My camp at Rangely

  What you can't see are all the little holes in the ground. They were like ant holes, with the little mounds of debris or tailings that ants push out when they burrow. But there weren't any ants going in or out of them. I never did figure out what lived down there. 

  While I'm on the subject of insects, which I am now, does anyone know why yellow-jackets like BMW motorcycles?  Every time I stop, lately, two or three immediately show up. I'm starting to think they've got a hive going somewhere on the bike.  Or maybe I hit a queen while riding, and they smell her remains?  

  Surely there is an insectologist who knows the answer. So give it up, such person. Why do they bug me?

The Two Stories of Rangely, Colorado

  Rangely, Colorado, is another Western town laid out along both sides of the highway, and it looks a little more prosperous than most.  It has nice people, too, several of whom stopped to help me when I dumped my bike in some gravel turning around to find the campground.  On this fall, I broke the left front turn signal, which I field repaired with silicone and electrician's tape in the morning.  But I got to the campground, and there the two stories emerged.

  The first has to do with a guy in the next spot over.  He was driving a Tacoma, and pulling what I learned was a restored 1967 Airstream, one of the little ones.  He and his wife had bought it from the third owner, and spent a year restoring it.  He came over when he saw my bike, and started talking about his bikes.  This is common: some guy sees the bike, walks over to talk about it, and winds up telling me about his bike, and how envious he is becasue I am riding mine and he isn't rding his.  I listened a lot.  But this guy had lots of other stuff he wanted to talk about, and so I listened.  I never did see his wife, as she never left the trailer.  It turned out that she has lupus, and he had retired from the Bureau of Prisons as a case manager to be the caregiver for his wife.  He was an extraordinary man, very much in love with his wife, and attending to her.  They both had the courage to get out and see our country even with her debilitating condition.  You have to admire both of them.

  Oh, and he recommended that if I went to Yellowstone, I should stay at the KOA in West Yellowstone.  As it happened, I did, where I met Carlos and Nick, and we will get to those two later.

  The second story is about the guy who came to take a shower at the campground, and why pre-judging is bad.

  The campground offers free showers to those who pay for camping, and charges two dollars for all others.  I saw a few men and women come and pay their $2 to get clean, all of them arriving in vehicles that were neither new nor shiny.  Once, as I was headed over to the bathroom, a dirty, rusty former mommy-van pulled in, and an old guy got out.  He was about my height, but outweighed me by an easy 75 pounds.  He shuffled as he walked, his feet stuck into some old fake-fur lined house slippers, the palms of his hands turned backwards, one hand carrying "Alaska Carry-on Luggage" (a white plastic grocery bag for those who don't fly to or from Alaska) in which could be seen his toiletries and clean clothes.  He was covered from hat to slippers in dirt and dust, and he moved with seeming weariness.

  He was accosted by the camp hostess, a woman who seemed to forget to put her teeth in before meeting the public, and she asked him about payment.  In what sounded to me like a curmudgeonly tone, he told her that he had paid at the box by the gate.  He shuffled on into the shower, and I could hear him in there huffing and puffing and sighing until the sound of the shower prevailed.

  The next morning, I decided I needed to eat more fruit, so I found the local market, and went in.  I had toyed with the idea of getting a breakfast of some sort if thy had a deli, but when I got to the deli, all of the breakfast food was gone.  A bunch of geezers were sitting in the booths, picking their teeth and drinking coffee from paper cups.  I figured them for the offenders who had eaten all the scrambled eggs and sausages.  So I got some bananas, an orange, some bagels, and a gallon of water, and went outside for my breakfast.  I'm eating my banana, drinking my water, and eyeing my bagels, when I noticed I had parked near what looked like the old guy's former mommy-van.  Sure enough, halfway through my bagel, he comes out, shuffling towards me in those same slippers, but in new clean clothes.  In one hand he had something wrapped in a napkin, and it seemed likely he was one of the guys who had cleaned out the breakfast food in the deli.

