My week started with my street glide making noises that I couldnt tell were in my head, or not. Turns out, a cam chain guide fell off and rested in the bottom of my engine, so I took it in to get it fixed. That left me with a weekend to ride, and the untested fat boy in garage. It was time to see what this softail was made of. if it was destined to be an around the town bike that I end up bobbing and make into something worth looking at, or if I would bag it up a bit and make it into something that makes some miles.
So saturday morning I headed out around gunlock, and up towards rachel nevada. That was my goal anyway, to head out, have a couple of beers and lunch in rachel, and mabye see some terrain I hadnt ever seen in nevada.
My first stop was mountain meadow. I hadnt been here for a few years, and figured that it would be a good place to rest my ass and see what new things have been there in the way of monuments. Mountain meadow still holds controversy, as mormon settlers and indians seiged and massacred 120 men, women and children. Its a complex story as to why, and Ive studied it and read about it several times since college. I stopped, snapped some pictures and headed north.
Somewhere up toward Enterprise, erik’s cousin wrecked on erik’s ultra glide the night before. I couldnt find any evidence or wreckage, and bombed to the nevada border.
Just on the nevada utah border, I explored modena a little bit…. another cool little old (almost) ghost town in nevada that vandals havent done anything to.
after modena, another hour and I found myself in Caliente, drinking a beer and hearing my brothers plans had fallen through, so I headed back to st george to meet him, drink a bottle of Glen Livet and prep for another ride tomorrow.
Gotta go back to caliente, theres more to see there.
Woke up around 8, and randy took my bike down to the auto parts store to get something to fix his cable. Nothing. So we ate breakfast across the street, and parted ways… Randy to head north to Wendover and then to Morgan, I headed west to Tonopah. I debated whether I should go. 500 miles in a day isnt a short jaunt, its a commitment that might mean not getting home that night if something happens, or I take too much time. I decided to go.
The ride out of Tonopah surprised me.
It was nice! long sweeping turns and nice and cool outside. My head wasnt in the ride tho. I was feeling guilty for not heading home, spending money (even though this trip was extremely cheap) and not coming home and getting ready for my work week. I struggled to get my head into my ride untill at the junction of hwy 6 and 318: Halstead’s Blackjack Inn. For one, I love ghost towns. I love seeing civilization in the middle of nowhere, where a person has taken a risk and put his shingle out to start a business and to piece together its history. I love it.
Halstead’s BlackJack Inn
Second, there was an old trailer that im sure had a ton of history that someone had spraypainted on that put my mind in the right place:
“Home is something some of us never find”
That was the ticket. I headed out with a new point of view, and knew this was going to be a great ride.
Currant Nevada
Nevada always suprises me. It wasnt what I was expecting, theres more there than just sagebrush. I want to explore it all now. Life in nevada comes in surprising places, and in little pockets.
“Home Cooking – Come on In”
At the end of a really awesome 50 mile ride I found Currant Nevada. its still on the road signs, but there isnt much going on there. I was there for probably 20 or more minutes and never saw a soul, let alone a passing car. It was almost apocalyptic — the abandoned bar/motel/rv park/gas station was overgrown with weeds, but looks as though the people were vaporized mid spot. theres still bedding and pillows on the beds, clothes hanging in the closets in the hotel. In the restaurant, theres an unfinished bottle of wine on the table. The bar has a cowboy hat on it, and a stocked bar. Theres vines growing under the doors, and the calendar reads november of 1996. It was trippy, if anyone knows a story, or THE story behind this place, please email me or post here. I’d love to know it.
Food in the plates and a half empty bottle of wine on the tables…
_
Almost apocalyptic – Wierd
From then on out, it was 100 miles of Flat and long, with the only turns coming at the mountainous rises from the high desert floor.
Hope I make it
I’ve never ran my bike out of gas before. I know around 100 miles the needleleaves from being pegged full, and at 175 miles its pegged empty and pretty much out of gas. My ride was 170 miles between gas stations, and I was pretty confident when I left, untill I started wondering how much the extra weight and wind resistance on a full tour pak would make. I know at around 1/4 tank it drops visibly fast. You have about 10 or 15 miles max. I pulled into tonopah and i was nearly empty, and my gas gauge read 174.4 miles. Awesome.
Pulled into tonopah around 2:30 pm, checked out the place a bit, and stopped into a local watering hole for a brewski, and doubled back to head toward Rachel and home.
House in Warm Springs Nevada
Warm springs is another place i’d love to know the story of. I stopped there, stretched my legs and checked out the old bar/cafe and the house across the street. some of the grafitti inside told the story, and theres a warm spring that runs into a pool on the site that is fenced, but I’ve read about people still using it. The writings on the wall suggest that the house was inhabited as late as 1988, but whether or not thats true is another story. The house is starting to fall in on itself a bit. In the back were evidence of an RV park.
Warm Springs Bar and Cafe
Warm spring is at the junction of 6, and the Extraterrestrial highway I headed south toward Rachel.
