Epilog

The ride is over. It has been an incredible adventure. This something that I will remember for the rest of my life. I have had a wonderful time writing the blog although it has been almost impossible at times to put into words the joy, beauty, laughter, disapointment, stark terror, apprehension, appreciation, peace, camaraderie, solitude, freedom, and blessings that I have felt. Even so, I hope that everyone who has been a reader has in some way felt as if they were there with us.

Thank You

I wish to express thanks first and foremost to Our Lord for His grace and mercy, both to those of us on the journey that was "The Ride for Paul and Tabitha" and to all of us on the journey of life. I thank Him for protecting us and returning us all safely home. I give Him the credit for all things experienced on the trip, both perceived by us as "good" or "bad", as they were all lessons in His nature, blessings, and love.

Thanks to all of the contributors and those who have pledged for mileage. By the way......if you are reading this and have not yet contributed, or if you know of someone who would enjoy reading this blog after the fact, please click on "August 2006" under "Archive" on the right side of the main blog page. Scroll down to the "Thanks to Contributors" post on August 3, 2006. All of the information is there to make a donation. I will continue to accept donations for Paul and Tabitha until it becomes obvious that there are no more donations forthcoming.

For those who have pledged on mileage, I will be contacting you........

Thanks to the woman on Pike's Peak who unselfishly helped us with a ride all of the way back to our hotel.

Thank you to the man who made the anonymous contribution at the Harley dealership in New Mexico.

Thanks to Thunder Mountain Harley-Davidson in Loveland, Colorado for their over-the-top efforts to fabricate parts and get us back on the road when Mark had a brake system issue.

Thanks to Santa Fe Harley-Davidson for making an on-the-spot replacement of my crash bars.

Thanks to everyone whose hearts and minds were with us on the trip.

Thanks also to all who made comments to the blog.

Statistics

• Total number of miles ridden: 5,474
  
• Number of days on the road: 15
  
• Number of days making forward progress: 14
• Approximate gallons of gas (just for me) : 135
• Approximate gas cost (just for me) : $425.00
• Crashes involving cars: 1
• Crashes involving sleet, hail, and ice: 5 or 6 (maybe with some therapy, I can remember the exact number of times we crashed on Pike's Peak!)

The mileage was a little less than anticipated because we were down for travel for one full day in Santa Fe to relax and visit with my brother and his family. We lost the better part of a day due to Rick's crash in Nebraska, and we lost close to a day with the Pike's Peak fiasco.

Observations

• 75 - 80 mph is slow
• Laptop computers are wonderful for checking weather and making the next night's hotel reservations. Good for blogging too.
• Digital cameras - can't do without them!
• Windshields on motorcycles are a must. I can't imagine catching that many bugs with my face.
• Harley-Davidson Fuel injection does not like extreme altitude.
• Most hotels have laundry facilities....pack lighter next time.
• UPS stores are great for lightening your load....just ship it home!
  
• Worst Drivers: Tennessee (Dishonorable mention: Santa Fe)
• Friendliest people: Nebraska
• Biggest outbound disappointment: Gateway Arch area in St. Louis
• Biggest inbound disappointment: Having to skip the Blue Ridge Parkway due to time.
• Most beautiful outbound scenery: Black Hills of South Dakota and Rocky Mountain National Park
• Most beautiful inbound scenery: Coming back to Virginia!!!
• Number of inappropriate encounters with cars: One (Rick's crash in Nebraska)
• Number of near misses with cars: Numerous in Tennessee!
• Most frightening moment: Coming down Pike's Peak in hail and lightning. (honorable mention: thunder and lightning storms in New Mexico)
• Second most frightening moment: Going up Pike's Peak in a hail and lightning storm!
• Where we felt most welcome: Nebraska
• Friendliest HD dealership: Thunder Mountain HD in Loveland, Colorado.
• Most clueless HD dealership: St. Joe HD in St. Joseph, Missouri. They were closed while thousands of bikers were en route to and from Sturgis.

It has been a pleasure. If anything new comes up, I will make the appropriate new entries.

Thanks Again!

