I Just Felt Like Riding

[hppants]

Still tuned in - and enjoying every minute of it.

The "scavenger hunt" story was indeed memorable. While I've never had that exact experience, like all of you I'm sure, I have had total strangers walk up to me and start a conversation. The bike and the transformer suit does this, I think. Some want to re-live their youth and share it with some one ("I had a motorcycle back in 1978...."). Others are fascinated with the idea ("Where ya going? Have you rode that thing all the way from Lou-see-anna?"). Still others have their own reasons, I'm sure. It's a part of the riding experience that I really like.

 

[Geezer]

Still tuned in - and enjoying every minute of it.
The "scavenger hunt" story was indeed memorable. While I've never had that exact experience, like all of you I'm sure, I have had total strangers walk up to me and start a conversation. The bike and the transformer suit does this, I think. Some want to re-live their youth and share it with some one ("I had a motorcycle back in 1978...."). Others are fascinated with the idea ("Where ya going? Have you rode that thing all the way from Lou-see-anna?"). Still others have their own reasons, I'm sure. It's a part of the riding experience that I really like.

The best is when a man comes up at a gas station and starts asking about the motorcycle and what it's like to be riding far from home, and in the middle of the conversation a woman comes up and drags him away. Poor guys.......

 

[BikerGeek99]

Monday, August 1, 2016.


Holy carp what a day yesterday was! Just … amazing.

But today is our ‘turning point.’ Today is the day where, well, this is the farthest west we’ll be. From now on, we’ll be heading back east towards home. I remember this day from our ride to the west coast in 2010. On that day, we were saying farewell to folks in Eureka, California, some of whom we hadn’t seen, since then, until this trip, and that feeling of melancholy that I felt then, and felt yesterday, kinda crept back in. Funny how that works when you are 1500+ miles from home and you feel melancholy aboot heading home.

When we got to our hotel last night, we realized that Arizona is three hours behind us back in Ohio, thanks to the whole Daylight Savings thing.

Great.

I REALLY do not adjust well to time changes.

So, of course, I woke up not knowing what the hell day it is (NOT a bad thing), and not knowing what the hell time it is (SONOFAMOTHERLESSGOAT).

But, we had some grub at the hotel and hit the road, heading back east.

When we were in Montrose, we spoke with AJ, AKA HotRodZilla, aboot where we may stay this night and, if nothing else, meet up for lunch. We’d decided to stay a bit east of him, so, after swapping texts with him and a chat on the phone as we were loading the bike, figured we’d meet up for lunch.

Cool!

The rain that greeted us last night was gone, and we had a nice, clear, crisp morning to start our ride. Where we live, if you’re heading west on an interstate, the signs say Indianapolis. Here? They say Los Angeles.



But we’re heading east.


Not a whole lot to say, initially.

As we headed east outta Flagstaff, we dropped in elevation, and that was the end of any cool temperature for the rest of the ride.




But when I was looking at what’s between Flagstaff and where we’re going, something did jump out at me and said, “GEEK! You gotta!”


Who am I to not listen to myself, eh?



Sooze and I have ridden bits of Route 66, our first jaunt in 2009, when we rode The Route from Tulsa to Chicago. We still wanna grab the rest, from Tulsa to the west coast, and we’ll git ‘er done eventually, but this was too close to pass up.

So, there is this one place, made kinda well-known thanks to some hacks in a band…



Winslow, Arizona. If you don’t know the reference, well, there’s something culturally wrong with you.



Yep, we went and stood on a corner in Winslow, Arizona.



No – we really did? See? Thanks to another ‘stander,’ we got our picture taken.



And, of course, SELFIE!



After spending something like eighty bucks on trash and trinkets in here….



We were back on our way.



LOTSA signs for this kinda stuff in this part of the country.






And then there is, of course, the scenery.



Lordy lordy, the scenery out here does not suck.



As I write this, looking back at these pictures, I’m still just incredibly thankful for the opportunity to have been able to experience this in the absolute best way possible – on a motorcycle, with Sooze.



Lookit the cars in the other lane – gives some perspective on how large that rock thingamajig is.

 

[BikerGeek99]

And that wasn’t the only one.






There is just some interesting stuff along the road that woulda been nice to have stopped at.



Before too much longer, we were in our next state – state number 45 for us, together, on a motorcycle!



Taking a break from the idiots on the slab, we took a quick stop for the usual reasons.



And then continued on our way. The sun was warming things up nicely.






