I'm On My Way to Alamo -- Alamo, NV, That Is....

I'm On My Way to Alamo -- Alamo, NV, That Is....

I pulled my usual pre-long-ride/big-event trick last night and woke up at 3AM after going to bed at midnight. I finally got back to sleep at about 6:00 and got up at 7:30. Then I was the traveling guy Jim Rau (junglejim on the Forum) knows and loves so well -- it took me till 10AM to hit the road. I had a 637-mile day riding from Greeley to Cedar City, UT. It was nice till I got to about Rifle, 250 miles or so from home on I-70. Then the rain started. It was hit or miss till I left Green River, UT, 400 miles from Greeley. Then it just rained almost all the way for the last 237 miles, probably all but about 30-40 miles of the last part of the trip. It was a cold rain and not just a light shower. My thermometer on the bike was reporting 31F at the top of the passes west of Green River, but I'd guess it probably didn't go below 34-35F. Nothing ever froze on the windshield and it doesn't have a very good defroster.

I was bucking headwinds most off the last stretch and only got 41mpg between Green River and Beaver, UT. My cruise control works great until I'm pulling a steep grade and going into a strong headwind. When the throttle gets rotated to the last 1/8" or so of its travel, the cruise cuts out.

I had a good meal at a local steakhouse next to an auction barn and I've checked into the Motel 6.

I've only got 150 miles to do tomorrow, then Saturday morning at 6-ish, I'll start the Team Lyle Rachel Strange Insanity Days Rally. 1524 miles around central Nevada in 24 hours for a that long-awaited Bun Burner Gold!

We've got a banquet on Sunday night and then I'm meeting FalconAF (Rick Ryan) here in Cedar City and we'll take two days to ride back across Colorado. It sounds like we'll have about the same kind of weather I did today. Rick's building a high-end gaming computer for a friend of his in Brentwood (a suburb of Denver on the north side of town). It'll be good to see him again. We parted ways in San Diego when he had an intestinal bug and I was on my way to Key West during the Epic Ride.

I'm going to go to bed now!

Travel safe Phil

Bun Burner Gold! My buns have usually had enough after 400 miles. I have great admiration for your tenacity, Phil.

Good to hear news of FalconAF, aka Rick. Still miss his opinions and insight. Will Rick be coming to Spearfish?

Yoda said:

Bun Burner Gold! My buns have usually had enough after 400 miles. I have great admiration for your tenacity, Phil.

Good to hear news of FalconAF, aka Rick. Still miss his opinions and insight. Will Rick be coming to Spearfish?

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I'll ask him, Rich.

Phil Tarman said:

Then I was the traveling guy Jim Rau (junglejim on the Forum) knows and loves so well -- it took me till 10AM to hit the road.

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Phil, if you are going to do a Bun Burner Gold you're going to have to leave before your usual 10:ish AM or average 100 mph. Not sure which is the bigger challenge.

Good luck to you and ride safe.

Jim, it's 24 hours, no matter when you start.

Howsomever, I do plan on leaving at 6AM.

I woke up this morning to fairly hard, steady rain in Cedar City. I don't mind (too much) riding in rain, but I absolutely, positively HATE leaving when it's raining. I checked out of the Motel 6 and went to I-Hop and ate a leisurely breakfast. I looked up and, lo and behold, it was snowing. It wasn't sticking to anything, but it snowed for nearly an hour. I ended up getting out of Cedar City at 12:30 and got here to Alamo at 2:45. Pretty good time for 150 mile, huh?

I'd forgotten that Nevada is in the Pacific Time Zone.

I love riding in central Nevada. The Basin and Range is fascinating terrain. Mountain ranges every 20-30 miles, vast valleys and vistas.

We're having a dinner tonight at 6PM to get a briefing and then, as I said, I'll start the clock at about 6AM.

Chris, my thermometer is a Kisan Chargeguard. It's a combined voltage meter / thermometer. I'm pretty sure it shows a lower temperature than true when it gets cold. It was showing 29F last night and for a while this afternoon and nothing was freezing. I'd guess it's off maybe 5-degrees at lower temperatures.

A motel next to the I-Hop was showing 46F while it was snowing in Cedar City at 11:30 today, so I'm not the only one who's off.

Phil Tarman said:

I'm meeting FalconAF (Rick Ryan)

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Phil
Please say "Hi" to Rick from me and Joy. He's such a great guy and a good road companion. I wish I lived close enough to visit him sometimes.
Clay

RedNigel said:

Phil
Please say "Hi" to Rick from me and Joy. He's such a great guy and a good road companion. I wish I lived close enough to visit him sometimes.
Clay

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Yeah - I'd like to see Rick at Spearfish too.