Day Fifteen - Virginia

Up and out of the hotel by 0600, we headed out before sunrise again to make time while it is still cool. We had been warned about a speed enforcement crackdown on Interstate 81 in Virginia. I suppose it is because students are going back to colleges this weekend. The road was just lousy with State Troopers. They were like poppy seeds on a bagel. They were driving marked cars, unmarked cars, sports cars, full size Ford and Dodge trucks, you name it. There were so many of them out there that I wouldn't be suprised if they were fighting amoung themselves over the best hiding places. We tried to stay about 5 mph over or less and they didn't pay us any attention. It was so nice to have our beautiful Virginia scenery for the ride!

Finally made it to the wide spot in the road that is Gore, VA! About four more miles and I am home.












BACK AT THE RANCH!!!



Here is the ending mileage for the trip. Looks to me like about 5,474 miles. That is a little less than what I had originally planned, but we did have a couple of days with limited riding (motorcycle crash in Nebraska, falling down Pike's Peak, chilling out in Santa Fe).

Keep checking back. We are not finished yet.

Day Fourteen - Bristol

Our objective for the day was to do as close to 700 miles as possible. We got out of the hotel and on the road by 0500. Conway spans three exits on Interstate 40. We stayed the night at the middle exit. The first thing we saw after getting back on Interstate 40 east was all of the signs for the third Conway exit. I am not making this up....there was s sign for a recreation area named "Toad Suck Park"......I looked twice.....that is what it said. During this last two weeks we have seen places named "Salt Lick", "Buck Snort", "Elk Crossing", but I just can't describe the mental time-out that you go through at 0500 in the morning when you see a sign that says "Toad Suck". I thought that maybe....but then....if.....could be....well..ahhh.....OK, Conway, Arkansas Wins! I have been left speechless twice in less than 12 hours!!!

We saw the sunrise in Arkansas before we crossed the Mississippi river for the second time in two weeks and entered Memphis, Tennessee.

It was hot, but not as bad as we have had on previous days. We just concentrated on putting miles in our rear-view mirrors. Traffic and drivers in Memphis were terrible and we thought that it was just because we were going through a major city near rush hour. What we discovered is about 600 miles of bad drivers!

One nice thing is that the further east we travel, the countryside becomes more lush and green. It is nice to see forests of green and the tree covered Applacian Mountains. This looks like home.



We dealt with it the best way we could, and pushed through the state to find the prize at the end....the Welcome To Virginia sign!! The picture is blurry, but then so were we by then.

We stopped at 7:00 pm at the Holiday Inn in Bristol, VA having covered 692 miles and three states. We are a couple of tired old horses heading for the barn.

About five hours after climbing back on the bike in the morning and I will be back in the teeming metropolis of Gore, VA. We have had quite an adventure, but home sounds good. I have missed my wife Vi and my grandchildren Ava and Clarence.

Just two more tanks of gas.......

Day Thirteen - Conway

We got up early and left Amarillo by 0500 to take advantage of the cool of the morning and light traffic. There was also NO RAIN! Yes...that means that it was DRY. We were HAPPY.

We got to Oklahoma by sunrise and the terrain became even more flat. Also, it became very windy. When it is too windy, it is also difficult to take pictures because you are constantly fighting the bike with both hands. Mind you, I am not complaining....we were dry. Most of Oklahoma was largly unremarkable.

Probably the most interesting thing that we saw was a windmill farm. There were just hundreds (?) of them on both sides of the road. It is hard to get an idea of scale from this picture, but they were quite large.









I suppose that it is always windy here or they wouldn't have a windmill farm, huh? Oklahoma was not a hot and miserable as the part of Wyoming we went through, but it was close. We just rode!

We needed to get out of the heat for a few minutes by the time we crossed the border into Arkansas. The rest stop had cages around all of the vending machines. I have never seen this before. I don't know if I should have been suprised, but I was. We did not go too far away from the bikes and kept them in sight the whole time we were there relaxing in the shade.

Usually we ask about the next stop on the night before while having dinner or when checking into our hotel for the evening. No one thought that there was a safe place to stay in Little Rock, AR. The general consensus seemed to be that the town of Conway (about 20 miles or so west of Little Rock) was our best bet. It was described to us as a "college town". We stopped there and checked into a Holiday Inn Express. There was even an Outback Steakhouse and a Wal-Mart within walking distance.

