Home, James
Wednesday May 15, 2019
You see I've been through the desert on a horse with no name
It felt good to be out of the rain
In the desert you can remember your name
For there ain't no one for to give you no pain
- Everybody knows this is America, right?
(Trivia notes for music geeks: Written in Key of E minor, I believe this is the only song I know that contains only two chords [with variations on one]. Don't try this at home, kids.)
Well, our horse has a name: Crusader (self-named on the way home from the dealer in the first 10 miles of travel together). And we did find some pain, some of it given by people.
After six days in the desert...
We've crossed most of the US deserts but have never spent this much time immersed in them. The variety of ecological systems that can be classified is "desert" is mind-numbing. We've traversed south to north, from the Sonoran saguaros on the US-Mexico border zones to deserts of creosote plants, sagebrush, and Utah junipers to Colorado desert within sight lines of the Rocky Mountains. I need some time to take a deep breath and process all this awesomeness, to accept the crazy diversity that at times makes views on opposite sides of the roadway appear as though from a different planet but in fact separated by a hundred yards. I'm a little overwhelmed right now with what we've seen.
 |
| Riding gloves at retirement |
 |
| Stock company photo, Firstgear Ultra Mesh gloves |
Kitty bursts out laughing. "You should carry them gently home and dispose of them properly!" she says.
Like a US flag disposal, I think to myself. So I retire the old pair, put them in a safe place in the trunk for their final ride home, and don the spiffy new redesigned pair.
I've chosen Amarillo TX as a likely stopping point of under 500 miles because we cross into Central Time and "lose" an hour, also having lost an hour yesterday due to the transition from quirky Arizona time zone to New Mexico time zone. Those hours add up and I thought we'd make a little earlier stop today.
We leave a half hour later than planned because the insurance company calls just as we ready to load out, to confirm plans to see an adjuster when we get home and to get a few more details. "This will soon become part of the past," the agent says. Those words strike home and are food for the soul when come hard times or disagreeable circumstances.
We ride 475 miles today and it's like nothing. Just lovely and easy. No drama. I leave the camera packed away in the trunk. Cool this morning at 57F, warm this afternoon at 90F, but pleasant with the mesh jackets while moving. My taped-up mirror works OK under the circumstances. From northwestern New Mexico's vast high desert sagebrush expanses and gas fields, we transition downward from the 7000-foot elevation to the vast flat grassland plains of the Texas Panhandle at 3600 feet above sea level. It's one of the things I enjoy most about traveling fast and far: Seeing how the land changes from one geographical zone to another.
This morning at our first fuel stop near Albuquerque, our fuel mileage was 40 mpg. No crosswind. At the second stop, riding through the strong southerly winds that constantly sweep the Texas Panhandle, riding the same type of flatland with the same load and speeds, our fuel mileage was 30 mpg. That's the effect of the aerodynamically destructive force of a crosswind.
At one point we ride a mile past a feedlot with tens of thousands of cattle. Wow, that is intense! I would not want to live downwind of that feedlot! We ride 35 miles through an electric turbine wind farm. Although there's been some negative publicity on these graceful monsters, we see dozens and dozens under construction.
Well, there might have been a little drama. I'd routed to a motel in Amarillo just to have a destination in the GPS, and in the afternoon we decided Amarillo would be a fine stopping point so I make the reservation with the hotel app. But after a little while, back on the Interstate, I realize something is bothering me about this reservation. I finally realize what it is: The address I'd seen on the GPS wasn't the same as one I'd seen in the app. So we know where to go, but don't have reservations there. And we have reservations, but we don't know where.
I'm not in the mood to get off the Interstate and figure it out. "The app listed it as 'Amarillo West'", I tell Kitty in the headset. "When we get close to Amarillo, help me start looking for the hotel marquee on the exit signs.: About six miles from our routed destination, we see the brand itself, but there's no exit. So I get off at the next exit, do the Texas U-Turn thing under the Interstate (very clever, these Texans, with their interchange traffic management), drive back on the frontage road, repeat the Texas U-Turn thing, and find the property.
"I think we might have reservations here," I tell the clerk. The customer standing behind me laughs out loud, and I explain what happened. It turns out we've guessed right, and it's adjacent to an Outback Steakhouse restaurant, so it all turns out well.
Kitty is an amazing co-rider. Today we rode tank to tank to final destination with no breaks in between. She is very committed to being fit and has lost weight since our riding days 10 years ago. Maybe it's that or maybe it's the 1800 Wing's seat improvement over the 1500 seat, but she would never have been able to ride those miles and those distances without breaks. Her only comment is "Maybe three hours between breaks late in the day is a little long."
She makes it look easy.
 |
| SpotWalla track for Day |
 |
| SpotWalla track for trip |
No comments:
Post a Comment