Day 2 continued . The Joys of 170.

We gassed up in Study Butte.  Is that where the grumpy cash register guy was? havin more than 5 customers in a ten minute stretch was bustin his butt and he was quite vocal about it.  A couple Harley riders warned us about the 3 miles of construction on 170 so we knew something was coming.  We waited our turn to take the one lane and first it was a bit bumpy.  Then we got to a bit where the steam roller hadn't packed it down yet.  The fellows on their mighty steeds were feeling a little squirrelly at 15 mph.  Heck i was feeling the squirrelly's at 110 on I-90 so this kind of squirelly was makin me laugh.  i took the lead for a short spell cause the concours didn't seem to mind.  I gave up the lead as soon as it turned to pavement and for good reason.

One of the first corners that stick in my mind was a steep rise to a fall away, slightly off camber right hander that starts to 's' back to the left before you even get to the bottom of it.  if i hadn't seen the helmet of guy in front of me disappear to the right i might have been hosed.  Once i saw what kind of treachery this road throws at ya, I planned conservatively for it.  there weren't too many more scary ones though.  most 20mph corners were 40's and most 30mph were 55 or 60's.

this picture is maybe from the halfway point? i kept bumping my camera off auto exposure so some pics didn't turn out.  [Greg and Jason]

bout 2 miles before this picture was taken, i didn't wave to a harley guy as he went by.  which is very unusual for me.  the extenuating circumstance being he was [just barely] on my side of the double yellow. 

beautiful

self portrait

my bike and my next bike???

brian and jason

after this it flattens out with a series of whoopty-do's some of which can seperate your butt from the seat of your bike if your not careful.  next stop presidio where a couple of the guys spent 20+ minutes shooting the bull with the local sheriff.  he was supposed to be buying his wife a hamburger but had too much fun talking to us.  literally this is what happend.  i'm not trying to write a silly story about getting a ticket.  that's one constable that likes to shoot the bull, i tell ya.

it was now 6:30pm? and the dining room in Ft. Davis closed at 9pm. 80 miles a way.  67 is as straight on the ground as it is on the map.  This caused the mighty zzr's to do what they do best.  The concours acheived a new land speed record due to me realizing transferring my weight forward made the squirrely go away.  I still couldn't have caught them if not for the border patrol checkpoint.

took a pic of the Marfa courthouse.  It was glowing orange but the camera didn't quite capture the glow.  guess i was on the wrong side.  Right around marfa was when the new seat and sheepskin started givin me the monkey butt.  If it can go 12 hours every day i guess i can't complain.

 the zzr guys commented how cold it got when the sun went down.  replied the concours guy, "Gee.  I didn't notice"  ;-)

got to the Limpia hotel and they upgraded Chris to a double for free so i didn't have to sleep in the street.  We then headed to the resteraunt limpia where i ordered equal $ amounts of food and drink.  both were pretty good.  [the drink was a little expensive but its the only bar in the county].  Chris proceeded to try to give the waitress a hard time but she was used to it.  it livened up the meal a bit.

The suite they gave us was nicer than my house.   I recommend it.  A pleasant experience.  I parked at the curb, Chris parked on the sidewalk.

Chris.  amazing a guy with such squinty eyes can ride so fast.

DAY 3

Morning roll out.  The front of the hotel.   Greg warming up the vfr.

Brian warming up the zzr

Greg and Chris are into bike cleanliness so this crusty shot ought to go over pretty good.

and a shot of a little peg stop grindage on the concours.  look real close you can almost see it!.