We walked to the Wal-mart and I got some cough medicine....the pills are not working that well. And then we Walked to the Outback for dinner. It turns out that Conway is infact a college town. There are three colleges here: UCA - Central Arkansas, Hendrix College, and Central Baptist College. Also, this is the home of Axiom, a data processing firm. When you use your Visa or MasterCard, Conway is where the transaction is routed and processed!

The Outback was a story in itself. There were two entrances. One said "Public Restaurant" and the other said "Private Club". If you want to be served alcohol, it is necessary to "join" the private club (Five dollars is the charge for a year's membership). You have to fill out a form and sign a book. Only one person in the group needs to be a member and others with them may sign another book as "guests". It seems that this is some issue from the era of Prohibition in the 1920's that the local lawmakers in Conway have not been able to figure out how to solve. I just don't know what else to say about that....it is not often that I am left speechless!

We traveled 589 miles today and our intent is to duplicate that effort tomorrow. We will try to get up early again and take advantage of the cool of the morning. It seems as if we are not at risk for harsh rains as we continue east. If it is as hot as today (100+) then we will probably take a break somewhere with air conditioning for the afternoon hours and then resume riding as the day is cooling down. To be able to make it to Bristol, TN would be great, but to reach Knoxville, TN would still be a good day's ride.

Day Twelve - Amarillo

Everywhere we go I attempt to talk up "The Ride for Paul and Tabitha". While we were at the Harley shop in Santa Fe yesterday I was telling the story to two sales people. One of them took a twenty dollar bill out of his pocket and wanted to donate it. I asked him for his name and he wished to remain anonymous. I thanked him and gave him the URL of this blog. I would like to appologize to him for not mentioning this yesterday on the day that he contributed.

We got up early, packed, and headed out for Roswell. The road took us past Wayne's house and about 17 inches past that point, a heavy fog settled in. For about 20 miles we were dealing with visibility of around one eighth to one quarter of a mile. It lifted a little and for another 15 miles we just had spotty fog.

We had checked the weather channel and the internet for bad weather and confirmed that we were going to have some! There was a big storm cell just north of Roswell and another one even larger to the northeast of Roswell. We had to suit up for the smaller system while heading southeast on route 285.




Roswell is a real trip! There are pictures of aliens and space ships on the Wal-Mart, and just about every other business in town. The streetlights have "eyes" so that they look like aliens!! They really have a good time with this. Without the whole alien controversy, this place would just be another wide spot in the road in New Mexico. Because of it, a town of almost 50,000 has sprung up as a tourist metropolis.



We visited the Harley store and made our obligitory t-shirt purchases. It was time for lunch and one of the sales people at the Harley store told us that there was nowhere to eat for 90 miles northeast of here. Food seemed like a good idea.

We had lunch at a Chilis and then headed northeast on route 70 toward Texas. If you remember, this is where the larger storm cell was wandering around. Well, we found it! I remember a poem: "The Charge of the Light Brigade" in which one of the stanzas is "Cannon to the left of them; cannon to the right of them; into the jaws of death rode the 600". This is about what we felt like. The sky was almost black. There were thunder storms and lightning strikes about 10 miles to either side of us and evidence of downpours ahead.
We suited up again and went through some of the most miserable weather yet. I thought that New Mexico was supposed to be HOT and DRY. All we have seen is COLD and WET! At least everywhere we have gone, the folks there have thanked us for bringing the rain!

Somehow we made it to route 60 and the Texas boarder. Now it was so hot we were boiling in our rain suits. We stopped to take them off and then crossed the border.

From this point to almost all the way to Amarillo there was nothing but cattle feed yards, fertilizer factories, and meat packing houses. I have never smelled such stench in my life!

There is a paper factory just outside Hopewell, VA and it is pretty rank, but it is like a walk in the gardenias compared to this part of Texas. I was seriously considering burning the clothes I was wearing.

Before we could get all of the way to Amarillo (come on....we were only 20 miles away!) here comes more rain. We had to stop in the middle of all of this stink and breathe through our mouths while putting our rainsuits on for the third or fourth time today. Heavy traffic, torrential downpour....so what else is new?

We stopped at the Harley shop and I spent some more of my kid's inheritance. Thankfully, the Harley shop is only a short distance from our hotel, so it was easy to get checked in, park the bikes, and stow our gear.

Having had enough rain for one day, we called a cab and went to dinner at a Japanese steak house. Great food, good atmosphere, very relaxing.

