the picnic area along the route with a picnic lunch for us.
Saguaro and prickly pearGiant saguaroEven bigger saguaroSaguarosSaguaro on the rocks
For years, our guides had been hearing from guests who had ridden in Europe about how good the food was there, and they took it a a challenge to provide an over-the-top picnic for us. And I have to say, I think they succeeded. They had a slow cooker of sausages (bratwurst and Italian), another slow cooker of chicken, potato salad, pasta salad, hummus, cured meats, cheeses, and so, so much more. We all ate our fill, and they ended up with significant leftovers.
Lunch!
After lunch, it was time to make our way back to the hotel for our final night there. The entire round trip from the hotel would have made for a VERY long day, so our afternoon ride only took us about 1/3 of the way back. We met our shuttles at a locally owned bike shop, with a Dairy Queen next door. While our guides loaded the bikes on the trailer, we enjoyed ice cream before we shuttled back to the hotel for our final dinner together.