  To my surprise, he stopped to chat.  He wanted to know where I was from, and where I was going.  We chatted some more, and there was never a less curmudgeonly man.  He was 76, had been in Rangely since 1948, because you could always find work in Rangely.  There was work in the coal mine east of town (three seams, he said, and gave me the thickness of each seam), or in the oil fields, and  "there is the richest man in Rangely right there."  Turns out the richest man made his money in the oil fields, but was paying the price from breathing the fumes occuring in the oild fields by contracting  emphysema, carrying his life-giving oxygen bottle with him these last few years.  The old guy I was talking with carried on about energy policy in our country, and his views on it, and so forth.  But the whole while we talked, he was leaning on something, as though gravity was trying to pull him down, but he was going to prop himself up and not let it win.  Told me he felt pretty good, pretty good, and we parted.  He walked over to his former mommy-van, pulled the door open, and in the nicest, sweetest voice, said to his dog, "Here buddy, I got something for ya', a treat."  I never saw the dog, it must have been on the front seat both times, quiet, patient, waiting for the old guy.

  I hope I can quit pre-judging people.

Further North: Highway 139

  So after Fred gets the new tires on, I'm complaining about having to ride through Salt Lake City on the bike to get north.  Oh no, says Fred, ride up to I-70, ride east on I-70 to 139, and ride it up to Vernal, and north from there.  I look at the map, and see that if I go north from Vernal, I can hit Yellowstone again.  Good idea, and I put Plan 139 into operation.  It was an excellent plan, even with I-70 in it.

  I don't have pictures, because I was just riding and enjoying it.  You get on 139 at a little town named Loma, which seems pleasant enough, even if a soccer-mom didn't recognize my motorcycle as another motor vehicle with rights to the space it occupies on the public highway.  The fun doesn't start until you get out of the grass (and therfore oil) lands and up into the hills.  Then it gets exciting.  Up a mountain pass with twists and turns and uphill all tthe way.  The switchbacks were just that:  180 degree turns, all posted at 25 - 35 mph.  On one, with a severe drop-off at the apex, was one of those signs markig the site of a fatal accident.  This sign was for a motorcyclist, with the admonition to "ride safe."  It focused my attention very tightly.

  A mile or two up the hill, I came across another sign, this one that pushed the pucker factor to 11: "Open Range Watch For Cattle."  What?  I have to watch for homeless cows AND steer this 600 pound bike (950 pounds with rider and gear) through tight corners?  There are only so many options when a 950 pound rolling object encounters a semi-stationary 1200 pound object on a roadway when the former is in motion and the latter is not, and all but one of those options ends with a loud "splat" and a bucket of pain.

  But I made it up and down the pass, into beautiful ranchland, and finally to Rangely, Colorado.  But before we get to the two stories about Rangely, I want to emphasize that Highway 139 is worth the ride.  It is both fun and beautiful, and we can't ask for more than that.

Northward

  So I got up and headed north. I thought I might visit Canyonlands National Park, but as I turned into the Park, the weather started threatening, so I turned around.  Next I thought I would stop at Arches National Park, but while in the Visitors Center, some rude Frenchman pushed me out of the way as I was looking at an exhibit.  I was hot, it was hot outside, and the rudeness just put me off.  So I just got back on the bike and started riding.

  Motorcyclists know that motorcycle tires wear out much faster than car/truck tires.  I had been watching the tread wear, and looking for a source for new tires for a week or so, as the tires I was running were known to last on the average 6500 to 7500 miles.  I was getting close to that bottom number, and only had 1/8th of an inch of tread on the rear tire.

 

  Moab.  What can you say about Moab?  Red?  Been said.  Beautiful?  Been said.  Awesome?  Been said.  It is just surreal.

  While riding down the street in Moab, I saw a sign that said "Powersports" on the front of a building, with a motorcycle or two outside.  I stopped to inquire, and they said they didn't have what I needed, but Fred would.  Fred?  Arrowhead Enterprises.  They looked up his telephone number, I called, he had what I needed, and would install them while I waited.  Off I went.

  If you are ever in or near Moab, and you need stuff for your motorcycle, this is the guy.  Write it down: The Guy.  Not only did he have the exact tire I wanted (as opposed to any tire will do) for both the front and the rear, but he had the equipment to change the tires and changed them in an hour or less.  I would still be trying to spoon that rear tire on.  And Romaniac?  He sells parts for KLR's just for people like you.

  It was after this wonderful experience that I ran into the Frenchmen, or they ran into me, but I found this arch anyway:

  See the people?  Harley riders. They infest the West like locusts as their Sturgis rally draws near. More like cicadas, really, with their ugly noise. Fie on them, fie I say!  Let them be muffled, and made to be courteous, or not ride at all. 

 But I digress from my story. 

The Sculpture at the Mesa Verde Visitor Center

 It is difficult to make out in this iPhone photo, but that is a man, scaling a cliff, with a basket of building materials on his back.