Yep, kinda like in Kansas, the skies were getting a bit gnarly looking, but I was hoping that we would be able to slide in between these two gray clouds and ride through the clear sky in the middle.



TRAIN! More on this to come…



As much as I was hoping that we would slide in between any weather….



We saw some rather significant lightning fly across the sky, but we were not meant to dodge the showers today.


The rain we hit was pretty significant, but we’ve ridden through worse, so we just chugged through it. No big deal. It was actually kinda nice – the rain cooled things down a bit.

Briefly.

We, and the cagers that apparently had not seen rain since the 1800’s, made it through, and it once again warmed right back up.

These cool-looking rocks were along the road.










I hope the owner if this car is gonna do something fun, ‘cause I really see the potential in this thing!



And then….

 

[BikerGeek99]

We come over the crest of a hill, and I see an SUV in the median.

And I say to myself, “SELF! Huh. That’s an odd place to park an SUV. Even if you’re broken down.”

We get a bit closer.

There is someone in the driver’s seat.

And I say to myself, “SELF!”

And before I can say anything else to myself, I realize it’s a LEO.

Quick speedo check: 8 over. I am not the fastest, nor the slowest, compared to traffic around me.

We pass by.

The LEO immediately heads out from the median onto the road.

The thoughts going on in my helmet… “WTF? Really? I’m 8 over and I’m gonna get popped for a performance award? REALLY?”

I watch the mirrors. Nothing for a minute or two.

WHEW!

And then….

And that SUV comes up next to us. I was expecting <hoping?> he / she / Caitlyn Jenner would just move along.

But no.

So I look to me left.

And, there he is, AJ, AKA HotRodZilla, in his SUV Sheriff unit, window rolled down, laughing his ass off, giving us the ‘salute.’

Can’t say I will have ever been so relieved to see his goofy-assed mug.

With a couple of hang signals, I suggested he lead us to lunch, and away we went.

It was kinda cool having an escort.



So I slid in behind him.



And, let’s say, we made good time – it was funny passing cars that had passed us earlier, but we were 10 feet off the bumper of a Sheriff’s deputy – like they were standing still.



AJ led us to a really neat place in Albuquerque.



Kelly’s Brew Pub.



We were there mid- to late-afternoon, so there wasn’t much of a crowd. This place used to be a Ford dealer. As in, prolly back in the Henry Ford days. It is a REALLY neat place – our server was telling us aboot how the overhead doors were once to entry to the service bays…

Just cool as shit.



Good call, dork / AKA AJ.

As much as we woulda liked to have sampled their brews, we abstained, but the sammiches were fan-fookin-tastic!



Worst. Selfie. Ever.




For the record, I tried to pick up the check, but AJ knocked over my iced tea and grabbed the check, so, thanks again AJ, for the escort, the meal, the chit-chat, and for your service to your community.

But yer still a dork.
Dork.



More to come…

 

[FJRBandit]

Geeks and Dorks in the same ride report. Can't get much better than that!

Keep it coming, Geek. Good stuff!

 

[HotRodZilla]

Ok Geek, you never asked, so I didn't think about it. Those interesting "rocks" you saw were lava flow. That entire area from just east of Gallup to Albuquerque is made up of enormous lava beds with millions of tons of rock from eruptions. There are volcanos all over the place between Gallup and Albuquerque. It's not bad now, but a couple million years ago, it would have sucked living here.

I was glad it was a slow day and I didn't really have too much to do. That was a good lunch, and I'm glad you liked it. Kelly''s is cool on a weekend evening. Good beer, and a pretty good crowd keep it fun.

Keep it up, you're almost through Texas. Haha...

 

[wheatonFJR]

Great report!

 

[hppants]

I was right there with ya - "Damm it - he got a ticket with his Snooze on the back - crap!!!".

The punch line made me chuckle out loud!!

 

[petey]

Great stuff Geek, but I'm sure we have to thank Sooze for those great pics...

 

[BikerGeek99]

Great stuff Geek, but I'm sure we have to thank Sooze for those great pics...

Yep! After all, she is the Pillion Paparazzi.

 

[Burnspot]

What a fantastic RR Geek and Sooze, keep it up! Really enjoying the read and references to various things.

 

[BikerGeek99]

Our late lunch complete, AJ led us outta town.



There were some interesting alternatives to grass for yards here and there.



Back on the slab heading east, AJ eventually peeled off. I tooted the horns. AJ lit up the lights and siren on his cruiser which prolly resulted in someone in one of the cars around him having a heart attack. Showoff.

It was still pretty warm, but that’s what you get when you’re in New Mexico in August, eh?



