Monthly Archives: August 2015
It was a hail of a day! Sunday morning, my last day on the road for a while, dawned clear and beautiful, as desert days usually do. I stacked and packed the Honda, left the Best Western behind, and headed south on US 191 with the objective of getting down to I-10 and then home. Northern Arizona has its own kind of beauty. It’s often grassy, always wide open, and can seem… Read More
I hate it when reality rears its ugly head. After a day of bliss on the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad (C&TS), I had to put some serious miles on the Honda in order to get home by the 16th. In spite of that, I still managed a couple of scenic stops between Antonito, CO, and Chinle, AZ. First, we have two passes on CO 17 before riding into New Mexico. Unlike… Read More
How do I describe a day of bliss in a blog post? There are facts: The Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad (C&TS) runs at least two trains daily (one eastbound, one westbound) between Antonito, CO, and Chama, NM, during the tourist season. (In addition to the daily trains, it also has many specials.) The ride is 64 miles long and rises to the highest elevation (10,015 feet, at Cumbres Pass) of any currently-operating… Read More
With a total distance of over 550 miles (as the Honda rolls) between Casper, Wyoming, and Antonito, Colorado, I knew it would take two days to make the trip. I also knew that I wanted to ride the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad – which is why I was headed for Antonito to begin with. I also knew that I had to be home by Sunday, August 16, so it was getting… Read More
Would the last one leaving please turn out the lights? That’s how I felt the Monday I left Sturgis. I also had a flashback to my college days, when I would frequently have one of the last finals on the last day of finals week. By that time, everyone else would have left campus, and formerly-crowded buildings, sidewalks and open spaces were *empty*. Sturgis was the same way, and in particular, the… Read More
In my last post I told you about visiting the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site and then ran out of space. There was still a lot of day left when I departed the Command Center, so I rode back along I-90 to the eastern end of the Badlands National Park and turned onto the access road. Before I got back to the park, though, I stopped to wander through the Prairie Homestead and find… Read More
If you’re not familiar with an area, it can be fun finding places to visit / explore. Such was the case today, when I rode east to go through the Badlands National Park and discovered the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site and a prairie homestead, and then ended up actually visiting Wall Drug! I decided to get an early start, because I knew it was going to be a long day. Badlands Park… Read More
All things – good and bad – must eventually end. The past week with Jen, Paula and Tony definitely ranks among the good, but they all have other commitments on Monday and are more than 900 miles away from said commitments, so today they’re leaving to begin the long ride home. Tony chose to wear his souvenir boots (with a glow-in-the-dark skull-and-crossbones graphic on each one): Jen and Paula simply wore whatever was… Read More
Friday, August 7, was very near the end of the 75th annual Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, and a lot of people were leaving by then. Jen, Paula and Tony would leave on Saturday, and given our late return to camp Thursday night, it really was no surprise that none of us wanted to do any serious riding on the 7th. Plus, both Tony and Paula decided to get their bikes’ oil changed before… Read More
What a day THIS was! Jen, Tony, Paula and I did not become famous (or infamous) for rising early in Sturgis. It didn’t seem to matter what had transpired the night before – regardless of whether the night was late or early, the morning departure on the bikes was always a late one. Today’s ride took us down a road we hadn’t previously ridden, through Vanocker Canyon. The plan had been to… Read More
The Peripatetic Traveler 
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