Last week Jonathan and I drove out from San Luis Obispo to Sedona for a few days of mountain biking and celebrating the end of the wedding season. It’s a long 11 or so hour drive from here so we met at 5am and headed out so we might be able to stop somewhere along the way with enough light left to get a short ride in before dark. We found a trail right in Williams just a hundred miles before Sedona that fit perfectly. As you can see from the picture of the trail map below, when we decided to take trail “21″ we were in for some serious climbing! The trail started at about 7,000 feet so it only took about a mile before we were riding in snow. It was a very tough climb but welcome after all that driving and the way down was cold but a lot of fun.
The next day Jonathan and I headed out for about a 4 hour ride on some of Sedona’s famous red sand trails, it was a blast! Twisty with lots of short ups and downs, we had even more fun than we could have hoped for. A mechanical issue had us stopped for a bit but there are bike shops on pretty much every corner of town so it hardly slowed us at all.
That evening Riley drove up from Phoenix to join us. A few adult beverages were enjoyed and a bit of altitude sickness ensued. No matter as the trails were waiting so I worked through it and got in a pretty adventurous ride that involved lots of exploring and becoming acquainted with the neighborhoods of Sedona. Yup, we were lost most of the day lol! Being lost on a mountain bike ride is almost a requirement for an epic day IMO!
It was an awesome trip and really helped recharge my creativity, I definitely would love to go back to Sedona again. So if you are planning on getting married in Sedona give me a call, what a stunning place!

Yes, that does say 2200 feet of climbing in 3 miles… didn’t mention the snow though!

Our hotel was right by the Sedona Airport which has a lookout that many tourists come to for sunset. We placed bets on how many Nikon and Canon camera’s were there. It was really funny to see so many people with $2k+ TRIPODS taking the same pictures that countless others have already taken! Riley is enjoying the use of a Fuji instant camera, Jonathan scarfs down some aprés ride health food and I have a big smile after an epic 5+ hour ride.

What a place! Riley sits on top of one of the hundreds of technical sections that are a real challenge to climb up and a lot of fun to go down.

Kyla was really excited to see me when I got home!