The skies were once again getting dark and there was definitely rain in the area.



Pretty sure there is some rain coming down on the other side of that windmill.



Then we saw something really cool that we haven’t seen before.



Portions of rainbows up in the clouds! It was really cool to see – they were all over the place in the clouds. They were tough for Sooze get a picture of, but she done got it!



We were staying the night in Santa Rosa, New Mexico. When we told AJ aboot this, it turns out that’s where his brother lives. AJ called him and asked for recommendations for dinner, and one of the recommendations was just down the road from our hotel – perfect!

This was between the restaurant and the hotel.






Our fine dining destination for the evening. It’s been around for a while.



The margaritas were pretty tasty, but why do I look so damn serious? I got nothin’ here.



I had their blue corn enchiladas. They were OK. I’m kinda spoiled, though – there is a place back home that has awesome blue corn enchiladas. Suddenly I’m hungry for blue corn enchiladas…



Sooze had their famous beef tacos.



454 miles ridden today, saw some excellent scenery, didn’t get cold, had a couple of laughs and a great lunch with AJ… It was a great day!

 

[BikerGeek99]

Tuesday, August 2, 2016.

We did our usual – got up in the morning, grabbed a quick breakfast at the hotel continental breakfast, re-packed our crap, geared up and headed out before it got too hot, not that it would really matter.

One thing aboot old Route 66 – there are still remnants from when it was a bustling road.



And some newer ones.









We decided to take a little detour, and we headed south outta Santa Rosa.

Mother-in-law suite, New Mexico style.



The weather was utterly perfect. No wind. Traffic was damn near non-existent. The road was in terrific shape. Sight lines were in the miles. So, I let the FJR run for a while. I won’t say how fast we went, nor for how long, but, um, yeah… The ticket woulda been pricey.



We decided to head south to Roswell. You know – the UFO place.



Roswell is a helluva lot bigger than I was expecting.



It was 9:30 in the morning and already 87 degrees. We made a bee-line for the UFO Museum.







I got kind of a weird vibe so we took our helmets inside with us. The friendly staff let us stash our helmets and Sooze’s jacket behind the front desk. We paid our entrance fee (it was cheap - $5 each or so) and checked things out.






A classic movie. Not the one with Keanu, though.

 

[BikerGeek99]

These guys were hysterical. Every now and then, their heads would move… One of ‘em had a chest moving in and out like it was breathing…



SELFIE!!



And every now and then, the space ship would spin around, smoke machines did their thing, that cheesy 50’s space movie sound was piped in, and the aliens ‘spoke’ in their native language. It was pretty entertaining.






A few more pictures from the museum.






We hit the trash and trinkets shop for some crap that we cannot live without, and rolled out.






Before leaving town, we stopped at a post office just up the road to mail our hard-won crap to ourselves, and we stopped to gas up and to keep hydrated. By now it was 11:00 or so and 93 degrees. It was warm.

We were on US70, headed northeast, which led us through some small New Mexico towns.



LOOK! A Dollar Tree!!



And before too much longer, we were in Texas, state number 46 that Sooze and I have ridden in together! WOO-HOO!!



A better sign.



This stretch has a serious stench to it.



They say everything is bigger in Texas.



Lots of cattle yards through here, and boy howdy do they stink, at least to me.

 

[BikerGeek99]

TRAIN!



OK, big deal, right? It’s a train. Well, that’s true, however last year I started a new job which had me travelling a lot, and this particular railway was the first client I worked with. I spent the better part of four months at their corporate headquarters in Fort Worth, so, ya, it’s a geeky thing, but it’s OK – I am a geek.


There were LOTS of trains moving stuff around through here, with multiple tracks running parallel to the road.



TRAIN! I was trying to get the engineer / conductor / dude driving the train to hit his horns, but he either didn’t see me or just ignored me. The bastard.



I mentioned that there was quite a stench through there, and there was. The cattle yards were incredibly large, so I guess that’s the smell of beef being processed. So, yeah, to me, it stank to high hell. I would imagine that to the locals, it’s the smell of prosperity… Of jobs… Of wealth… I can respect that, but it still stank to high hell.

This is a rather well-known place. The Big Texan. We saw signs for it but didn’t go. Maybe next time.



It was hot. It was really hot. We were stopping significantly sooner than we normally would to make sure we stayed hydrated and to cool off as best we could, all things considered. So we high-tailed it to our hotel to get outta the heat.

We stayed in Amarillo, Texas.

