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.

Share The Road - On the road - Day 8

DAY 8
SHOW LOW to QUEMADO (NM)
Total distance: 96 miles

Crossed the state line in to New Mexico today. Hills were much less today. One of the big challenges was the crosswinds. On several of the downhills (hit a top speed of 48.2 today!) the winds would gust suddenly and nearly blow me off my bike. The weather cooled a bit. We rode consistently at 6000-7500 feet. Tomorrow we get over 8000, I think. I noticed I got more sun than I did the last couple of rides in hotter weather. The sun may be more intense at this altitude than I realized. I have to make sure to reapply the sunblock mid-morning.

Stopped to do our laundry along the way this morning in Springerville (about 2.5 hours into our ride). We simply don’t have time to plan the laundry -- too many intangibles with the trip. When we see the laundrymat, we gotta be on it. We have only four riding uniforms apiece so that means doing our dirties once every couple of days.

I took my first fall off the bike today. Thankfully, I was slowing to a stop and only fell onto some dirt and brush. Felt silly and made a little production out of my silliness until I looked around and saw no one was looking. If a kook falls on the side of the road and no one pays attention to his shenanigans, did he really fall?

We rolled into Quemado a little later in the afternoon. This place is a seriously small town. We had a good meal at a little place called, “Chuck Wagon” (this is funny -- click here to see what the Chuck Wagon is now...). I had a delicious bean and cheese burrito with green chile and some Spanish rice. That’ll do ‘er!

We’re going to camp tonight at Lake Quemado -- a good choice as the other option was to stay behind Ray’s -- not a store, but a man’s house. Ray apparently is “the man” in Quemado. Though it was a nice offer, getting out to a campsite sounds even better. Looks like it might even be a national forest (Apache). We’re going to cookout on the grill tonight -- first time we’ll have broken it out. That’ll be fun. Maybe I’ll even pitch the tent and blow up the airbed -- give myself a little extra space.

We’ll probably have to get up around 3:30 to get on the road by 5:00 as we have to account for the 14 mile RV ride back to town.

DOWN AT LAKE QUEMADO

Wow. It’s absolutely gorgeous. Chris and Gary were bold enough to swim in the chilly waters. I woosed out -- for one because of the cold, for two because of my occasional reaction to bacteria in stagnant water (like lakes). I get rashes and sometimes have sinus inflamation -- neither of which I want to deal with at all right now.

It’s very peaceful right now. Chris and Geoff is sleeping. Geoff got ill this afternoon and is hopefully sleeping off his stomach pain. Gary is updating his journal. I’m obviously doing mine. I’m also anticipating the sunset with three different cameras:

My 3-chip video
My 35 mm still camera -- it’s first time out on this trip -- can’t wait to see what it will do
and the digi still -- always great to know right away if what I’m doing has a shot. It takes some great pictures to (as I hope you’ve seen on the website).

I also got the video I’ve been shooting from my Samsung Sports Cam to upload to iMovie (Apple’s editing software that comes with the computer). It’s a far cry from Final Cut Pro, but it will do on the road. It also is made to upload easily to homepage -- so I hope to have a great video for you all to see very soon.

I set up the tent for myself tonight -- something I’ve been looking forward to. This way I can get to bed when I’m ready -- nice. Also, we’re going to be cooking out on the grill tonight. That will be tasty. Off to set up the grill then take some pics.