Define “Spirit Tour”: A spiritual journey on bikes, over multiple days, various terrains, and one common goal throughout the group, finding the spirit. Which, while done as a collective, is an individual pursuit in and of itself. Or at least it presents itself that way over the course of the tour.
In January of 2022 (the inaugural Spirit Tour), four riders looped a four-day route through the desert south of Tucson, and paralleled the border with Mexico, before heading back east through Patagonia, AZ, and finishing in Tucson. This year’s edition of the Spirit Tour saw two more eager riders added to the crew making six total. Also added to the tour this year, was a fifth day, which boasted a big loop around Mount Wrightson and Mt Hopkins starting and finishing in Patagonia.
Our Kona Adventure Team rider Kerry Werner was quick to throw is name in the hat of attendees. Werner shut his season down after CX Nationals in Hartford, CT the second weekend of December, where Werner landed a Single Speed CX National title and third place in the Elite Men race. Therefore, this year’s Spirt tour was a swift rip of the band-aid back into the throws of training for Werner, but while the tour boasted big days Werner was brimming with excitement, and for good reason. We’ll let Kerry take it from here.
Day 1 Strava Link- https://www.strava.com/activities/8339471274
92 miles, 7ish hours, 6500ft of climbing
We got up early and packed the final things into our bags. We were credit card bikepacking, meaning we slept in hotels and had to carry clothes, toiletries, cold-weather clothing, and as much food as would fit into our empty spaces. We all used some combination of a bar bag, frame bag, and seat bag. Two guys wore hydration vests, and the rest of us relied on the Giardia bottles (bottles on the bottom of the down tube) for extra water.
We headed out of Tucson at roughly 9am on the standard “shoot out” loop. The shoot out is a famous group ride in Tucson that happens every Saturday morning and is notoriously fast due to the high caliber of athletes that spend the winter in Tucson getting ready for the season to come. This is probably why I felt the need to throw some watts down on the group…
After roughly 4 miles of pavement, we headed into the mountains pointing towards Keystone Peak. The one and only big climb for the day. The climb up was breezy. Nice gravel roads wind up through the arroyos. Then we dropped off the backside and the real fun began. We got into some fast, chunky gravel. Suitable for a side-by-side or serious 4×4 vehicle. This was our first real test on the bags, our setup, and our brakes.
We were dumped into a wash, which was all part of the plan according to travel guide Russell Finsterwald (Finsty), that was when we started hiking/riding/hiking. Following the paths that our rather large four legged bovine companions left for us.
We did eventually hit a road, which spat us onto pavement before meandering back into the desert where the road disappeared leaving Finsty to admit that “There was a road here on google maps.”
We bushwhacked our way through the scrub brush, following the lines on our GPS units until we finally found a real road, with real tire tracks!
From there it was smooth sailing to La Siesta Campground, Arivaca’s one and only lodging option. Steve, the owner and host, had us setup in a large fifth wheel and pop up party tent. We chowed down on BBQ and burritos for dinner and breakfast burritos the next morning. Steve is the man!
Day 2 strava link- https://www.strava.com/activities/8344946817
122 miles, 7.5 hours, 10ft of climbing
We got up a bit early as we knew we had a big day ahead of us. After this day we would adopt the motto “Bite off more than you can chew then chew like hell!”
Before leaving Arrivaca we stopped at the mercantile in town. We had to make it 40 miles to Rio Rico on some isolated back country gravel.
We headed out of Arrivaca on Ruby Rd, a gem of a road and let the good times roll. This section of the tour is on of my favorites as the views are awesome, there is seldom a person/car out there, and did I say the views are awesome?
We arrived in Rio Rico to stock up at our final stop for the day. From here we needed to be able to push the final 80 miles to Bisbee.
I grabbed a roller dog, Haribo gummies, and some coffee from Starbucks in a can and we were off!
More amazing, wide-open country as we neared ever closer to the border.
The final climb of the day loomed, Montezuma Pass. Once summiting you could see the border wall stretch out from east to west. The governor of Arizona took it upon himself to keep construction rolling. He was using tax payer dollars to have shipping containers brought in and set on the border. It was a sight to see.
We dropped off the pass down the snaking west side, which started as gravel before turning into super fast pavement. While this was the last climb of the day we still had 20 miles of pavement to crush before rolling into the Copper Queen hotel in Bisbee. You could ask anyone in the crew those last 20 miles are the hardest of the whole day. At least we had a sick sunset to bring us in with.