Within walking distance to the hotel was a restaurant that, yes, it is a chain but, not, we do not have ‘em in Ohio. When I was going to Fort Worth all the time, this was one of my go-to places for dinner. I can honestly say that I never had an improperly cooked steak at these places – they are really consistent.

Mmm… Saltgrass Steakhouse…



I had their surf ‘n turf, which consisted of a ribeye (that was, once again, cooked perfectly), and BBQ bacon-wrapped stuffed shwimps… And a loaded tater…



Sooze had a steak as well but got some shwimps that were ruined due to adding coconut. Ick. She seemed to like it, though.



So, it was a fairly light day – right aboot 350 miles. But, it’s Tuesday and we’re planning on being home on Friday. And we live in Ohio. But we’re in Texas. So we’ve got some riding to do over the next few days. And there is no end in sight to this heat wave.

 

[BikerGeek99]

Wednesday, August 3, 2016.


Amarillo got some pretty heavy rain last night. Unfortunately, I was not able to park the bike under the overhang at the hotel, but my half-cover did the job instead.

Have I mentioned that changing time zones screws me up? Oy. We got a later start than we had planned on and it was already quite warm when we left the hotel, ran over to Target for more Icy Hot patches for my neck, and continued on our way east.

Lotsa these out here. Go figure.



Everything is, as they say, bigger in Texas.



Today is gonna be relatively light on pictures because, well, there just wasn’t as much interesting stuff, and we had miles to ride.



Traffic was kinda dumb. It took patience. At one point, it was pretty warm, and we were aboot ready for fuel, so we hopped off for a quick jaunt into a town along Route 66.



Once again, there is the old stuff on Route 66.



And the newer stuff. This re-done Conoco station was pretty cool in the blistering heat. We didn’t stop but I woulda liked to.



“Big Vern.” One of our neighbors at our old place was named Vern. I have a story or two aboot Vern…



Before much longer we crossed into Oklahoma. Sorry, Oklahoma, but you didn’t provide us with many photo ops, but there were a couple here and there.

Garth Brooks home town.



We made a fuel / hydration / bio / stretch break west of Oklahoma City. As we were hydrating, a couple of fellas rolled in on their Harley baggers. They were quite friendly and kinda funny – when asked where they left from, the one fella said, “Oklahoma City.” I was thinking to myself, “SELF! We are just west of OKC. Why are they only this far?” when one of the fellas held up his arm and said, “Yeah, we made it to our first gas stop and I realized I left my FitBit in the damn hotel room. So after a call to make sure they had it, we had to go back and get it. It was a gift from my daughter. I couldn’t just leave it.” Kinda speaks to that guy’s character, if you ask me. They lived in Charlotte, but that guy had a non-Charlotte accent. He was originally from Brooklyn. His commentary on a New Yorker living in Charlotte was entertaining. They were interested in Route 66 so, since we’ve got some ‘sperience, I offered up a few suggestions, including a suggestion that we would be taking, but that comes tomorrow. After watching the other fella look around for his glove that he managed to misplace in his first 45 seconds after parking, they continued on their way west, eventually to Sturgis.

We continued on our way east.

We saw either this truck, or one just like it, coming into Albuquerque. It’s loaded with bags of onions. This made us laugh. Why did it make us laugh? A friend of ours was caring for her father who was losing his marbles, bit by bit. (Her words, not mine.) For his career, he was a chef. One day, our friend gets home from work. And there is a 50-pound bag of onions that had been delivered. Her dad had ordered the 50-pound bag of onions because it came with one of those plastic onion saver thingamabobs. She was giving away onions to whoever would take ‘em for quite a while.

Like I said – losing his marbles, bit by bit.

One more quick story aboot him – he was, among other things, diabetic and both of his legs had been amputated. He had prosthetic legs. They put, I kid you not, return address labels on his legs in case he lost one in public. When he passed away, he was buried with his prosthetic legs. Our friend has said several times, “If one of those damned legs shows up, I swear…” Think aboot it.

Gallows humor, I guess, but still kinda funny.

Anyway. Yeah, onions.



Not much more to show you of Oklahoma.



And then we were in Missouri. Now it was hot AND humid.



We stayed in Springfield, Missouri. Whoda thunk that there are two hotels, in the same chain, on the same damned road, in Springfield? Once we made it to the correct hotel (my error, 100%), we realized we stayed at this same hotel when we did our Tulsa – to – Chicago Route 66 ride back in 2009.

We walked a mile or so down the road (it felt good to walk, even though it was kinda hot out) to another hotel, and ate at Houlihan’s. It was pretty damn good.