  Super-Size that, corporate America.

Mesa Verde

  Leaving Quemada, I continued to ride in those beautiful New Mexico hills for many miles.  In addition to the many signs of elk passing trough the area, I saw actual elk.  Actually, only one elk.  But that one elk (cow) proved to me that I was right: there were elk in the area.

  But beauty, as we know, is never constant, and all too soon the green and tree covered hills gave way to brown and brush, and I dropped into Gallup, New Mexico.  I needed water, and lithium.  Lithium batteries, I should say, for the SPOT.  After I found the right street for the one bridge over the railway tracks, I headed north to visit the Four Corners where Arizona, New Mexico, Utah and Colorado meet, and then to Mesa Verde.  The country was brownly beautiful.

  That mesa in the far distance is huge.  You can see it from the top of Mesa Verde.

 (By the way, in all of these areas, the oil and gas companies paint all of their buildings and infra-structure the same color as the local desert.  They are much less obtrusive than what we see in Alaska).

  Four Corners is a commercial enterprise run by a Native Tribe, and I refuse to recall which one.  I paid three dollars to approach the "monument," and had I known the amount of insanity there, I would not even have done that.  The monument is in a plaza, with booths on each of the four sides.  You may purchase all types of stuff, either before or after standing in line so you can stand in, on, or near the four corners.  I chose to purchase only water, and to take pictures of others having their picture taken.

  Having amused myself in this fashion, I rode on to Mesa Verde.

  I had never seen actual cliff dwellings until April of this year with Meredith in Arizona.  Of course, Mesa Verde is the largest collection, and they are stunning in their concept and execution.  Imagine a people with no steel or iron, weaving their ropes from plant fiber, scaling these cliffs, carrying baskets of rocks to a cleft, then building these communal structures.  Growing their food in the valley floors, hauling all that they need and had, including their water, up these cliffs.  What perseverance.  What imagination.  What strength.  No Super-Size-Me here, just humanity at its very best, working together that all might survive.  Do you hear that, Los Angeles?  Working together that all might survive.

  Look at those logs!  They had to be hauled up the cliff too.  Did they rig a block and tackle?  Or did they do it the old fashioned way, dragging the rope hand over hand over hand.

  The natural defenses to their "cities", the vast canyons and cliffs that surround the Mesa.

  My camp that night.

  A wonderful place.

The Lost Pages of New Mexico

The iPad ate my blog entry! And so I have to start over.

  The hills of southeast New Mexico are pretty in their own historic and dusty way.  Driving up to Lincoln was pleasant, with little traffic.  The bike just eats up those two lane roads, and I enjoy feeling it do its magic.  The smile never leaves my face.

  But New Mexico also teaches that change always occurs, and no place remains the same.  The crossing of the Jornado del Muerto was different this time, because the recent rains made the "desert" green.  The road is the same (although recently resurfaced) but the greenery completely changed the views and the whole sense of being on the edge of a place where surviving is one of two options.

  Likewise, Datil and the San Augustin Plains are changed.  The ride (after you get out of Soccorro and their away from their persistent police) and up into the hills remains beautiful and a magnificent ride.  The sweeping views are still there, but the towns seem to be dying.  From Magdalena through Datil to Pie Town, the closed businesses outnumber those that remain open.  Meredith is safe from ever moving to Datil, or any place close, because having been there again, I won't want to live (or die) there.  It is beautiful, but depressing at the same time.

  I took pictures of the plains, but I don't think they do them justice.  

  You will note the power lines in the picture.  You can not take a picture in the American West without the power lines.  The electrical "grid" or infrastructure is everywhere.  It supplies power to all of the resource development that has taken place and is taking place.  It is truly remarkable.  Even the great prairies and grasslands have huge powerlines marching across them.  They seem to be even more ubiquitous than the cell phone towers . . .

  After realizing you can never go back again (for the umpteenth time this trip) I left Datil and headed up to Pie Town, looking for some pie, and because I had never been there before.  BY definition, I couldn't be dissapointed.  Well, the only dissapointment was that Pie Town is not a town, or even a junnction, and the pie store was only open three days a week for four hours on those days.  I was there on the wrong day, much less the wrong time of day.  "There was no joy in Pie Ville, the Mighty Daniel had struck out."