Little A’Le’Inn in Rachel
At rachel I stopped to check the Little A’Le’Inn out. This place is famous if you run in UFO Circles (which I dont, but find it interesting), and is the closest town to area 51. I think its awesome to see a place survive for 20 years out in the middle of nowhere, and hopefully will for 100 more.
I walked in, and the only other people in there were from Pittsburgh. I had my penguins shirt on, and we talked for a bit. Really nice guys, just checking out area 51. Its just amazing that 5 penguin/Steeler fans meet in the middle of nowhere. I had me a patty melt, a couple of Guinnesses (obviously a place with good taste), took some pictures and started heading for home. Ill come back to rachel. They let you pitch a tent for free there, and are extremely friendly folks.
The Black Mailbox
The guy at Little A’Le’Inn told me about the mailbox for area 51, 20 miles outside of town so I stopped and took pictures. The real story of the mailbox can be found here, but the box was interesting nonetheless. I guess alien afficianados gather around it at night looking for evidence, and holds the claim as the most famous mailbox in the world. I took some pictures and moved on.
20 miles of good road later, I was at the junction of Extraterrestrial highway and nevada state road 93. I felt closer to home now, but this was all new. If I go left, I go through caliente and the map says its a scenic drive, and Im home in probably 90 minutes. If i go right, its 3 hours. I went right. I figured left is a ride erik and I can do later possibly, and I didnt want to go home yet.
I got gas in ash springs, and was surpised to see so many people again. the pumps were all full of people and I had to wait, and the store was busy. Getting close to civilization again. Lots of trees and a couple of lakes. I opened it up and started heading south toward moapa.
Waiting out the Rain
I’d had the rain at my back all day, but heading south at moapa it caught up to me. It came down pretty good. Had to wait it out a bit in glendale. No big deal, the break was nice before the stretch home.
I made it home around 10pm. Id done 480 miles that day, and honestly, I could have done 500 more. The bike ran great and I 100% enjoyed riding in nevada. Like i said, it surpised me. I want to check it all out now. Nevada is no longer a state to just get through, its a place to explore. To be able to find places like I’d visited today that were so intact and not vandalized was amazing to me. I need to find out more about them and go back again.
Ride totals: 3 States, 485 miles in 12 hours
NOTE: I didnt realize but the date on my camera is wrong this trip.
Woke up this morning, went and by the time I got the tent down, loaded the bike and made a phone call Randy showed up. Its good to see him again. We bullshitted for a minute then headed out by 10.
Leamington Utah General Store
The road was great. on the way to delta, Randy showed me a spot where he and his grandpa used to go, an old general store in leamington. Its closed now, but looked like a cool place. Randys grandpa was one of a kind. when we lived in Long beach in 89, got to know him a little bit and the stories of him and the things he said and did always make me smile.
burned through and ate in delta, then headed on the straight road to great basin national park. It was a nice ride, not too hot, 5 or so degrees out of being just perfect. We stopped at the nevada/utah border because we had some time to kill before the cave tours at lehman caves, grabbed something cold to drink and headed to the caves.
Apparantly we killed too much time, and just barely missed the tour.
Wheeler Peak Road
So we bought some of the last 2 tickets for the day and headed up to wheeler peak drive, to kill an hour before our 90 minute tour. Wheeler peak drive was really nice, climbs 10,000 feet in about 10 miles or so, up into the pines. From the view areas you can see clear across nevada. A nice nevada surprise. We considered bagging going into ely and camping up there. I’d like to take the RV up and go back there with the kids. Definately a beautiful place, and not too far away. We went to the top, and raced back down just in time to grab our tour of the caves, without a minute to spare.
Entrance to Lehman Caves
I’ve been in a few cave tours before, and I’d have to say this was the best. Lehman Caves is a wet cave, so its still very active in growing and was nice and cool down there. In addition to being the coolest looking cave I’ve ever seen, our tour guide was great. You could tell right away she really loved people and loved what she was doing, and it showed in the first 5 minutes. She made the stories and geology of the cave come alive for everyone, and the 90 minute tour was perfect.
The skies had clouded up even more and you could smell the rain that was about to happen. We decided to head into Ely, it didnt look like it was going to be any drier than it was at that moment, so we loaded up and headed out.
Just as we hit the town limits the wind started raging. We pulled into the KOA a
Randy, Fixing his throttle cable in the Motel Room
nd I ran inside to see if they had at least a cabin to crash in for cheap, since putting up a tent in a storm just didnt seem like fun. They didnt. we headed into town and got a room at the white pine, a bit of a roach motel that Ive stayed in before with the family. It was shmeggy, but it was better than a tent.
Heading up and down the passes Randy broke his return throttle cable. Randy got his bike from a guy for $125 bucks, and I gotta say, it ran great. For a 1980’s bike that had been neglected for so long, to come out of the trip with something as minor as a throttle cable was impressive. Randy didnt mind, he’s a good field mechanic and came up with a few options to fix it in the morning. We ran down to the casino, got a gristle steak, and then went back to the room and crashed.