Tomorrow we plan to cover about 600 miles. If weather doesn't slow us down, this will be the most miles covered in one day yet. We are feeling the push to get home. The 600 miles should put us near Little Rock, Arkansas.

Rick sent us an email today. He is feeling much better. His insurance declared his motorcycle a total loss and he has already picked up his new 2007 Harley-Davidson Ultra Classic in Cobalt Blue!! He sent us a picture of it!!!!

Day Eleven - Santa Fe again

I slept in a little this morning but made sure that I was up early enough to update yesterday's blog posts and get ready for my doctor's appointment. I updated the blog because I had forgotten to download a couple of pictures that I wanted to add. Step back a day and you can see the updates for Day Ten.

Wayne picked me up and we arrived at the doctor's office in time to provide insurance information and fill out one of those forms that asks about all of your habits and complete medical history back to the womb. The doctor is a character as well as being a friend of my brother. We had a very enjoyable conversation that actually lasted longer than the exam. The bottom line is that I have some sort of viral bronchitis. All he could do is give me a prescripton for some non-narcotic pills that may help with the cough. Other than that, this thing just has to run its course.

We dropped off the prescription at Walgreens and went by the Harley dealership. My crash bars were bent up on Pike's Peak and I was concerned that, having been bent, the structual integrity of the bars may not be 100%. They are there to give you protection (field tested on Pike's Peak) and I wanted no less than all of the protection that I could have. Also, because the bar was twisted, the highway pegs are not aligned and I noticed that it was not comftorable using them on the ride from Colorado Springs to Santa Fe. The service manager said that he would be happy to look at the damage if I could bring my bike by.

Wayne and I went back to the hotel where Mark and I packed up another bunch of stuff to UPS back home. Mark and I got on our bikes and followed Wayne back to the Harley shop. The service manager looked at my bike and said that he could put new crash bars on in about an hour and that he would switch over the highway pegs at no charge. I had him write the repair order. While I was in the back with the service personnel, Mark went to the parts counter and purchased a new CB antenna for his bike. Somewhere along the road it just disappeared from the back of his bike!

We left both bikes there and then went to the UPS store and shipped our stuff home. The next stop was the Sprint phone store because Mark's phone had died and he needed to purchase another one.

Carol and the kids met us at a chinese buffet restaurant in the same shopping center as the Sprint store. Wayne treated us and we had a good and filling lunch.

After lunch we said good-bye to Carol & the kids and then Wayne, Mark, and I went back to the Harley store. My bike was ready, so we started back to the hotel just in time for a torrential downpour. We were in t-shirts and jeans. Our rain suits were in the hotel room. It rained so hard that we could barely see. Not only that, but Santa Fe's storm drain system is not engineered to handle the amount of rain that they are getting this year. We rode through streets flooded with over a foot of water!! We were riding fairly slowly...I didn't want to bend up my new crash bars in the first three minutes that I had them. Other people did not seem to understand why we were riding so slowly and were rushing past us at speeds that were unsafe for them and us. We were drenched not only by the pouring rain, but by waves of water that seemed to rival some surfing competitions that I have seen on TV. Sorry, but I was unable to get any pictures!! This was not very relaxing. We arrived totally drenched back at the hotel. We got out of our wet clothes and put them in bags to take back to Wayne's to wash yet another load of clothes.

On the way to Wayne's house we picked up my prescription and then stopped by the fire station. Wayne is a volunteer fireman and he treated us to a tour.



My brother is a flight attendent with American Airlines. He flies the Chicago to London and other countries in Europe. Every time he travels he takes a baseball type hat has the fire station's information on it. He has an opportunity to run into a lot of people so he tries to get pictures of famous folks posing with or wearing the hat. No one in my family has ever met a stranger. We are all a little gregarious. Anyway, there is a wall of photos in the fire house that has folks posing with "the hat".
I am sure that I have forgotten some, but here is a partial list:

Bill Clinton
Paris Hilton
The guy that plays Kramer on Seinfeld (I forgot his name)
Holly Hunter
Bill Idol (he and Wayne are friends from way back)
Grace Slick (from The Jefferson Airplane rock group)
The actress who played the teenage girl on the original Brady Bunch TV show.
Matthew Perry (Chandler Bing on the Friends TV show)

We locked up the fire house (it is all volunteer, and we were the only ones there) and went to Wayne's house. We washed closed, visited, got carry out pizza and finally just relaxed. Wayne and his younger son Austin took Mark and I back to the hotel. We explained the motorcycles to Austin and he was very interested and attentive. He was a little too timid to sit on one, but you could tell that he thought that they were cool.

