Epic Bikepacking to Joshua Tree (SoCal Ep.5)

Whilst I'm on this long and lonesome road, it got me thinking about how much my life has changed since I finished a bike trip. And over the last almost four years, the changes I've made to my own life, I think when I finished a bike trip, well I don't think I know, I was pretty lost. I felt without purpose, identity, didn't know where to be physically. But rather than thinking I've failed, it's a bit of a mind shift. It's just a progression in life. The aim is just to really try and enjoy yourself and make as much of an impact to help other people as possible. However you do that, that's for you to work out. Just when you think the road's getting better, it gets worse. Oh, and sand. Coachella, canal route. This is a long, windy, tiresome road. I've gone all day on this, so just lean into it. Better just enjoy it. For some reason, the fence has just stopped. There's no trespassing signs everywhere. Farewell Coachella canal. I love tarmac sometimes. Mecca on the horizon. Bring me water. Let's go. Hello there. I'm in the bath. My hair is disgusting. I felt pretty spent today. I am near Coachella. It's a long day done. It's about 1,900 kilometers I've done today. I thought it'd be worth doing a quick update on where we are on the map. So this is where I slept. Slab City. I was just on the outskirts of the city. As you can see, there's a naval base. There's a military base in the desert, and I slept listening to machine gun fire, which was not fun. I then made my way along this flat, very windy route following the Coachella canal. As I headed north, made my way towards the city, as you can see, of Coachella. Made my way to the town of Indio, which is where I slept. I then made my way back onto the route. This is what you're about to see. The reason I'm showing you this with the elevation profile, if you look at the bottom, you can see the climb is about to start. So I'm about to make my way into Joshua Tree National Park, climbing, as you can see, to about 2,000 meters, 4,000 plus feet, and then there's more climbing to come. Right, let's get to it. Good morning. Just having some hotel room porridge oats. Probably shouldn't be doing this. I've just realized I've got four days left of cycling. I fly home on Wednesday, but I need to sort out a bike box and pack my bike. I just feel exhausted right now. I'm just out of practice, and I've gone straight in at the deep end at a really hard one, and I'm going to enjoy the next three or four days. Just leaving Indio. It's 10 a.m., so a little bit of a late start for me, but I can see the mountains in the distance. Very good. How are you doing? Do you mind if I watch? Thank you. Nice. You ever do shooting? I used to be in the army. I used to be in the British army. It's been a while. I left the army about four or five years ago now, but I used to be in the infantry. I used to fire mortars. That was my thing, but yeah, I fired a lot of weapons. Do you want to fire? I have a real special rifle. Are you sure? An ACO rifle. Oh, absolutely. It's a 1911 .45, and they're shooting just some Ruger Mark II's .22 caliber. Yeah, yeah. It's a target business. It's a Glock .34, 9mm, Glock .43, compact, 9mm. This is an old Colt, single action. That's sweet. So this would be, you know, it's on half-cock. That's like a Western. A Western gun. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This thing's a beast as well. What's this thing? This is a .357 Magnum. Wow. A Colt. That's his gun. What year did you buy this? 1991. Yeah. Wowza. This is a M1A SOCOM 16. It shoots, I know in Britain they use a .308 caliber. They go .308's. Okay. And then a .556. Yeah, and this would be 7.62. I'll load it up for you, and you could probably, if you could see that metal gun. Nice. And shoot at that. Fantastic. And then the gun is safe, loaded. This is the safety. It just goes forward, so far. This design is right after World War II, the US, and they still keep that design to this day. Really? Yeah. Is that Special Operations Command? Yes. Nice. Thank you so much. You're welcome, you're welcome. What's your name? Lorenzo. Lorenzo Addo. Nice to meet you. It's been a pleasure, thank you. This is so cool. Seen this ring around the sun. I've never seen this before. Still hear the gunshots. Look at that. I hope so. We're at over 1,000 meters climbed. About 300 more meters up this mountain. This is where I've come from. It's looking gorgeous today. That cloud has been an absolute godsend. I'm so happy for it. Look at this. I could do that every five minutes if I wanted. It's just constant dripping from my forehead. It's good though. I've not got a lot of water again. Probably four liters left. That's not enough. This is tiring. We can start to see Joshua trees surrounding me now. Very cool tree. They look like they're doing dances, like contemporary dance trees. Dreaming. There's a lot of vegetation up here. This is the payoff, the afterglow. Oh yeah, baby. Yes, Joshua tree. This is amazing. I can see the sun is dropping, which means I should find somewhere to camp. I'm a little bit spoilt for choice here. Albeit, nothing here is flat. It's all got a bit of a slant. This could be good. This is a little camping spot. Very sandy, which is not a bad thing. What about down here? Is that ants? No. Oh, what is this? This is a sandy spot ideal for camping, I would say. Little camp spot. Look at that. Perfect. That's the view. The sun has just dipped over here. This is the spot. Then I'll descend in the morning, climb again, and then go to civilization. I've got three liters of water, I think, in this camelback. It is full. So I'm going to really limit it. I'm not going to cook with any water tonight. I'm going to have some beans and wraps. Good morning. Today's breakfast is a pack of Pop-Tarts, some blueberry ones, I believe. Here comes the sun. Down we go. Down to the bottom of the hill. Yeah, Joshua tree. I like you. I like you a lot. I'm about halfway through this. It's a bit late for that. I should have had one of these sands at the other side as well. After a short stop in Joshua tree, I came across this market, which was great for buying some fruits and ice cream. I also happened to buy some art from this shop before continuing on a big old climb towards Pioneertown. Made it to Pioneertown. It's not quite as good as I was hoping. I don't know what I expected, to be honest. It's a bit crass. You can hear some electric guitar playing. We've still got nice Joshua trees here though. That's cool. Let's get out of here. Back to pushing again. I thought we were done with pushing. This is climbing after Pioneertown. I'm okay with it though. I've got to the point now where I just appreciate the chance to slow down a bit. Just enjoy the scenery. It's getting cooler. See the sun is coming low in the ground, so it's setting soon. I'm just going to try and make my way as far as I can on this track. Climbing a hill on a bike, especially a very long one, is almost a spiritual experience. You're reduced to traveling at a speed very close to walking pace. Sweat dripping from your forehead into your glasses and then down off your nose and onto the floor. It's always easier to take the flat route, but the memories are so much duller. The same goes for life. The harder the task, the more difficult the struggle, the more worthwhile it will feel. This is what I think is going to be camp tonight. Nice flat sandy bed. I've just come up the track about 400 meters up there. Just followed the riverbed. There's a lot of people around here. I know it doesn't look like it, but there's a lot of little houses in the mountains, which is making it a bit tricky to find somewhere to sleep. I'm very hungry, but very good day. Let's go get some food. Good day today. This is the fifth episode in this SoCal Desert Ramble series. If you've not seen any of the previous videos, you can go back and catch up and watch those and I'll see you on what will be the final episode. As I make my way to San Bernardino in Los Angeles.