  And there were no other services available either.  Nor would there be until I got to Quemada.  However, the beauty of this high country New Mexico made up for things like no services.  You can ride or drive and be nourished by the sights and smells.  There are no sounds other thaan nature's sounds when you stop and turn off the engine.  Traffic is very light, and so the quiet just dominates.  I'm told the country is a hunter's paradise, and people spend gooly sums to come here (if they win the lottery for getting a tag for the area) to hunt elk and deer.  I can understand  why.  Elk sign is all over, from their tracks on the shoulders of the roads to the waste products they leave on the roadway.  Yup, elks poop on the highway, friends, just like the bears do in the woods.  I think elk do it in the woods too, but I didn't go there to look.

  Quemada has a motel and restaurant that was much appreciated.  This little crossroads apparently does well becasue it caters to the hunters and fishermen who come to New Mexico for the world class fish and game.  But why don't the other little places do as well?  Maybe it is Quemada's proximity to Gallup and the east-west freeway that allows it to do better.  Regardless, I was really happy to find it at 7:00 p.m., because the nearest campground was another 80 miles away.

New Mexico SE to NE

  The morning I left the campground near Roswell, I saw a roadrunner. I haven't seen one in years. I was just happy to see one again. 

  I rode up to Capitan and Lincoln to revisit them. The land of Smokey Bear and the Lincoln County War. Billy the Kid. Pat Garrett. Murder. Nothing has changed since 1972. Except they resurfaced the road. 

 

  

Texas

  The drive across Texas on 82 was simply that: a drive across history, beautiful open country, and the smell of oil. Yes, from time to time, near the operating well heads, you can smell the crude oil. I'm sure an experienced oilman can tell you which field from which the crude came, just by the smell. 

  I spent the night in Wichita Falls, not so much a quaint little town anymore, and then headed for Lubbock. 

  It was on the road (82) to Lubbock where I had my closest call do far. 82 was a divided highway at that point. A fellow driving his pickup in the oncoming lane turned left in front of me. And stopped. He was blocking all the right lane, in which I was traveling, and half the left lane. Those lane change exercises they teach in the basic motorcycle course are worthwhile. 

The Turning Point

  Birmingham was the turning point.  I left on Friday heading West.  I rode down to Tuscaloosa, home of the Other Football Team in Alabama.  I was hoping to see some hulking big football players, or maybe the cheerleading squad, but none were in sight.  So I picked up Highway 82, and headed West.  I looked carefully at the weather maps, and they showed an arc of storms in Texas, more than a state (Arkansas) away. I felt good, and rode on.  

  The BMW at 65 sounds like it is literally purring.  It is so quiet and effortless, the rider has little to do, aside from a steering input here and there.  It is really a joy to ride.  It can still get away from me at slow speeds, so you know where I will be practicing.  No, not the Federal Building parking garage.

  As I crossed into Arkansas, I entered what appears to be the southeastern fringe of the U.S energy belt.  Oil and gas infrastructure everywhere.  They were better maintained than the roadways . . .  I also entered bayou country.  Swampy land, sloughs, bayous, creeks, cricks, streams, rivers.  I had the feeling that if I spit, the water level in Lake Pontchartrain would rise.

  I found a campground in Arkansas, still a distance from that line of storms.  I could see that they had benefitted from some recent rains, with debris scalloped and shaped by run-off, but they had gravel pads for the tents.  Here is a photo:

  I pitched my tent, including the rain fly, and in a surfeit of caution, put all my gear in the tent with me or under the rainfly.  At about  8:30, some rain spattered about, so I crawled now somewhat less spacious tent.  Thankfully, I had done laundry in Birmingham, so I did not have to contend with smelly socks.  About 9:30, as I was dozing, some other nearby campers returned from their day of fishing on a nearby river/bayou/lake/swamp.  They were a little noisy, and their lights kept sweeping my tent.  Those lights kept on flickering, and then I realized - lightning.

  Soon I heard faint rumblings of thunder.  The storms were coming, and they arrived about an hour later in all of God's glory.  Lightning, thunder, rain right smack over me.  Since I was inside the tent, and dry there, that's where I stayed.  The storms slowly moved off, and by mid-nigt, all that was left was the rain, which continued while I slept.

  In the morning, all was still dry in the tent.  As I broke camp, even the ground under the tent was dry. The only wet things were the rain fly, and the seat on the motorcycle.  So I put the rain fly in a water-proof (not water-resistant) bag, and rode west on Ol' 82.

As promised, the three cutest grandchildren in Birmingham, Alabama

Connor, Parker, and Louis.

Connor became known as Motorcycle Man.