Tomorrow we leave Santa Fe and head southeast on route 285 to Roswell, NM. After a brief stop at the Harley store will will proceed northeast to Amarillo, TX. Hopefully our day here in Santa Fe will have taken some of the rain out of the picture for us. We made reservations at a La Quinta near the airport in Amarillo. It is also only a few blocks from the Harley shop there. Guess where we are going.

It was great to take a day and visit with my Brother and his family. Our Mom, other brother, and sister all live on the gulf coast and I have not seen Wayne since hurricane Katrina when we all showed up to help my Mom and sister.

We have traveled 3,473 miles so far and have more than 2000 to go. Because we have had two "days off" (today and the day that Rick crashed) we may have to alter our homeward route in the interests of time. I suspect that we may cut out jog over to Asheville, NC and the trip up the Blue Ridge Parkway. We will probably take Interstate 81 home from Knoxville, TN. Maybe one day there will be a Blue Ridge Parkway blog.

Day Ten - Santa Fe

This morning our mission was to recover our bikes from Pike's Peak. We got up at 0430 and showered, shaved, and packed all of our gear. The cab was due to arrive at 0530. As scheduled, the cab arrived on time and we had to explain to a 20 year resident of Colorado Springs how to get to Pike's Peak! When we got there the ranger station was closed so we sent the cab home and waited for the appropriate personnel to arrive. The ranger who arrived first was actually the one who attempted to escort us down the mountain yesterday. He was a really nice guy and informed us that another ranger would be taking us up to our bikes. Eventually, we got our ride up to the bikes and the ranger went ahead to the summit to check on things there. We were left to attempt to start our bikes. Mark's bike with the newer fuel injection system was not too difficult to start. Mine was another story. It took quite a while to get it started, and then it did not like the thin atmosphere at our elevation. While on the way up with the ranger we noticed that there were several pieces of machinery grading the way up and down the mountain. We decided that our best move would be to start the motorcycles and take them to the summit. There we could get coffee, pastries, soft drinks, and whatever. This would be preferencial to just sitting on the side of the road doing nothing until the grading was completed below. Besides, we still had really not seen the view from the summit yet!

Our ride up to the summit from the parking place the night before was awe inspring. I knew that we had experienced a miracle the previous day, but I did not realize just how much of one was bestowed upon us. The drive up to the summit and the inspection of the road showed us just how dangerous the road was from the day before.

You know you are loved when the living God of the universise reaches down and holds you in his hands to protect you! I praise this name, his love, his grace, and his Kingdom.!


The way down was dry, but still very tedious.We at least saw some wildlife... a baby elk!














We headed down Interstate 25 towards Santa Fe, our next stop. There were thunder showers everywhere. We got caught in a couple of torrential downpours and a few that had some small hail. The road and scenery was beautiful. I called Wayne (my brother) from Las Vegas, NM and made arrangements to rendevous with him.


Wayne met us just off of Interstate 25 in Santa Fe. He led us to our hotel where we checked in and cleaned up. We had dinner at a small tavern. After eating we went to Wayne's home and had a great visit with the whole family: Wayne, Carol, Denver, Austin, and London (his children). Carol, Wayne's wife, was very gracious and we had a wonderful time.








I have had a bad cough for about 6 weeks, so Wayne made me an appointment with his GP for 0900 tomorrow morning. We have all but decided to spend an extra day in Santa Fe with Wayne, Carol, and kids to let some of the bad weather pass. We will give it another day and see if we can avoid the rain. Besides, we are still looking for a day to relax!! Every time that we think we are going to have a relaxing day, we either fall down a mountain on our motorcycles, or have a mechanical problem, or fight really scary weather. I need a day off from my day off!!

The next stop is Roswell, NM ! I am looking forward to this stop, but I will also enjoy a day to relax with Wayne and Carol & kids. If we leave Santa Fe on Wednesday morning, that still gives us four days to get home. That should be enough.

