Today the plan was for Kevin to drive me to Escalante where I would visit Elbio and spend the night with him. On our way there, we stopped in Las Vegas to hike around the Red Rocks then we drove to a bouldering spot in St. George called Moe’s Valley. I tried several different boulders and routes, even coming across someone who was willing to help me up a crack route. However, I couldn’t work with much due to my bleeding fingers. He suggested I let it heal and that most rock-climbers would not push themselves through that.
We continued moving, arriving in Escalante at night. It was nice to catch up with Elbio in my favorite way—in person and through the ability to look into one another’s eyes. I was quite impressed to see how much he grew spiritually/emotionally, he had been working on himself in such a deep way. And so we made love while we reminisced of our time on the Hayduke, planning on finishing the section of the Grand Canyon together since I couldn’t traverse it on my own.
The following day he cooked me breakfast while I washed dishes.
“This is how you can know that I like you,” he said, “because I wouldn’t even do this for myself.”
Afterwards, he took me hiking to several different places such as the Weaver Caves, Hundred Hands and Lower Calf Creek Falls. We discovered petroglyphs and neat rock carvings made from heavy rain and erosion.
We parted ways before it got dark.
“I bet you break a heart everywhere you go,” Elbio said as he held me tight. “And it’s not your fault. You can’t help it.”
He kissed me goodbye then Kevin and I drove a few hours east so it wouldn’t be too much driving for him the following day.
I called my mom only to have her try to convince me not to go to Africa. “I read that they eat people in Ghana,” she said. “White people in particular taste very well.”
I had a memory of voicing to another friend where I was headed and just the same he had asked, “Isn’t that the country where they eat people?”
Oh God, what did I get myself into?
Kevin and I made it to Hanksville where he booked us a night in a western cabin. Then while in town, he got us a super solid burger at the pub across the street. We found humor in the guy working there who seemed so over the day, just slapping menus onto people’s tables and doing a fake greeting voice.
Thursday morning, he drove us all the way out to Golden. Just before dark, we stopped at a trailhead and did a small hike, both feeling refreshed and rejuvenated from the crisp November air. Kevin spotted out some rock climbers so we watched as one of them ascended a long route. I was going to miss this sport while I was away.
We arrived around 5 pm and invited CTM out for dinner. She got to meet Kevin and was really impressed by the fact I had one normal guy in my life. We went back to her place to spend the night, then I gifted her some pinecones. She got to choose 2 out of the batch that we collected.
Then, we sat at the dinner table as they asked me what I got done to prepare myself for the bicycle trip.
“Well, I bought the bike,” I said. “That’s about it.”
“Have you ridden one before?” CTM asked.
“Nope! Shouldn’t be that hard, though.”
They were both surprised how I hadn’t done more research for the trip, not even looking at how much it cost for a bike bag or what requirements each airline had for traveling with one. I barely even knew what route we were taking in Ghana nor did I know what kind of food they served there, other than human meat apparently.
Kevin goes, “You believed her?!”
“Well yeah,” I said. “Two people told me that so it has to be true!”
“Oh my god, Goda. They don’t eat people. Jesus Christ.”
