Wednesday, December 11, 2013

The Last Motorcycle Trip - October 2013

In October I decided to take one last motorcycle trip before I sold the bike.  The initial destination was Kansas City, Missouri to visit Arden, Nancy’s daughter for the weekend.   I would then head south and ride back to California through Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico and Arizona.

Monday – Sacramento to Eureka

I left Sacramento on Tuesday afternoon around 4:00 pm with the intent to make it to the other side Reno before stopping for the night.  The ride up through the Sierras went well – the weather was perfect, the traffic was light, and the bike was really performing well.   I left I-80 in Fernley grabbed a quick bite before heading out on Highway 50 towards Austin.  

About 10 miles out of Austin it was dark and one of the side panels of the bike came free and started flapping around and crashing into my shin.  Luckily the panel stayed connected to the bike (I would never have found it in the dark) so I drove very carefully for the next 10 miles with one hand on the throttle and the other holding the side panel in place.   I figured that might be easier to limp along than to mess about in the middle of nowhere in the dark at the side of the road.

To my surprise when I got to Austin all the hotels were full (there are only three of them).   There was some sort of bike tour going on and all the hotel rooms were occupied by cyclists.  So I gassed up, removed the panel from the bike, strapped it on the back, and set off for the next town, Eureka, an hour or so down the road.  In Eureka, where there are more and bigger hotels, I got the last room.  Eureka apparently was full of fire fighters.

This was good progress for the first day, but I didn’t need the bike to start falling apart on me and I didn't expect lodging to be a problem.

Wednesday – Eureka to Grand Junction

I was up early Wednesday morning and fixed the bike with tie wraps and duct tape, the two essential components of my tool kit.  It was a cold morning and the weather looked ominous – there were signs that it might rain.  Nevertheless the road from Eureka to Ely was quite spectacular and with clouds looming in the background it was even more spectacular. 

View from Highway 50 near Ely
I had breakfast in Ely and then gassed up for the ride into Utah.   It wasn’t looking like a warm ride so I put more clothes on, including the electric vest (the best piece of motorcycle garb I have ever purchased).  I continued on Highway 50 into Utah passing through Delta, Salina, and Green River.   While the countryside in Utah is quite dramatic the towns are not so inviting.  Green River is particularly dismal and on this afternoon with the wind blowing dust around the town it was not a place to hang around.

Utah between Salina and Green River
I pushed on into Colorado along the Grand Army of the Republic Highway (Highway 70 is its less dramatic name) and stopped at Grand Junction for the night.  There were some nice stretches along the banks of the Colorado River coming into Grand Junction but on the whole it is not a very impressive place.  

Thursday –  Grand Junction to Garden City

An early start again with a ride through some nice countryside in Western Colorado.  I rode as far as Gunnison before stopping for a late breakfast. Gunnison looked like an interesting town – it caters for tourists with hunting, fishing, outdoor activities and skiing in the wintertime.  After Gunnison the road climbed over Monarch Pass at around 11,000 ft.  There was snow on the top of the pass and lower down the aspens were turning and the colors were glorious.  

Aspens near Salida, Colorado
I passed through Salida and continued on to Pueblo.   After Pueblo the land became monotonous and flat - the plains of eastern Colorado and Kansas.  Agricultural land, cattle and feed lots.   I drove through Rocky Ford, Lamar and stopped for the night in Garden City, Kansas.  While most states mark their boundary with some sort of welcoming signage, I didn't notice any welcome into Kansas - it went by unnoticed. 

Garden City is graced by a huge Tyson Foods plant – presumably chickens and the associated processing of them.  There was a distinct smell and the flies were everywhere.  At the hotel check in, I was swatting away flies but the desk clerk didn’t seem to notice them.

Friday – Garden City to Kansas City

On the road the next day driving through Western Kansas was again pretty monotonous – grain silos, feed lots and a few oil wells.   The grain silos in the morning light actually looked beautiful and worthy of a picture.  

Grain Silo between Garden City and Dodge Cite
The first stop of the day was in Dodge City for breakfast.  Dodge City looks like it has some tourism going for it by promoting the links to Wyatt Earp, Bat Masterson, the Chisholm Trail and all the western stuff.   Alas at 10:00 in the morning there was nothing much to see except a renovated historic section of town where just about everything was closed and a lot of smelly meat processing plants.  Dodge City has some of the largest meat processing plants in the US that are capable of handling a huge number of cattle (one plant alone can process 6,000 cattle each day).  The downside of course is that it comes with a certain odor and a large number of flies.  Since the work in the processing plants is not particularly pleasant the town is predominantly Hispanic.  I can’t imagine what goes on behind the walls of those plants – enough to make anyone a vegetarian I am sure.