Day Nine -Colorado Springs

We needed a day to sleep in and this was it. We got up around 10:00 am and had breakfast. We packed up and headed south to Colorado Springs. It was a short ride, compared to the rides that we have been taking! We went through Denver and headed south out of town.

Castle Rock is kind of neat and has a whole community built around it. The ride from Denver to Colorado Springs only took about an hour and a half. Just north of Colorado Springs I noticed that in front of the Air Force Academy they have a B-52! It looks like it is elevated (on stands) but it is hard to tell from the road. I wasn't able to get a picture.

We were really looking forward to taking the bikes up Pike's Peak while we were here, so we checked into the Holiday Inn Express by the airport in Colorado Springs, threw our bags in the room and headed for the big rock.

The ride up was a little overcast but still beautiful. Because there are so many twists and turns in the road we were unable to take a lot of pictures. About two miles from the summit A cloud rolled over the mountain, the temperature plumeted, and it started hailing. By this time there were cars in front of us, cars behind us, and nowhere to stop and turn around anyway! We were committed to continuing to the top!

This is a picture of our bikes at the summit of Pikes Peak, 14100 feet and sleet. About the time we got here there were lightning strikes at the summit and park personnel suggested that everyone stay inside for a while until that part of the storm passed.








We went inside for about 20 minutes until they said that the lightning danger had passed. There is a cog train that goes up Pike's Peak and unloads at the visitor center. I was prepared to leave our bikes at the summit and ride the train down. I asked a park ranger if that would be OK. He said that there was no way that we could leave our motorcycles at the summit! He said that we had to take them down!

He said that we did not have a choice. Another park ranger followed us and he was followed by some other folks who were making their way down the mountain. The sleet was not only slipery, but hid the irregularities in the dirt road and we only got about a mile and a half before Mark and I had both dumped our bikes a couple of times.





We decided that we were just not going to go any further! A nice woman with her two children in the car offered to drive us all the way to our hotel. We managed to get the bikes to a pull-over area and parked them.















We were sure thankful that someone as kind as this woman was there to help us. Mark sat in the front seat to give her directions to the hotel and I sat in the back with her 11 year old daughter and 10 year old son. They fought and were loud the whole way, but I was glad to be getting off of the mountain. The park ranger at the base of Pike's Peak told us that if we got there at 0630 tomorrow morning, that we could get a ride to our bikes with the first ranger that goes up to check the road conditions. We have ordered a taxi for 0530 tomorrow morning and our intention is to go and pick up our bikes, come back to the hotel for breakfast, and then head to Santa Fe.

I did a lot of praying at the summit. Someone showed up to help us get down in one piece....our bikes are not functionally damaged....and we have a plan for recovery in the morning.

Thank You!

I wish that I had been taking better notes....I could write a book.

Day Eight - Estes Park

We got up and out early to make our 0800 appointment at Thunder Mountain Harley-Davidson. This dealership is amazing! It is the largest HD dealer in Colorado and the fourth largest in the United States. At a few minutes before 0800, we were #3 and #4 in line. We both requested 2500 mile services which includes oil and filter change and adjustment of many other items. Mark requested that they check his front brake in that it was beginning to feel a little strange.



We settled in to wait for the bikes to be finished so that we could ride to Rocky Mountain National Park. The mechanic and service manager came to confer with Mark and informed him that someone had put the wrong type of brake fluid in his front brake system. The brake line would have to be replaced and he master cylinder rebuilt! This is Saturday and they do not have all of the parts, but they can get them from another dealer in a few hours. They assured us that the bike would be ready by the close of business.

Mark decided that he was not interested in just hanging around the HD store all day, he rented a bike and we were on our way to the park. At least the rental agent at Thunder Mountain gave him a reduced price due to the situation.

We rode west on route 34 and through Big Thompson Canyon. It had sheer rock walls right next to the road with a stream on the other side. It was beautiful. At the end of this run, we came to the town of Estes Park, which is the gateway to the Rocky Mountain National Park. We had hit intermittent sprinkles up to this point, but now it was attempting to rain for real! We stopped and put on our rain gear and continued to the entrance of the park.


Due to weather conditions, road conditions, traffic, and needing to be back at the HD dealership before closing, we just rode to the top of the first mountain. This was far above the tree line at about 13,500 feet. My bike protested in the thin air, but just ran rough and did not cut out.




