Share the Road - On the road - Day #9

DAY 9 104 miles - Quemado to Socarro, NM ICE COLD for our start. No joke. The first time we had to don our cold weather gear. 52 degrees and with the wind chill (whatever speed we were travelling at) -- who knows? I felt like I was peddling through mud for the first hour - hour-and-a-half. There were some beautiful sights. Much of the territory reminded me of Wyoming/Colorado -- wide open plains. We went through probably the most beautiful forest area we’ve been through yet early on in the day (just east of Datil). Not long after that, we ran into the VLA (Very Large Array). Okay, zero points credit for the name, but about 1 million for the cool factor on these huge satellite dishes that work together (27 in all) to bring the deepest space images possible to earth. They were used in the movie, “Contact” (one of my favorites). We had many stops -- no real drama through the first 90 miles, though my butt is really beginning to ache. I have to start in with the corn starch and neosporin. At mile 90 I got my latest flat tire. That’s two, with three tubes technically (as the first flat cost me two tubes for some reason). This time I found the culprit -- a little thorn of some sort. A nice man named Roland pulled off to the side of the road to ask if I was okay. Unfortunately, in my mind, my first thought was, I hope this guy isn’t going to fuck with me. He didn’t. He stuck around and we talked bikes ‘til Gary and I got the new tube in. I kept it slow down the last hill (too bad as I would have really liked to have flown down that bad boy). We had an amazing dinner in Socorro -- can’t remember the name of the place, but it was amazing: Hummus and pita bread, guacamole and blue corn chips, spinach salad with roasted red peppers and a calzone with olives, spinach and ricotta. I’ve developed a real affinity (or reconnection) with soda water and lime, too -- great on the stomach. Afterward we hit WalMart for our goods (those stranglers of small business America) and went back to the RV park to find a party at the pool for the 4th of July. Our host, Charlie (the owner of the park) had free food and drink. I’m thankful I don’t drink as I used to or I might have really put on a show. Actually, I had half of one beer on the third night of this trip and I couldn’t finish it. It sounded great -- it just didn’t go down well. Mind you, I’m a fan of the flavor of beer. It may be that my system is just running so clean and hot right now that it doesn’t deal witll with the alcohol. Dunno... Anywho, the party was fun and afterward, Charlie had the “greatest fireworks show ever” (that’s his description). It was basically a couple of bottle rockets and firecrackers and some kids running dangerously close to the pile of unused gun powder. Every once in a while, after lighting off an explosion, Charlie would yell, “Come on! Let’s here some enthusiasm” to the dozens of onlookers. I was too tired to do much but apologize to a little 6-year-old girl who I’d been teasing by the pool (she apparently thought I was pretty mean for continually and intentionally changing her name from “Missy” to...well, pretty much any other name you can think of). Her mom appreciated the apology and I got to sleep with a clear conscience. What a deal.