A Long Ride

Elena has been taking photos from the back seat for the last day and a half, and a lot of her shots really capture what it feels like to be riding. That's Pete up ahead.


We were up over 9000 feet elevation going over some of the mountain passes. This is near the top of Coronado Trail on State Road 180. It was such a cool relief from the scorching heat below.



There's a meadow behind the hotel in Springerville, Arizona with cows and a few horses. This must be the world's most laid-back horse. He got a good rubdown and muzzle-scratching from all of us, and I'm going to see if I can find a few carrots or apples for him this morning.

This is State Road 78, which connects SR 191 with SR 180 across the New Mexico - Arizona border. Click the photo for a big panorama.

This photo is close to the mental image I get when I hear the word "desert." Baking hot, high speed, radar traps, and roadside collections so funky you think you're hallucinating in the heat. After I took a few photos, the highway patrolman came over to chat. I wanted to know about his radar equipment, and he asked me about my trip. It was a funny conversation between two friendly adversaries.


We passed a terrible wreck yesterday morning, what looked like a head-on impact between a car and a motorcycle. One of them must have drifted over the centerline, and there were bits and pieces of both vehicles all over the road. It wouldn't have mattered in that wreck, but nobody in Arizona seems to wear helmets or gloves, let alone a set of leathers. This guy wasn't even wearing a shirt. He's not giving himself much of a chance to make a mistake, and he's riding a fast bike.

The last time I rode through the Rocky Mountains, I was surprised by just how big they are. They're on the same scale as the Alps I've seen in Switzerland and France. I promised myself I'd go back and explore some of the areas I missed. Well, I'm heading back... in two days I leave on a ten day ride through the southwest to Montrose, Colorado.

This time Elena is riding on the back seat, I'm riding with a group, and the destination is the annual Sport-Touring.net National Meet. The ride was organized by GTS_Rider, a Los Angeles-based rider known for organizing epic "mutual destination" tours. Mutual destination means we end up in the same place at night, but you can ride as fast or slow as you please, alone or with other riders. I'm happiest by myself on an empty road, so we'll see how this works out.

If you're here to read about my trip around the United States and Canada last Fall, you can click here. It's in chronological order there, so it's a bit easier to read from start to finish.