We came back down the mountain, back to Estes Park where we had a quick lunch of chili and cornbread. After eating we drove back through Big Thompson Canyon and to the HD dealership. Mark turned in the rental while I checked in the service department for his bike. It turns out that they had to fabricate a few pieces and connectors and they would not be finished with the bike until about 30 to 45 minutes after closing. To their credit, they stayed as long as it took to finish the job. The expense of this work is probably 5 to 6 times what just the 2500 mile service would have been.

We rode back to the hotel in heavy traffic and were late in meeting Mark's friend for dinner. He was waiting for us and we went to an Italian restaurant and had a good meal. By the time we got back to the room, it was after midnight. This was supposed to be our day to relax. Oh well, we did get to see some beautiful scenery.

Day Seven - Denver

The first part of the day brought us to some more beautiful scenery. It is hard to explain just what it feels like to be in the middle of all of this. The only thing that I can come up with is "Everywhere we go is the most beautiful place we've been". I don't know if that makes any sense, but it is wonderful to see our Creator in his creation.


We got up early and left Hot Springs to take route 385 north to Deadwood and Spearfish. This took us through parts of the Black Hills National Forrest. The speed in the park is 45 miles per hour and they have a warning sign below the speed limit that says "LARGE WILDLIFE ON ROAD". There were bison everywhere! We watched them for a while at several locations and took a few pictures. At one point while I was taking pictures of bison, I heard a "chirping". My bike was still running and I became concerned that something was wrong/loose/whatever. I turned it off and still heard the chirping! Looking over I saw about 100 holes and mounds between me and the bison and most had prarie dogs sticking out of them barking at me! I tried to get a picture, but I guess that they are camera shy!
The signs also warned not to approach the bison. Evidently they do not have very accomodating personalities and will take pleasure in stomping you into mush. Where they were a safe distance from the road, or where there was some physical barrier between us and them (hill, guardrail, etc) we turned off the bikes and took pictures. In situations where they looked as if they could pay us a visit rapidly, we kept the bikes running and took pictures while still saddled up. The park was beautiful. After leaving the bison, we continued northward on route 385 to Deadwood. There were almost as many bikes there as we saw in Sturgis. Our goal was to find a UPS store so that we could ship a bunch of stuff home. It was too much of a zoo in Deadwood to even look for somethng, so we continued on to Spearfish. There was a UPS store in Spearfish and we were able to lighten our load considerably.

From the UPS store we took route 14a which winds around Spearfish Canyon. There are 300 to 400 foot high rock outcroppings right next to the road. The route has many twists and turns and is a lot of fun to ride.










About half way through the canyon road, we stopped to have breakfast. It was kind of expensive, but you could not beat the setting.



I had originally scheduled oil change and filter services for all three bikes about a month ago at Thunder Mountain Harley-Davidson in Loveland, Colorado. I tried to call them after breakfast and let them know that Rick's appointment needed to be cancelled. I couldn't get cell phone coverage, so that would have to wait.

We continued on the canyon road until we came to Cheyenne Crossing, were we turned southwest on route 85. By accident, we saw the Crazy Horse monument from that route. It was several miles away, but we could clearly see the head. Actually, the head is all that is completed. They sort of ran out of money and are scrambling to find anyone who cares enough about it to contribute dollars to continue with the rock sculpture.

This has been such a wonderful trip for scenery and the variety of topography and scale. Remember what I said earlier about "Everywhere we go is the most beautiful place we've been"? Well you know what happens when you make a statement like that.....you usually wind up eating it in short order. That is exactly what happened. Route 85 southwest took us to Wyoming. Almost as soon as we crossed the state line near Buckhorn, WY, everything changed. Eastern Wyoming is a furnace this time of year. We had 100+ degree temperatures with very strong crosswinds. No sooner would I get the bike leaned over to deal with the crosswinds, they would change directions and I would have to overadjust to allow for the change of direction. It was a constant fight. It is kind of like trying to ride a pogo stick on the beach during a nuclear attack.
Because of the winds, it wasn't safe to take pictures. Not that there was anything to see. It was flat with no interesting topography.

My AAA map indicates that the area is pretty desolate, so we gassed up more frequently than usual. We did not want to run out of gas here! We got gas in Lusk, WY and the gas station was justs full of bikers. It was kind of funny. When it is very hot it is common to see cows all huddled under the sole tree in a field. At the gas station, bikers were occupying every piece of shade under the canopy.

