Scottsdale to Maricopa

Today’s route was pretty good as far as bicycle paths, bicycle lanes, and road shoulder were concerned. It turned out that South Arizona Ave was a major arterial with heavy traffic. While we had mostly a pretty wide shoulder, there were large bumps every 20 feet or so due to expansion from the heat that created ruptures in the asphalt. Not great riding, but very acceptable from a safety standpoint. Our original planned route was to take zero traffic roads all the way into Maricopa after turning off South Arizona Ave. However, a road closure sign caused us to reroute to Maricopa Road SR347. While there was very heavy traffic (presumably the after-work crowd that lives in Maricopa and works in the Mesa/Chandler area), there was an extremely wide shoulder and happily the asphalt ruptures were much smoother to ride over in comparison to those on South Arizona Ave.