The eastward road took me out of the park and right to the Lake Meade Recreational Area. That’s where I turned north. It was 9 miles to the little town of Overton.  Man, that was one big... rooster.  A car came close to sideswiping me as it left a parking lot. There were no direction signs on the road, but I just kept heading north and figured I’d eventually run into Interstate 15. I passed the Moapa Valley Library and Lou Street (not a person, a street named Lou). Horses grazed in a field next to Paint Horse Lane.

Back on the interstate, very high mountains loomed ahead. I crossed the Arizona state line a few miles down the road. The interstate went through the breathtaking Virgin River Gorge, with towering, violent cliffs. I’d never heard of it before. Thirty miles past the Arizona border I crossed into Utah. About 40 miles from Mesquite, the elevation had risen to 3,000 feet.
 

It was just after noon when I got off the interstate and took the road towards Hurricane. At least, I thought it was the road... I had to stop at a convenience store for directions. I was directed to turn left at the next intersection, then follow Highway 9 into Hurricane. I needed to go east from there, so the girl told me to turn right at the Wells Fargo Bank. And son of a gun, there it was. At the bank, I turned right on Highway 59. The road made a sharp left, then took me up the steep slopes of the bluff overlooking the town. The narrow, climbing road gave me a panoramic view of the valley before it turned east.

When I crossed the Arizona border at Colorado City, Highway 59 became Highway 389, which must be confusing for some travelers. Traffic picked up on the crowded little 2-lane blacktop. I crossed back over into Arizona. Just after 1 PM, I entered the Kaibab Paiute Reservation. It was a bright, sunny day, the miles easily rolling by. I was getting close to Grand Canyon country. Signs on the side of the road advertised the north rim. A pale violet ridge appeared ahead. I crossed over a creekbed full of strange, black trees.

Fredonia was sleepy and quiet when I rolled into town. That was where I turned right on Highway 89… but I wasn’t completely sure until I backtracked a mile or so. I passed the vintage Grand Canyon Motel ("Free Wireless Internet") and a store advertising “Guns, Ammo, Beer.”  Past Fredonia, the highway quickly turned into a very lonely road. I’d go for a half hour or more before seeing another vehicle. There was no shoulder to the lonesome 2-lane highway. I soon entered the Kaibab National Forest, though the forest starts out as just a few bushes here and there alongside the highway. Cedar and ponderosa pines congregated quickly all around me as I kept going. I was on the Kaibab Plateau, which hugs the north rim of the Grand Canyon.

The air was very cool. Satori’s engine started running better, and I knew I was over the hump. The Sun came out. It was a lovely, peaceful forest, the air sweet. I started seeing rocks between the trees, and then cliffs, and then, up ahead, a splash of distant red. It was the Vermillion Cliffs, rising out of the plain below like something from a Tolkien novel. I pulled over at a rest area for a view. There were more Native American vendors selling crafts beside the road, and it was interesting seeing them haggle with the Japanese tourists. Signs at the rest area talked about local wildlife. I nibbled on a can of nuts and finished off the last of the Triscuits. Far below, a tiny thread stretched across the wide, dry valley. It was the road I drove down to off the heights of the Kaibab Plateau.

I asked the clerk at the gas station if there were any campgrounds around Tuba City, and he just shook his head. It didn’t look good. Marble Canyon was where the famous Navajo Bridge crossed the Colorado River, so I pulled into the visitor center. The outside was built to look like an old ruined adobe building. Inside, I asked the nice lady if there was a place to camp for the night ahead: a roadside park, campground, state park, anything. She said to just pull off the road and park wherever I wanted. “Really?” I asked, and she said yes, “People will leave you alone.” I bought a souvenir patch and left feeling… well, I didn’t know how I felt.

I was thinking it over when I got to Bitter Springs. At the intersection, the highway north led to Page, and the highway south led to Tuba City and… Flagstaff, 110 miles away. Flagstaff had a hostel where I could sleep in a real bed, get a hot shower, eat a hot meal sitting at a table. Those options were very tempting, too. I checked the smartphone, which said Chinle was a 3-hour trip from Flagstaff, over mostly familiar roads. I could still make it-- just with a slight detour. A full stomach and a good night’s sleep would let me make a logical decision. So, I turned south, towards Flagstaff.

The landscape was very colorful, with many outcroppings of stone. The stark landscape of the west never disappoints me. I passed the Highway 160 interchange, the turnoff for Tuba City, and kept going. At a quarter after 5 I went through Gray Mountain, where all the businesses seemed to be closed. (Not to be confused with Grey Mountain, which is west of Flagstaff.) I found a Flagstaff radio station. The weather report said it would 43 degrees that night, with a chance of “monsoon storms” on Thursday. Maybe it wasn’t a good night to camp out, after all. The radio station also said that day would’ve been Buddy Holly’s 75th birthday.

Back in the dorm room, I met up with Francisco. He was from Barcelona, Spain, but now lived in Berkley. He would eventually be moving to Boston to study at MIT. He was traveling, wanting to see America while he was “on holiday,” but travel by bus was really expensive. Francisco had been searching Craigslist for a car to buy, thinking $2,000 would get him something drivable. He had a good idea of where he wanted to go, but was daunted by the distances. He said the distance between Los Angeles and San Francisco was almost the width of his country. “Everything is so big!” he said. Francisco wanted to see the Grand Canyon, and wondered if you could hike down and back up again in one day. He was also interested in going to Albuquerque to see the Atomic Museum. (I noticed he was reading a biography of J. Robert Oppenheimer.) He also wanted to visit the Trinity Site, where the first atomic bomb was detonated, but was surprised when I told him the site was only open to the public two days out of the year. (I knew, because I wanted to go sometime, too.) When he left to go somewhere, he packed his stuff in his backpack and took it all with him.

More guys showed up to spend the night in the dorm room. There was a guy from Phoenix and two Japanese tourists. I met a French girl in the kitchen. Flagstaff was a college town, and some students stayed at the hostel until they could find an apartment. I called home. It was a shock to hear my nephew broke his leg! That was terrible.