In October/November 2003 Kevin and I had conferences at the same time in the South West USA. So a road/ mountain biking trip was born. We rented a car from LA, came up the coast riding Cerro Alto, Corte de Madera, and Mt Tam; then to the Sierras to the Downieville Downhill (best days mountainbiking of my life!) and Lake Tahoe. After dropping Kevin at his conference in Reno, I drove down the eastern side of the Sierras to Death Valley and across to the Grand Canyon. Thanks to mild temperatures, I was able to do a round trip, hiking down the Kaibab Trail to the Colorado River, then returning up the Bright Angel trail (The Park Service rightly recommends against attempting to reach the river and return in a single day: in summer many hikers have problems with heat exhaustion attempting this). Finally I made it to Phoenix for the E-Learn 2003 conference, the work justification for the trip.