    This mornings ride was up the hill to the Mcdonald Observatory.  Excellent road.  There is a loop that goes around but someone knew the backside of the loop was pretty flat and not near as good as the road up to the observatory. we pulled in in a nice tight formation for once.

they said open at 9. but didn't open till 9:10.  we killed some time  talking to 2 guys on a goldwing and vfr. 

mcdonald observatory.  been there, done that, bought the t-shirt.  [on sale closeout for $10.95]

we went to the end of the fun side and turned around and came back down the fun side.  this is when i decided to put the camera in video mode.  when i find a place to host it i'll get it up.  its a pass in review. 

back down to the Limpia hotel for 'elevensies' [late breakfast for those who aren't Lord of the rings nerds]

Good thing there are a lot of honest people in this world.  This was about the 4th time on this trip i walked away from my bike with the key in  the ignition.

the waitress.  She was a good sport. engaged to be married, graduating college, just a regular ball o' fire.  not the best pic of her.  Chris had no luck with his attempts to seduce this one, but he can always go back in 3 years when her little sister 's legal.

Had a bagel with ham and cream cheese.  Shook everybody hands and bolted.  They had decided they wanted to sample the mexican culture one more time so they only had a 3-4 hour day ahead of them.  As i ate my bagel my grampa was retrieving my dog from the vets.  that meant i had to be home in time for the next walk.  420 miles to go.

118 to alpine was a nice clean road.  not too exciting.  the neat part was watching the tarantula's crossing the road.  tried not to hit any of them.  90 from Alpine to Marathon was strange because the were running the Marathon Marathon.   The main crowd must have already finished.  Most people i saw were walking.  A few bouncing jogging bra's in the bunch.  No time to stop and ogle.  had to get home to the pup. 

When I got to marathon, there were 6 sheriffs cars and a fire truck at the finish line where we had parked the bikes the day before.  Doing the math- 6 sheriff cars in town equals none on the road out of town.  Good for me!  I made it from Ft. Davis to Del Rio in 3 hours.  Mapquest said 4 hours and 2 minutes. Ha!

even stopped for a few windmill pictures for grampa

 When i got to bracketville for gas, I decided to stay on 90 instead of exactly retracing my route.  I figured I'd make this last stop of the trip the same as the first stop of the trip, and took a leak in the weeds even though the sac-n-pac had a restroom 100 feet away.  Also changed out of my long sleeve shirt as it had gotten warm.

sac-n-pac weeds

Figured i run up 83 from Uvalde and hit 337 and retrace my path from there.  83 ran nice and fast but before i got to leakey[337], I saw a sign saying Utopia 15 miles.  I knew Utopia was closer to 470 than leakey so i took it. 

the view of the Frio river from the 1050 bridge.   I'm always amazed by clear water.  I should have stopped more and taken pics of the other streams.

 It was 1050 going past Garner State Park.  Really great road.   I saw bicyclists in the first 1/2 mile.  I kept it in my head there may be more but I didn't see any.  Great little windy road maybe 12 feet wide.  saw other motorcyclists but only one other car.  Some kamikazee bug made it over the windshield, through the visor and hit the frame of my glasses.  and Damn did that bug smell funky.  Guess it was payback for the 1000 friends of his i took out.

traffic commenced to suck when i got to Bandera.  Seems all the yuppie city folk want to get a taste of Texas by packing themselves into a small town.  which is actually doing the opposite- making the country texans get a taste of yuppie city gridlock.  Was stuck in a train of cages until the other side of boerne. and then it was home free.   1338 miles in 2 days and 5 hours.

cracked a couple of these,

plugged the digital camera into the tv and put on a slide show for grampa.

 The pup didn't show any great love cause she remembered i was the jerk that sent her to the vets in the first place.  I know she loves me.

What did i learn? 

- concours hauls ass.

- concours could comfortably tour in 40-50 degree weather.

- olympia windtex gloves are too friggin hot for 50 degrees and above.

- a 2-3 day trip without camping can be done without saddle bags. a tank and tail bag would have been enough.  didn't use any of the things i packed in the saddle bags.

- alpinestar web boots are great boots.  could feel a little vibration of the footpegs but it didn't fatigue or affect my feet.

- dont forget the sunscreen even if only 3 inches of skin are showing.

- i should travel with a shock pump to adjust the rear suspension as needed.

- Brian, Greg, Jason, Chris are a decent bunch of guys.  maybe even great bunch.  have to do further research.

- i should stop tryin to read a map at 90mph.

and a bunch of other things i'll remember later.