Comanche said:

Yeah - I'd like to see Rick at Spearfish too.

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Doug
I forget where the next TWT Pie Run is but are you going to try to make it?

Clay

Comanche said:

Yeah - I'd like to see Rick at Spearfish too.

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I'd just like to meet Rick.

RedNigel said:

Doug
I forget where the next TWT Pie Run is but are you going to try to make it?

Clay

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The next one is at the Purple Pig in Flint, on May 30th. I won't be there as I will be heading home from a ride to Miami then.

Comanche said:

The next one is at the Purple Pig in Flint, on May 30th. I won't be there as I will be heading home from a ride to Miami then.

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I just remembered I cant go either
Gotta do inventory at work

Rick and I aren't going to get to ride together. He's going to Denver to build a high-powered gaming computer for a friend who learned today that his week off has been truncated. He needs to leave Denver Thursday morning. Given the uncertainty about weather through the mountains (in Colorado, Wyoming, and New Mexico, Rick's decided to leave tomorrow morning and drive to Denver. I needed to get home on Tuesday, but it may be Wednesday or Thursday.

The good news is that he's thinking about Spearfish.

I finished my Bun Burner Gold with nine minutes to spare. Since the base route for the Team Lyle Rachel Strange Insanity Rally was 1523.3 miles, I could have stopped at Ash Springs, 10 miles before getting to Alamo if I had been in any doubt of finishing and qualifying. I'll write a ride report and post some pictures sometime after I get some sleep.

Phil Tarman said:

I finished my Bun Burner Gold with nine minutes to spare. Since the base route for the Team Lyle Rachel Strange Insanity Rally was 1523.3 miles, I could have stopped at Ash Springs, 10 miles before getting to Alamo if I had been in any doubt of finishing and qualifying. I'll write a ride report and post some pictures sometime after I get some sleep.

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Congrats, Phil. That's quite an achievement for age 72!

Way to go Phil.

amazing trip........I do want to try a IBA BBG 1000 miles in 24 hrs sometime. waiting for a well rested story

Way to go Phil! Tell Rick I said hello next time you talk to him.

I did the Team Lyle Rachel Insanity Days Rally yesterday. I just rode the base route: 1523.2 miles from Alamo > Tonopah > Austin > Battle Mountain > West Wendover > Ely > Tonopah (again) > Fallon > Eureka > Baker > Alamo. I may have been the only person except for a woman riding a Ninjette 250cc who didn't have an auxiliary tank.

That didn't really make too much difference for me because I also need an auxiliary bladder. It was cold and I never turned my electric jacket off all day. It rained from Battle Mountain to Wendover and was still raining till I was maybe 75-80 miles south of Wendover. I was seeing temps in the low-30s to high-20s and figured I didn't want to ride the high passes on US-50 at night in snow. If it had kept raining till Ely, I was going to quit and head back to Alamo. But it did quit and then my only difficulty was time. I didn't have any to waste. When I left Fallon at 10:00, I'd been on the road for nearly 16 hours and still had 506 miles to go.

Fortunately I actually didn't need to whiz when I stopped for gas in Eureka (which was good because the gas station wasn't open and neither was anything else). My NT's lights, supplemented by the little Denalis do an amazing job. I saw two deer -- one was crossing the road right in front of me at the top of Austin Summit and I was only doing 30-ish. He ignored me and I thanked him. I saw the other one at least 200 yards away and backed out of it down to about 25 and he just stood there and watched me go back. The closest I came to nailing animals was with the suicidal jackrabbits. I think the 25 or so of us riding wiped out at least 50, but I only hit one little bird. I nearly nailed a turkey vulture that took off into the wind, which put him in my lane of travel. He was neither climbing or accelerating but my ABS brakes got me down from about 80 to 20 in short order and that gave him time to clear my lane.

By the time I left Baker, right on the UT border, I was pretty sure I had it made. That leg was 190 miles and I was able to ride at 75 and complete the trip to Alamo (I had 8/10ths of a gallon left) to finish the Bun Burner Gold with a whole 8 minutes to spare.

I love riding in Nevada. Fairly big speed feels safe and the scenery in the Basin and Range is absolutely magnificent. For me, big speed is capped at 85. Not so for some of my fellow riders. There were several BBG+ (1800 miles in 24 hours).

As I said elsewhere, I rolled over 100,000 miles yesterday while climbing Warm Springs Summit at about 5:30. I'm humble, yet proud, to join Woodadict and Rustinpeace in that elite club.

Enough for now -- I'm going to go to bed.

But, you know me, I'll write at greater (I can hear some of you mumbling, "Much greater length after some rest. And I'll get pictures posted because I know that for the illiterate among you, "If there ain't pictchers of it, it didn't happen."