Swell on Wheels: Riding Utah's San Rafael Swell

I was pedaling alone through a deserted corner of Utah, the first stars punching through the dome of the evening sky, when I saw the lion. Or what looked like a lion. It was too shadowy and quick to say for sure, but I feathered my brake levers, which were secured to my handlebars with zip ties and duct tape, and futilely squinted into the dusk. Riding on, faster now, rock walls launched into the sky at my side, their crenelated faces blushing in the day’s last light. I wanted to look up the names of the more dramatic peaks, but I had no map. No matter, it was all achingly beautiful and my smile led the way as I continued on, pedaling hard, further and further into nowhere. 

To understand why I’m streaking down a remote dirt road through failing light into one of the more isolated deserts in America — out of water, without a map, lights, or overnight gear of any kind — you have to know the convoluted history of this star-crossed bike journey into Utah’s San Rafael Swell. 

One family goes big

High in a remote corner of the Swan Valley we roll around a bend in the trail — 11-year-old Silas, 7-year-old Jonah, and me on one colossal mountain bike we call the Teasdale Train — when suddenly it’s there, not more than 30 feet away: a grizzly bear on its hind legs. I grab the brake levers of our rolling 200-pound behemoth and, in a motion practiced countless times, whip bear spray out of my pack’s side pocket the instant my feet hit the ground. As the boys would later revel in telling friends and family members, “Then dad said the ‘S’ word!”

The bear, it turns out, is tiny — which is even scarier than being huge. As the kids stare wide-eyed at the bruin, I twist my neck from side to side and scan the greenery for sound or movement. There is only one electric thought in my mind: Where’s mom?

A bike ride in Switzerland, part II

We pedaled out from the town of Livigno, Italy under heavy skies and snow-cloaked summits. Mick waited impatiently while I stopped to chat with a fisherman along the river at the edge of town. He was anxious to get over Chaschauna Pass before the predicted afternoon storms arrived, but I wasn't in a hurry. The way the churlish clouds were descending I figured we were getting clobbered no matter what.

Of course, there are many ways to get clobbered. Besides mountain storms and snow-choked passes, another good way is to push your bike up savagely steep mountains trails for 3,000 feet...

A bike ride in Switzerland

Recently got back from a week riding bikes in Switzerland and have to admit something: I totally underestimated the Alps.

When I heard last spring that the Swiss had developed a new 400-mile, nation-spanning mountain bike route, I knew I had to check it out. Then I learned that the organization behind it, Swiss Trails, would haul your luggage for you each day. You book your trip, they make your hotel reservations, send you a custom itinerary with maps, and, kazow, you're ready to go. All you do is show up and ride. Piece of cake. As someone used to doing self-contained wilderness trips, this sounded like a relaxing change of pace. Leisurely, even. 

Which just goes to show how clueless I was about Switzerland. I mean, there's a reason people call places with steep, gigantic mountains "the Alps of ... (insert name of place with steep, gigantic mountains here)."

Mick and I realized this as soon as we stepped off the train in Scuol, a mountain village tucked into a far eastern finger of the country near the Austrian and Italian borders.

"Are we riding over those?" Mick said, pointing up at the snow-covered wall of mountains rising 5,000 feet from the valley floor.

"I have no idea," I said, spinning around and taking in the view, "but we're going over something big."

Of this there was no doubt. Sky-scratching peaks loomed in every direction, so it really didn't matter that I had no idea where we going. One way or the other we were riding over the Alps, and by the looks of things it would be anything but leisurely.

still more campfires of 2009

This is John Stamstad and Todd Tanner attempting to dry out their feet around the fire. We'd crossed approximately 5,000 bone-freezing creeks that day and were seriously wet. Which is yet another example of how campfires are both hypnotic and practical.

If you're curious about our trip, you can read the article from Mountain Bike magazine here.

Yet more campfires of 2009

Good roads

Came across these images today from my last trip to Bolivia (back in the days of slide film). They are from a road that some people consider the most dangerous in the world. At the time I rode it, one car per week was going off the edge. As you can see, when that happens you don't survive.
I wrote a few stories about my time in Bolivia for various magazines, only one of which lives online. It's probably not the best I've written, in fact it was put together from the unused scraps of several other stories (to my editor: sorry!), but it does give a true sense of what it's like to ride a bike down there. The opener and a link to the full story follows these images...

"Bolivia's Wild Rides"
by Aaron Teasdale
Technically it was a road ride. Though in Bolivia — land of the most terrifying roads the world has ever known — that wasn’t exactly reassuring. In reality, it was a ragged, serpentine ribbon of mud and rock that rockets down 11,000 feet in 49 miles. Starting from Le Cumbre, a frozen, desolate pass at 16,000 feet, it plummets through cloud and cloudforest and waterfalls that land mid-road, into muggy tangles of jungle that spill over the roadside like groping green tentacles. Astoundingly, it is the main “highway” between the capital of La Paz and the cloud forest town of Corioco. Declared the “World’s Most Dangerous Road” by the Inter-American Bank, it features 10-foot widths, sheer 1,000-foot drops, and a multitude of small white crosses to remind drivers of the motorcycles, jeeps, and buses that routinely pitch off its precipices. Call it road biking Bolivian style.

Alistair Matthew, owner and chief guide of Gravity Assisted Mountain Biking, stood atop Le Cumbre preparing a dozen clients for their upcoming plunge. Without cracking a smile he said, “If you do find yourself going off the edge, please try to leave the bike behind as they’re quite difficult to come by down here.”

To read the full story, go here.

New story hits mailboxes

My latest story should be arriving in mailboxes any day now. Encompassing a summer's worth of overnight bike rides, or S24Os, it features epic riding, family shenanigans, and a big picture of me and my two boys mountain biking on our super-long, three-seater bike. We call it the Teasdale Train.

The cover is a self-portrait from a solo-overnight on Sheep Mountain, my favorite near-Missoula backcountry ride, with ultralight camping gear this September. Took about ten tries to get the shot right. I'll do another post about that soon, with a few alternate covers we considered from the same shoot.

The cover and opening spread are below. If you'd like to see the entire article, go here.