thoughtfulUPDATE: Here’s a google map of my journey
So I’m back in the office today, after a week on vacation, and some 4000 miles of traveling complete. I’m kind of easing back into things, and no one has spotted me come in yet, so I think I might have a few minutes before I find myself with 12 new things to do.
I left out of here Saturday before last, slightly sleep deprived from the stressful week leading up to departure. Of course, I waited to the last minute to finally get around to machining up the mounts for my new side cases (start here and click forward), and the bike servicing was last minute and didn’t include a valve lash adjustment like I planned on. The usual amount of stress before a trip, I guess you could say. I managed to leave home by 6am, and ran well ahead of schedule. Thanks to the Camelbak, I drank 4 liters of water on my 680 mile ride and managed to arrive just a little before 2pm PDT. Thank goodness for mesh riding pants, I was feeling good despite the almost 100 degree heat in Nevada/California. Other than almost being run off the road once just as soon as I crossed into CA, the trip was fairly uneventful. My fuel economy suffered with the new bags and the 85mph+ average: I don’t think I managed better than 38 the whole way.
Mel had claimed we would load the bike and head out to Abq almost as soon as I arrived, so I was kind of hell-bent to get there on time, but it hardly mattered, hehe. The house still needed a lot of work, so I settled in for the night. She also left me my 8 foot by 3 foot in the truck for the bike, only… the wrong way. I wanted a slot I could just ride up into, but she left me the last 4 foot of the truck’s width instead. I attempted to ride up into it, but only managed to make it most of the way up the ramp before panicking about hitting her things, coming to a stop, and falling over. Broke out a turn signal, bent a mounting bolt and a bar end, but did no real damage to myself or the bike. Whups! I went to plan B: found a loading dock in town, and used that to ride the bike into a level ramp instead of uphill. Strapped it down with some misgivings about it being sideways, but… turned out to be a non-issue, and it rode just fine the entire way.
Sunday we rolled out at noon. Seriously, noon. We were up until 2 the previous night cleaning and etc, so I can give some slack, but even I was surprised to not make it out on a 800 mile drive until noon 
(Sorry Mel, I know you were stressed at the time…). It’s been a while since I drove I-40 from CA to Abq, so it was entertaining. I listened to a lot of Car Talk podcasts, and then switched to This American Life. I’ve never been a huge fan of the This American Life, but I discovered that for driving, it has the right mix of something entertaining coupled with the ability to not have to think too hard to make it good stuff to keep you awake on the road. Mel and I talked back and forth via FRS radios, until they died about an hour out of Abq. We finally arrived at Jo’s around 2am MDT.
Monday was the party, and the 24 bottles of homebrewed beer I had carted with me on the motorcycle were well received. I can’t imagine a better way to enjoy a birthday than surrounded by good friends having a good time, in the middle of a big adventure!
Tuesday we were to leave out after dinner, but instead we ended up pushing leave-time to Wednesday morning, so for me, Tuesday was all about sleeping in and bumming around.
Wednesday we rolled out around 9 after a short breakfast. We stopped off at Cadillac-henge just outside of Amarillo (pictures forthcoming), and again at the giant cross at Groom, TX, where we also had lunch at a local place I knew of. The rest of the drive was mildly uneventful. We hit Missouri after dark, and it was raining lightly. At one point, a sudden bright spark shot over the hood and impacted on the passenger side of the windshield, startling me as I started at the bio-luminescent goo left by an ill fated lightning bug. I don’t see those things much, so they always are a bit of a surprise, haha. We arrived around 11PM CDT and pretty much just went to bed.
Thursday we unpacked enough of the truck so I could ride the bike out, packed it up, hugged Mel bye and rode out of town and for Stillwater, OK. It was an easy ride. I met up with a guy on a sport bike not far into Oklahoma on the turnpike and we ended up running rather quickly to Tulsa. Wheee. I met up with my folks at the nursing home my aunt is staying in, recovering from a pretty bad stroke. I hadn’t seen her in years; I can only imagine what she thought when she saw me. She’s unable to talk, but seems to be able to understand what you say to her, and can at least move her right side well. I stayed the night with my folks at their motel, and headed out after breakfast in the morning for Lubbock and my friend Mike.