I continued along Interstate 70 to Wichita where I got a bit confused and took the Toll Road 35 instead of the Interstate 35.  This meant I missed Abilene Kansas where I wanted to visit the Eisenhower Presidential Museum but it did mean I got to drive through the Flint Hills Prairie Lands - some of the last remaining tall grass prairie in the USA.   In the Flint Hills area the rocks are so close to the surface, the land couldn’t be plowed and so it was never converted to agricultural land and it remains as prairie to this day.  

I had a quick look around Topeka (a nice college town) before continuing on to Kansas City and a well-earned rest for the weekend.  I was grateful for not having to ride the bike for the next couple of days.

Monday – Kansas City to Paris

Monday morning I was back on the road again.  Nancy took an early flight back to Sacramento and I headed south through Missouri.  I skirted Joplin Missouri and crossed into Arkansas near Bentonville (home of the Walmart empire).  Southern Missouri and Arkansas was surprisingly pretty country – rolling forested hills – very lush.   After Fort Smith, Arkansas, I crossed into Oklahoma and again I was surprised by the nice countrysie – not at all what I had imagined from my previous visits to the other side of Oklahoma.

The destination for the night was Paris, Texas - a place that had always had some allure for me – perhaps because of the name, or perhaps because of the Wim Wenders film.  However, Paris is not really very impressive.   While it is a fair size, it’s center is a bit run down and has not been restored like many old Texas towns.  The Eiffel Tower on the edge of town is quite pathetic – squat and dumpy and sporting a red Stetson hat – very cheesy.

Paris's Eiffel Tower with Cowboy Hat

Tuesday – Paris to Houston

A short day today.   All I had to do was drive from Paris to Houston.  I passed through Athens and Palestine, both of which seemed to be more attractive than Paris.  At Huntsville I joined Interstate 45 for the 60 or so miles into Houston.   Not a pleasant ride – too many lanes, too much traffic, too fast – not the place to be riding a motorcycle.

Wednesday – Houston to Austin

After visiting my friend Mike in Houston, it was on the road for another short hop to Austin.  A weather front was passing through and I tried to dodge the rain but it caught up with me and I had to hide out under a freeway bridge until it passed.  Austin is quite the big town now and coming into town from the east was quite a mess with heavy traffic and construction. 

I made it downtown and just happened to be adjacent to the LBJ Museum and Library.  Alas because of our government shutdown, this facility, being a Federal facility, was closed.   I will leave that for some other time.

I stayed the night with friends and dined that evening on the banks of Lake Travis – a very low Lake Travis.   There is not a lot of water in the lake after yet another year of drought.

Thursday – Austin to Plainview

Leaving Austin my goal was to reach Taos by Saturday.  The hill country to the north east of Austin is quite pretty along Highway 183 to Lampasas.   I stopped in Lampasas for lunch. It is a nice town with a nice historic area.  From Lampasas it was on to Brownwood, Abilene, Snyder and Lubbock.   Not a particularly interesting road – a lot of cotton being grown around Snyder and a large number of oil wells pumping away.  I remember making a sales trip to Snyder many years ago – it hasn’t improved much.

Just south of Lubbock is the town of Post, founded by C.W. Post, the cereal magnate.   He founded the town as some sort of Utopian experiment in 1907.   Not so Utopian any more however.   I did stop for a milkshake at the McDonald’s to savor the Texas Utopia.

Post, Texas
I rode on to Plainview before I stopped for the night – another Holiday Inn Express.   Holiday Inn Express had become my lodging of choice - clean, modern, motorcycle friendly and reasonably priced.  Plainview is a fairly large town but not at all attractive – hotels, gas and fast food by the highway and an aging and decrepit old town with a railway, a few grain silos and an impressive courthouse.

Friday – Plainview to Santa Fe

Heading north from Plainview, the road passes through Canyon.  Canyon is adjacent to the Palo DuroCanyon.   This is the second largest (after the Grand Canyon) canyon in the USA and it is quite remarkable because for 100’s of miles around there is not a feature to be seen, it is just flat.  And then here outside Canyon there is this big tear in the land.  I took a detour into the Palo Duro State Park and drove around a little.   While it is a huge change in the topography, it is certainly nowhere near as visually impressive as the Grand Canyon. 