We were burning up, but it wasn't over yet. By the time we got to Torrington, we hit a dust/dirt/sand storm. Visibility was at least 20% down and it was a question of how many times you can blink and still be able to see where you are going. We would have stopped, but it didn't look like it was going to be ending anytime soon. Fortunately, we rode out of it in about 7 to 10 miles.

We spit grit for several miles and then received some cloud cover that helped with the heat. We could see rain all around us. It seemed as if it was about 5 to 10 miles away. We always seemed to thread our way around it. We finally arrived at Cheyenne, WY and were in drastic need of a rest. We found an Outback Steakhouse and took an hour or so to eat, relax, and recharge.


Continuing south on Interstate 25, we could see the Rocky Mountains just before we crossed the state line into Colorado. The wind had died down and the temperature was several degrees cooler. It was almost as if Wyoming just didn't like us.

We continued to Louisville, CO where we had a room reserved for two nights. We have to get up early tomorrow morning ( hahaha....by my watch it is already 0200 in the morning....eastern time ) and get our bikes serviced about 50 miles north of here.

This has been one of our most challenging days. We have spent 12+ hours on the road and have traveled over 500 miles in blistering heat, blast furnace winds, and finally the dark of evening not knowing where to find the hotel that had our reservation. We have two nights here and will try and take it easy a little. We need to save our energy for New Mexico, Texas, and Oklahoma. I suspect that we don't know what heat is yet!!

I am very tired and need to get to bed before it is time to get up and get the bikes serviced.

Day Six - Thursday

Because of Rick's accident and the delays associated with it, I have forgotten to update the number of miles traveled on our journey. So....it is about 1130 pm on Thursday and we have traveled 2201 miles. That has included our actual trip to Sturgis today.

The ride to Sturgis from our hotel in Hot Springs is almost 85 miles. So it is just like going to work for me! The scenery was beautiful. Rolling hills and areas that have viscious crosswinds tend to keep you alert. Eighty miles per hour is slow to these folks out here. This is probably one of those places where distance is measured in time and not in miles. Originally, we had wanted to spend two nights and three full days in the Sturgis area. Since we are a day behind, we have to cram a lot of stuff into a short period of time.

The first thing we did in Sturgis was find a place to eat breakfast. After that we took a few minutes to take pictures of Main Street and all of the bikes. Our next quest was for t-shirts and whatever other stuff we could find to attempt to max out our credit cards. We were only able to spend about three hours in Sturgis. It was a perfect example of "been there, done that, got the t-shirt".









Motorcycles, motorcycles, and more motorcycles. You would think that someone arranged for these 525,000 people to all be here at the same time!!

Before leaving Sturgis, Mark and I found out where the hospital was located just in case Rick wants to come out here with us again. hahahaha













Our next stop after leaving Sturgis was Black Hills Harley-Davidson in Rapid City. This place was almost a busy as Sturgis! They had numerous vendors selling everything from exhaust pipes to gel-pack seat cushions to all sorts of trinkets and patches. This is also a full service Harley dealer and they had every kind of

service available. Really a pretty impressive operation. There was also all sorts of food being cooked and served. We looked around and spent a little more money here and then headed for Mount Rushmore.

Mount Rushmore was very impressive, but it was hard to get close enough to take a good picture with the amount of zoom that I have on my little travel camera. The visitor center charged eight dollars to park....just seemed like a lot to go and take a few pictures. We drove past the monument and found an area to get a good profile of George Washington.























After seeing Rushmore, we found an air conditioned place to eat. The near 100 degree heat was intensified by the slow driving and heavy traffic.

After eating, we rode back to the hotel to relax for a few moments and go through our stuff. We have now successfully acquired more stuff than we can carry on our bikes. That means that we will have to find a UPS store tomorrow and send a bunch of stuff back home.

We went out to eat at a steak house, came back to the hotel and spent probably an hour in the pool and hot tub. This was a relaxing end to an enjoyable but hot day.

Tomorrow we plan to drive up to Spearfish and Deadwood to take a scenic drive that is recognized as one of the most beautiful in the area. After that, we will be heading south into Wyoming with our Friday night destination of a hotel near Boulder, CO.