Friday I messed up. The temperture was about 85-90 the whole way, and overcast, so the mesh gear was helping a lot, and unlike the furnace of Nevada/California, it did not prompt me to stay on top of blood sugar and water like I should have. By the time I hit Amarillo, I was not feeling well at all. I stopped and had a candy bar and put back a bottle of water, and hit the road again. I made it within 50 miles of target when my stomach came unglued and I had to stop. I rested for a while, thought I was doing alright, and suited up to get on the bike when my stomach flipped over. Yanked off the helmet and back into the Burger King and threw up. That was really wild for me. I felt a lot better after, which made no sense to me: dehydration should have continued to make me feel bad, you’d think. I kept on water into Lubbock, and felt just fine by the time I hit Mike’s house. Very strange, that’s never happened to me. Regardless, that’s what I get for ignoring my key motorcycling axioms of hydration and blood sugar, doh! Mike’s wife, Lindsay, gave me the wrong address via email, one house off, which made for an interesting moment or two, but I found them. We had dinner, and watched some movie.
Saturday, Mike had a golf game to get to, so I rolled out of Lubbock far earlier than I planned. I was on the road by 6:30 MDT! I rode north and took a cutoff to Raton, NM I had never been on, but rather liked. I stopped in Trinidad and had lunch and relaxed, and hit the road, staying on water this time Just north of Colorado Springs, traffic slowed down as we reached the front of a thunderstorm. I’d already put on the wet gear, so I was set and ready to go through it. I had a moment of laughter, though, as I tooled under an overpass that was currently giving shelter to a half dozen guys riding cruisers and no helmets or rain gear. I turned and gave them a big wave, and they waved back. I wonder who thought the other stupider at that point in time… The thunderstorm was pretty brief, but traffic over Momument Hill was slow, and I missed my arrival time in Boulder by an hour, but 6pm MDT was still very good, considering how many breaks I took. I felt great. We had dinner, went to a picnic, and ended up back at Keagan’s Man-Pad. He took me and his girlfriend Beth out for a ride up the Flagstaff canyon in his Subaru. He’s been practicing going up it, and I really felt I should be giving him driving notes ala rally car co-pilot style. He’s pretty good at it, and I had a great time. I really like Boulder. Why don’t I live there?
Sunday I changed my plans to ride over Rocky Mountain National Park and instead took a back way to I-70 and went through the Eisenhower tunnel. The bike rolled over 40,000 miles just before I entered the tunnel, not bad for being 3 and a half years old, eh? I stopped in Dillon and called Rose. She was a tad surprised, I guess I was going a lot faster than I thought too, and made it up there in an hour. I ended up riding up to Breckenridge and having brunch with Rose downtown. Afterwards, I followed her back to her condo to check it out. Sure, it’s only 300 square foot, but man… what a view! I can see why she is a tad sad to be moving down to Santa Fe soon. I ended up helping her pack up her flat screen TV while I was there, and left out around 1pm MDT to head north to Steamboat Springs and highway 40 to home. I had stalled getting back on the road just about ride, and ended up playing thread the needle with thunderstorms all the way into Utah. It started to rain on me once near Dinosaur, CO, so I pulled over to put colder gear on, only to have it stop raining a mile later. Ah well. I kept having to switch between just the mesh gear to the cold gear to stay comfortable on the ride into Utah, but it gave me plenty of chances for breaks, candy bars, and more water. I arrived home around 9pm MDT, tired and a bit sore, glad to be home.
So, for those keeping track at home, that’s about 1600 miles driving a moving truck, and about 2600 miles via motorcycle, totaling more than 4000 miles distance covered in a week. The bike is doing well, but needs a valve lash adjustment something fierce. I averaged about 40ish MPG on the bike, mostly due to me running 80+ mph the vast amount of the way. I had a great time, and it was really good seeing so many friends who I have not had a chance to catch up with in a long while. I hope I can get out to see you all more often in the future!
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