One more day of Mountains, and then I have to go home. I might as well make the
most of it.

 

Leaving the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, I headed east
on 50, a New Road. They still exist after all! That took me through several high
passes that the MZ hated. Cough, spit HACK! Phut. But it kept going. I had a
spare plug but I'm very grateful I didn't have to find out how difficult it is
to change on the road.

More cold! It's mid June and I betcha it's nasty hot back in Austin, where I

            will be in a few days. Cold is to be savored.

 

 

 

 

 

            Just before I turned off 50 onto 69 at Texas Creek, I felt something whop me in

the back. Assuming that my load had come loose I headed for a driveway, noticing
the bb size gravel only after I was on it. This time the superbrakes weren't so
helpful. The back locked and I couldn't get it to unlock, then the front. I went
down at low speed on the high side.

So, there I was on the side of the road with an upside down bike trying to
remember how to pick up a downed motorcycle. First I undid the load, which was
hanging on fine. Then I started picking up the bike, got about halfway and
couldn't get it any farther. I'd forgotten to turn around and use my legs. A car
stopped, a kid jumped out and together we got it back up.

There were a couple of scrapes from a garage oopsie on the right side before I
got the bike. They're just a little bigger and deeper now. No other damage,
except for the water bottle that had come loose and spooked me. And no damage to
me, except dignity.

Then down Hwy 165, the last scenic designated highway for this trip. No, it's
not a new road. There won't be many of those from here in.

 

And one final Point of Interest, Bishops Castle. It's astonishing
what obsession can do with a lifetime to work on. This confection in rock, steel
and glass has no functional purpose whatsoever. Access is through either tight
twisty stairs up the towers, or a ships ladder fifty feet high up one of the buttresses.

 

And it's at 7,000 feet. Even if you're in shape, you're going to be sore after clambering around inside.

             And clamber you must. It's just too weird.

 

  the inside staircase looking down

He's got a bit more of the moat, or cavern, or wall or whatever it is he's building in the front finished since my last trip.

At the Continental Divide I stopped for one more bike and snow photo. A Harley
rider suggested yet one more loop to round out the ride; Hwy 12 through the
Spanish Peaks. Another Highway 12! And it's 30 miles of interstate south, the
way I have to go anyway, and it puts me right back on the same Interstate
afterwards.

I could do one last loop of sunlight and mountains to finish off the afternoon
and the trip and sleep in Trinidad (just this side of the Raton Pass to New
Mexico) or I could be in Texas by motel time. Decisions, decisions. (Photos
253-6)

 

 

 

 

            It was cold as I crossed Raton Pass a few minutes before sunrise. I'd gotten an

early start to get as far as I could before the heat hit. Breakfast was in Roy,
NM, a hundred miles down the road. I'd made a wrong turn and found a better and
unfamiliar route to avoid the Interstates. The only place to eat in Roy was
small and weatherbeaten and looked probably closed. It wasn't.

The waitress was new. That was the first thing she told me, that it was her
first day on the job and she'd never been a waitress before.

Then she told me a WHOLE LOT of other things. She's part Russian, part German
and part Crow. It must have been an interesting marriage.

She's travelled to everywhere I (or anyone else in the diner, a couple of locals
and a mostly Cherokee Baptist Minister) have ever been. She's fostered 18 kids,
is a Christian but her brother is an animist and just underwent a 4 day
self-torture ritual on the Crow reservation in Montana to see visions, she had
both an Indian and a white grandmother and they hated each other and both tried
to teach her to cook their way, her husband is a part time deep sea fisherman in
Alaska and a part time oilfield roughneck who's working nearby at some
construction project, and she has her own Harley and has made the pilgrimage to
Sturgis.

All this while my New Mexico Enchilada was cooking.

After that, the enchilada had my attention. New Mexico food uses the same names
as TexMex or Taco Bell but at least in small dingy places in the countryside,
it's very different. The enchilada was a sandwich of two thicker than normal
tortillas with cheese between, covered in green pork chilli. Nothing at all like
Texas chilli, New Mexico chilli is a spicy greyish translucent sauce full of tiny
green bits and chunks of browned pork. The hotness is directly related to the
greenness; if it's noticeably green it's hotter than hell. This was fairly grey.
The waitress told me how to make it but I'm not sure I believe her.

And then, Texas. Just a couple miles down the road I descended a
series of switchbacks from warm but still comfortable New Mexico into the
western fringes of the Llano Estacado, the Texas high plains. It started to warm
up and just kept going.

In Vega, TX the bank thermometer said 107. At nearly 9 pm in Lomesa where I
stopped for the night, the bank thermometer said 109.

I was up early the next morning, hoping to get home before it got really hot.
Silly me, this is Texas. It's already sweltering.

A couple of hours later I entered the Hill Country and it got a little cooler.
And a LOT more humid. Welcome to the South, where "it's a dry heat" changes to
"it's not the heat, it's the humidity." Actually it's both.

There's packs of bikes on the road, almost all Harleys and all headed to Austin.
Today's Friday, and the ROT rally is in Austin this weekend.

Not too far outside Llano I passed a Yamaha on the side of the road. The rider
waved me down, and I stopped. He'd run out of gas. Since I had no spare gas nor
any way to get some out of the tank, all I could do was take his cell phone
number with me and try to find someone in Llano who'd be willing to help him
out. It took several phone calls, but I finally found a shop that was willing to
at least take the number and call the guy.

In Llano I'd intended to have lunch at Coopers. It was 102 and sticky and the
line was at least an hour, clear around the building. I had lunch in Spicewood.

And then home. Sara greeted me with a list of everything that had gone wrong in
my absence, and a hug. A cold shower, and it's time to unpack.

My daughter was home too, in town for a few days. After supper she and I rode
the W down to 6th street to check out the action. The rallyites had paraded down
Congress, and Congress and 6th were both blocked off, bikes only. Thousands of
leatherclad dentists and their wives were milling aimlessly for city blocks,
between rows and rows of chrome.

 

 

            Last year the big thing was bobbers and choppers that had been very artfully

faux faded and rusted. This year I didn't see so much of the artsy stuff. Just
lots and lots of chrome, with LED's hidden up in the motor to make it sparkle.

I had fun showing off in traffic with all the Harley types who only ride their
bikes a few miles from the trailer to the rally. They were paddling with both
feet like so many black leather ducks while I puttered alongside for blocks at
walking speed or less with a passenger, all four feet on the pegs.

And that's about it. Nearly 6,700 miles in almost three weeks, with a couple of
off days here and there. Just a little less than 400 miles a day of world class
Quality miles everywhere but Texas.

It was a great ride. I had fun. Thanks for coming along. Next time, bring your
bike and sleeping bag and you can write your own story.