Day 3 strava link- https://www.strava.com/activities/8349470999
84 miles, 5.5 hrs, 5700 ft of climbing
This was rest day! Haha. We grabbed some brew and food from the Bisbee Coffee Co then headed out of town and went straight for the Huachuca Mountains.
While this was a rest day the bikes didn’t know it. We had the most single track on tap this day, including a section of the Arizona Trail. Which brings me to this idea of gravel bikes riding gravel roads. We certainly blurred the lines of what these bikes were capable of on this trip. Most of us were on 45c tires and we were putting our rigid setups through the paces. We only had one flat tire on the whole trip, a sidewall slice.
After forging through the Miller Peak wilderness we popped out into the San Rafael Valley, which is quite a site to see. For us it meant only 40 miles left in the ride but it also meant staggering views and high speeds.
Arriving in Patagonia we went straight to Poncho Villa, where we got the last of the days burritos. We cheers’d over cokes and were stoked to drop bags and rally a big loop for day four.
Day 4 strava link- https://www.strava.com/activities/8355401633
81 miles, 6.25 hours, 8900 ft of climbing
Since this was a “bonus loop” we dropped bags in our hotel rooms and were treated to lighter bikes for a truly gnarly loop around Mt Wrightson and Mt Hopkins.
Travel guide Finsty warned us about a high level of single track but the group just rolled with it and even picked up an extra person, Evelyn Dong, for the day.
The beginning of this ride was par for the course. Amazing gravel/dirt roads out of Patagonia.
We dropped down box canyon and worked our way over the Elephant Head Rock, which is where the fun began.
From here We jumped on single track and it was proper! Somehow we all managed to bounce around through the chunder and cholla cacti with smiles on our faces.
We popped out of the elephant rock trail and were spit on the Hopkins pavement road climb and just kept climbing from 4,500ft to 6,00ft. Finally we took a break. We took in the views at the top and more importantly let our arms shake out. Little did we know what the drop off the backside had in store for us.
When I say we dropped off the backside I mean that literally. It was so steep. loose, and chunky. We were barely moving and had fistfuls of brake. This is where most of the crashes on the trip happened. Luckily, everyone walked away and we all laughed it off at the bottom wondering why such a road existed the first place.
We finished out the day dropping back into Patagonia on what felt like pavement compared to what we had just been through. It’s all about perspective and I think that single section changed a lot of our perspectives.
Day 5 Strava link- https://www.strava.com/activities/8361544153
152 miles, 9 hours, 7,800ft of climbing
Russell was surely not pulling any punches on the last day of the Tour. However, we got lucky early. The Spirit God’s were on our side and we had a sick tail wind. We crushed the first 60 miles of pavement in under 3 hours and rolled up the gas station, our only stop of the day. We had to go 90 miles from here on 3 bottles and whatever food we could haul.
From the gas station in Mezcal we rolled up through the Happy Valley, which dead ended into private property. Russell, had reached out to the rancher to obtain permission for us, which was great because otherwise this ride would have been a lot more boring.
The private property section of this ride traversed 3 different ranch lands. Some roads were better than others but in all it was awesome. Rather than pounding pavement we wound our way through saguaro thicket and endless scrub brush. The only other lifeforms we saw were cows.
Before popping back out into civilization our guide Finsty had us duck off of a perfectly fine gravel road and before you know it we were bushwhacking through god knows what, staring down at puma prints in the sand, jumping barbed wire fences, and floundering around in a small creek.
We finished our tour of private property and took a break. We were all keen on pushing from here. Next stop Tucson.
The final bits of gravel had no shortage of wash board. These bumps are extremely frustrating especially when trying to maintain a decent speed. Misery loves company though and while each of us struggled individually, we struggled as a group also, which united us in a weird way that made all the suffering worth it.
We turned left onto Reddington Rd, the final section before we dropped into Tucson. The undulating climb threaded the needle through the Rincon’s and Mt Lemmon.
Once we summited we took one final break before dive bombing into town. We ripped passed side by sides and kitted out 4×4’s. There is always a satisfaction I feel when ripping passed a gasoline powered vehicle with just my pockets full of sour gummies and the mechanical advantage of my gearing.
Not to mention sunset was absolutely killer! It was truly an epic way to end the trip. With everyone dropping into town with high spirits, the sunset popping off, and burritos now only single-digit miles away, all the lows of the trip couldn’t be remembered and if they were we laughed at them. It all had to happen to culminate in what was now the past and another successful Spirt Tour.