My first options anymore are to ride by myself. I dont mind it, and I don’t have to deal with anyones crap and can ride at whatever pace I want. Randy is one exception to that. Everytime we ride its always good, with zero hassles and the conversation is good. Today was a perfect example of that. We didnt ride too far, but all in all it was all good.
This morning I had every intention of going to Tonopah, but right now Im in Nephi.
Randy emailed me this morning and told him I was going to tonopah, and he said he’d meet me there. Hah, hes a die hard. Love traveling with this guy. Somehow that morphed into delta, and when I couldnt get a tent spot in delta and no parks in delta to crash, I rode to Nephi.
I managed to get out around 2:30 and hit 1-15. I hate 1-15. I hate freeways. But I didnt havfe all the time in the world, and wasnt sure what I could find as far as camping in nephi, I rode to cove fort and through Richfield. The rain was awesome going over the mountains into richfield. It came straight down, rather than straight into my face. I was soaking wet for about 20 miles, but once I got over the pass I could see the storm move south and blue sky ahead. Took hwy 89 north through manti etc, and off through fountain green and moroni.
One of my favorite thing about riding is the smells. Alfalfa, rain, Wet fields, even manure. You get it all. I can associate about half a dozen places with certain smells, now I have one more: Moroni smells like chicken shit. I can see why thats an insult, because chicken shit is no damn good. You speed up to get the smell of chicken shit out of your nose. You cant wait to stop smelling chicken shit. I may not drive through moroni again without checking the winds. nasty.
Im in nephi right now, found a nice little place with power and storm clouds brewing miles away. it could rain tonight, but I could give a shit. rain doesnt kill you. Not riding i think might.
The tour pak was awesome on its maiden voyage. I cant believe how much space I have now. a glutton of space. I hauled an extension chord up, just in case, which im using now. I still have room. One thing I did notice about the tour pak is how light and shaky it makes the front end of the bike, especially at slow speeds. with a passenger over the back wheel, its not bad. its normal, without one, and 25 pounds or so its a bit more edgy. I think I need to invest in a solo rack for the tour pak. I need to invent a way to get a quick coupler on it. I think Ive got a way I can do that.
So randy is coming out at 6AM from morgan. He should be here around 9 I’d guess. Then we head out. I’d like to go back down to tonopah if we can. I wanna cross that long desert, and randy is the only guy who’d do that without bitching about the heat. the question is, does he have the time. He’s gotta be back sunday night. Wherever we go, itll be fun.
First blog report from the road. hah, i love this.
The tour pak came in yesterday. Its on the bike, and its killer. The last few weeks ive been selling crap on ebay and buying things for the bike, including: The tour pak, tour pak liner, tour pak lid organizer, front saddlebag bars with storage and water bottles, new panoptx dark glasses, and a new helmet.
The rest of the money im gonna go riding with tomorrow. I havent been to tonopah nevada for 20 or more years, so tomorrow ill head out. Camping for 10 bucks, ill ride and eat cheap. Hopefully I can do my blog from my tent tomorrow night. Its 300 miles to Tonopah, im going to try and head out around 3.
Its not very often Robyn and I can spend the day riding. we dont always have babysitters, and overnight rides havent happened for years. This weekend is thunder on the mountain in brian head, so we decided to head on up where its cool and see what we see.
The longer I live, the more lucky I realize I am. Robyn is easygoing, and we have fun together and I enjoy her company more than anyone Ive ever met. We got to cedar city, and we knew we were going to get rained on. We went anyway. Went up to Brian head, cruised around for a few and on the way over to duck creek we started getting pelted with hail. Fairly big hail. we were stuck under the aspens there off the side of the road for about 20 minutes, then it broke and we headed out to duck creek, then out through Mt Carmel Junction and back through Zion.
Great day. It was nice to get out of the heat and spend the day together.
In 1990 when Harley was struggling to bring their company name back and sell motorcycles again, they introduced the fatboy. They wont publicly admit this, but the japanese we’re kicking their ass and rumor has it they named the fatboy after the 2 atomic bombs that were dropped on japan: Fat Man, and Little Boy.
Ive got a new member of the family.
2006 Fatboy. In the garage. Has a windshield, but this bike isnt for touring, its for bombing (hah, get it?) around town. Its not mine officially untill monday, and a few things have to happen but if they do (and they look like they will, the fatboy is gonna have a home in the garage and on the road.
Its a nice driving bike. Low to the ground, and the straightbars are comfortable. Im a bagger at heart, but you can never have too many bikes, and hopefully this will help keep the ol’ road rage from getting too many miles on it.
Enterprise Utah stop- Heading to Cedar City with Erik
108 degrees out, and my air conditioner went out friday night. Erik called me to go ride for a few hours, so we headed north out of town on highway 18 up to enterprise, and over to cedar city. Had a bite to eat, then it started raining pretty hard. Who cares. Rain just makes you wet, its just made of water.
Rode up through cedar canyon a few miles and about 4 miles up the road turned into a dirt road, which sucks on a bike but it wasnt too bad. 14 miles of dirt road till we hit kolob reservoir, and then we blew home. Rode about about 179 miles