Palo Duro Canyon
North from Canyon brought me to Amarillo.  I skirted the town and took Interstate 40 east.   Just outside Amarillo on I-40 is the “art installation” – Cadillac Ranch.  A dozen Cadillacs that were half buried in a field adjacent to the freeway.  The site has changed somewhat since it’s inception and it seems that any would-be graffiti artist (i.e. kid with a paint can) visits the site and sprays their own design or message on the remains of the vehicles.  That is all well and good, but what was surprising was the fact that they discard the aerosol cans in the vicinity.   There were literally hundreds of paint cans littering the adjacent field.

Cadillac Ranch
Next stop was Adrian, which just happens to be the mid-point of the old Route 66.  They make a big thing about Route 66 and I guess a lot of people follow the old route.   There are lots of coffee shops and hamburger places that try to recreate the atmosphere of a bygone era.   It’s all a bit touristy and cheesy if you ask me.  Nevertheless, I did stop at the diner in Adrian and had a so-so sandwich and piece of pie.


After Adrian 40 crosses into New Mexico.  New Mexico certainly makes a big deal about entering the state – there was a marquee banner announcing it spanning the road, there was a wonderful visitor center with all sorts of literature.  There are some wonderful things to see in New Mexico and they can be rightly proud of their natural wonders.

Interstate 40 then passes through Tucumcari.  Since it has been made famous in song (LittleFeet – Willin’). I had to stop there.  Alas it is another sad story of a once vibrant town on the highway and railway that is now a shadow of it’s former self.  Closed motels, gas stations and coffee shops in town with a smattering of modern fast food places and gas stations by the freeway.

I followed I-40 until just before Albuquerque and then left the highway on 64 to cut up to Santa Fe.  It was a nice ride up into Santa Fe but as the evening approached it got very cold.   I had to stop and put more clothes on.  I found my usual hotel – Holiday Inn Express on the main street into Santa Fe.

That night while dining in a Mexican restaurant, I was reading a "Things to do in New Mexico" magazine and found out that the next day, Saturday, was the opening of the Albuquerque Balloon Festival.  I had heard about this and thought that this might be something worth visiting.  The only drawback was that it started before sunrise and I was a good hour away from Albuquerque.

Saturday – Santa Fe to Taos

I arose at 4:00 am and set off for a cold early morning drive to Albuquerque.  As we got near to the venue for the balloon festival, the road got busy and the traffic was backed up on the freeway.  This was obviously a big deal – there were thousands of people lining up to get in.  I got parked and entered the event just before dawn and as the sun rose about a dozen balloons took off – the so-called dawn surprise.  That was all very nice but not worth getting up that early until about half an hour later balloons were being inflated all over the place.  There were literally hundreds of them.  What a spectacle and the amazing thing was you can walk among all these balloons as they are being inflated. 

Albuquerque Balloon Festival
After a couple of hours I was pretty much tired with looking at balloons, even tired of the chain saw carvers who were demonstrating their skills (an odd combination), so I headed back to Santa Fe.  It was well worth the early morning start and I would highly recommend this event.   One morning is enough however – apparently it goes on morning and evening for an entire week.

Santa Fe Architecture
In Santa Fe I toured around the downtown area on the bike.   It was nice enough though a bit touristy – lots of expensive artsy shops and a lot of well healed tourists.  I did go through the Georgia O’Keefe Gallery.  In small doses, I like her work and this gallery was not too large to put me off.  One thing I found out there was that in her early days she worked in Canyon, Texas the town near the Palo Duro canyon I had passed through the day before.

From Santa Fe I headed north west to Los Alamos.  This was the headquarters of the Manhattan Project in World War II.   I had expected there to be some remnants of that period, but not a lot remains.   There was a statue of Oppenheimer and Groves in the center of town and Oppenheimer’s old home was still present, though not accessible in any way.  Still Los Alamos was a refreshing change from the tourist-clogged streets of Santa Fe.

From Los Alamos I drove on to Taos where I was to stay with friends (Bart De P. who lives there and John G.who was visiting from Sacramento).  Bart has a beautiful house in the foothills of the Sangre De Cristo mountains near Arroyo Hondo.  I stayed a couple of nights to assist on Sunday with the construction of Bart’s new greenhouse – lots of fun.