We had a tuna appetizer that was delicious.



Sooze had chicken.



I had scallops.



A tasty meal and a few local brews were just what we needed after 565 hot, Hot, HOT miles. At one point in Oklahoma, we saw a sign showing 100 degrees. I believe it. But, the next couple of days will be shorter, and we’re on target to be home on Friday.

 

[escapefjrtist]

Most excellent 'Geek, enjoying following y'all on the trek east!

--G

 

[BikerGeek99]

Thursday, August 4, 2016.


We were up and aboot at a decent hour, but even then, walking outside was like someone throwing a hot, wet blanket on you. That was when the whole “dry heat” difference out in the western states really hit me. Totally different experiences.

We’ve made this slog several times and know it well. If it hadn’t been so damn hot out, we woulda stopped at the Arch in St. Louis. But we didn’t really feel like walking around the arch in our gear, not to mention fighting traffic, so we decided that the Arch will be there for us for a future trip. We got close. Ish.



Amazingly enough, traffic going through St. Louis was not a complete utter cluster of fscks! That is a first!

Not many pictures from this leg. And, quite frankly, compared to what just say a day or two ago… The scenery don’t change much from Missouri to, oh, central Pennsylvania or so.

At a gas stop, we spied this. It had LED lights in the back and everything – it was kinda cool, in a hippy / hipster / all-you-damn-kids-get-offa-mydamn-lawn way.



Another place we’ll have to check out when the heat index isn’t high enough to cook the Thanksgiving turkey.



After the 500+ hot miles yesterday, the plan was to break up the bit home into small chunks. So, we got to our destination plenty early. We stayed in Litchfield, Illinois. This is our fourth time staying in Litchfield. The first time we stayed here was on the Route 66 ride I mentioned earlier. The times we’ve stayed here, we didn’t really have time to see some things, but today we had the time and there were a couple of things we wanted to check out.

Since the GenIII FJRs came out, I’ve been kinda eyeballing ‘em and after NAFO, I’m thinking a new bike is in my future. Just down the road, we stopped in a dealer that we had actually visited back in … 2010? Something like that.



They had this on the floor. Tempting…



This is out in their parking lot.






Just down the road is the Litchfield Museum & Route 66 Welcome Center. When were here last, in 2014, we peeked in the door but they close earlier than we normally get off the road, but they were open today!



This was parked outside. Schweet….



I’m pretty sure the folks in that Cadillac were Australian. They talk even funnier than Canadians, eh?

Anyhoo.

There is some cool stuff in the museum, and it’s free!



I really like the classic juke box.









We were surprised to see this – you see, the whole reason why we stay in Litchfield is because of … Food. Back in 2009, I had Route 66 Points of Interest (POIs) loaded into my GPS. One that came up with the Ariston Café. We tried it and, well, this is our fourth time staying in Litchfield because of it. In the museum, they have an old menu and pictures from the Ariston – cool!






This is the town and the place I told the dude from Brooklyn who lives in Charlotte aboot. I hope they made it.

 

[BikerGeek99]

Sooze and I are, among other things, musicians. It’s how we met – the company that we both worked for at the time has an orchestra that we were both members of. Otherwise, we kinda doubt that we would have met. Life. It’s funny sometimes.

Sooze plays a more modern version of one of these. And piano.



I play one of these. That has a slide. (I’ll give you a hint – what I play is called a trombone.)



We bought some trash ‘n trinkets and then moseyed to and checked in to our hotel. I made a quick libation run on the FJR and realized that the erl level eye-dee-10-tee light was on. It’s normally hidden behind my GPS. D’OH! I made a quick run down to that dealer, and the service dude topped me off. Not sure what the deal was… In the 75,000 miles I’ve put on the thing, that has never happened. But, we’ve been doing a lot of high-speed cruising, and at the time, the bike had 118,000 miles one it (we’re over 120,000 miles on ‘er as of today), so who knows. Time for a new one, eh?

After cooling off a bit, we walked to the Ariston.



We just love this place. It ain’t the fanciest of places, but there’s just something to it… It kinda reminds me of a place where my dad would take me to lunch when I went to work with him as a kid.



We sat in the same booth (pure luck of the draw) and had the same server as the last time. The dude (I can’t remember his name now… Johnny? Tommy? Something like that) knows the menu backward and forward.

Sooze had the spaghetti.



I had the tilapia special and a loaded spud.



And while we don’t usually have dessert, tonight we did, and it was tasty.



It was a short – only 265 miles – riding day, but it was a hot one, fo sho.