Bart and the Greenhouse Project

Monday – Taos to Flagstaff

Monday morning it was back on the road with a destination of Flagstaff.  The drive down to Albuquerque was a repeat of Saturday’s ride and then I headed west on Interstate 40.  Nothing too exciting today, I passed through Gallup where I had lunch at the old El Rancho Hotel.   This must have been a splendid place in its day and apparently it was the stopping of place for many Hollywood celebrities.   They boast “the charm of yesterday, the convenience of tomorrow” and the hotel is a National Historic Site.  The food could be better however.

The El Rancho in Gallup
From Gallup it was on to Winslow and then at the end of the day I reached Flagstaff.   Flagstaff is the nearest large town to the southerly rim of the Grand Canyon.   It was full of tour buses, but they all had nowhere to go – access to the Grand Canyon was closed because it is a National Park and our Government is not working.   Those poor folk who have come from all corners of the world, many on a once in a lifetime trip, and they can’t get to the Canyon.   How sad.

Tuesday – Flagstaff to Twentynine Palms

Tuesday morning was a pleasant morning in Flagstaff.   It is a college town and it has a nice feel to it.  It is a railway town too and the main line passes straight through town – lots of very long freight trains cutting the town in two – like Sacramento, there are no railway bridges in town.

On the road I continued to travel west on I-40.  As the previous day, there wasn’t much of interest, or perhaps I was just getting tired and jaded.  For some reason the handlebars on the bike had worked loose and they were moving when I braked hard.  In Kingman (another Route 66 railroad town on I-40), I found a Napa parts store who just happened to have the right star wrench to do the tightening job - lucky.

Next stop was a turn south towards Lake Havasu and the infamous London Bridge.  This is a relatively new development on the banks of the Lake Havasu reservoir.  The developer heard they were pulling down a bridge in London so he arranged for the facing of the bridge to be shipped to the USA.  A weird idea but apparently it worked – the development did take off and has been reasonably successful.   Not my cup of tea however.

From Lake Havasu it was a late afternoon ride south down to Parker (an interesting looking town) and then west to 29 Palms.   A lovely ride over a nice roller coaster of a road.

Wednesday – Twentynine Palms to Bridgeport

The skies looked a little ominous on Wednesday morning and the forecast was for heavy winds and even rain and snow in the direction I was going.  With nowhere else to go, I set off hoping that the weather report was wrong.   I passed through Joshua Tree (another National Park that was closed) and headed over to Victorville and yes it was windy.   I was leaning into the wind the whole way. 

A Joshua Tree
Victorville is again on the old Route 66 and it was also a railway town.  I didn’t look that welcoming somewhat industrial with a cement works or something on the edge of town and, because of the wind, dust blowing everywhere.   I stopped for breakfast in Victorville at some nice little diner (Emma Jean's).

Just outside Victorville there is a relatively new looking airport, a cargo airport, with all sorts of planes lined up.   Not much traffic today though, just high winds blowing dust around.  I learned later this is the Southern California Logistics Airport  and it is a repurposed old air force base now being used for freight.

Driving north I joined Highway 395 for the ride up the east side of the Sierras – my favorite part of California in the shadow of the High Sierras.  The wind died down but the clouds were looking ominous, and sure enough the rain started around Big Pine.   I suited up with the heated vest and waterproof jacket and pants and pushed on.  The rain made things a bit unpleasant and by the time I got to Bishop I was considering stopping there for the night.   I fueled up in Bishop and warmed up in a Starbucks.  After deciding to call it a day and find a hotel I came out of the Starbucks to find a hole in the clouds and the sun shining through.  I figured that was the sign to keep going so I pushed on northwards.

The weather was fine only for a while and by the time I got near Mammoth it was turning bad again and as I climbed the pass north of Mammoth it started snowing.  I crept over the summit with ice on my fairing and helmet visor.  I made another cautious ride over the pass north of Mono Lake in the ice and snow before dropping into Bridgeport where I did stop for the night.   I stayed that night with friends from Sacramento, Ken and Diane, who were staying in a cabin west of Bridgeport.

Thursday – Bridgeport to Sacramento

The Bike with Snow in the morning
The next day the weather was much better and after a leisurely start to the day, I made the most pleasant ride back over Monitor Pass to Markleville, the Hope Valley, over Carson Pass and down to Sacramento.   This was to be my last long ride on the bike and I was really enjoying it. 

A couple of weeks later, I cleaned up the bike, repaired the broken side panel, and put it up for sale on Craigslist.  It sold within a couple of days.


  

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