Colorado Cruiser: Texas Big Bend Ride - Day 3

I woke up at about 7:00 but we didn't get on the road until nearly 8:00. We had Belgian waffles at the hotel breakfast and watched the space shuttle's final flight out of somewhere to somewhere on the TV. We also watched someone's opinion about health care and legalizing marijuana, then listened to all the various conversations around us about it.

Its kinda fun to watch people in the hotel breakfast room and try to figure out what's going on with each.

We finally gassed up and headed West on I-10 towards El Paso. I told John later that we might as well have been riding through Southern California, Arizona, New Mexico, or Texas because I-10 looks the same the whole way across.

We must have hit rush hour in El Paso because we had stop and go traffic for 5 minutes, but the West bound traffic was far worse. Once we got deep into Texas, the speed limit jumped up to 80mph and we really started flying. When the cross wind hit, it would whip the wind around my windshield and into my helmet which made my helmet shake back and forth at a high frequency. It looked to me like a really bad movie projector when the film starts jumping.

Not too far out of El Paso we hit a border patrol check point. I didn't even know they had such things. The entire freeway was funneled off and into a big covered garage looking thing, and a border patrol agent asked me if I was a US citizen. When I said yes, he just waved me on through. There were also cameras setup along side the road, I guess to capture license plates to track cars coming and going.

This morning's ride was MUCH warmer than yesterdays. The temp when I got up was 39 and quickly warmed into the 50s. The ride across I-10 was comfortable the whole way. It only felt warm when we stopped and stood in the sun for a while.

After 160 miles on I-10, we turned South on highway 90. It was noon Texas time, but neither John nor I felt like eating. Van Horn had allot of restaurants, but we were hoping to find something along the way. If you read yesterday's report, I talked about eating somewhere I was not happy about, and seeing something much better later on. Today was the more common case. We saw good places, but when we got to Marfa (yes, it's spelled that way) we couldn't find anything but a Subway and a DQ. We opted for the DQ because it looked cleaner and cooler. John and I reminisced about the number of times we've passed up places on the hopes of finding better, then wishing we'd have eaten when we had the chance. You can't win for loosing i guess.

We were riding allot of barren flat country here in South Texas. We were headed to the Texas/Mexico border (also known as the Rio Grande) with promises of riding the "Farm to Ranch Road", also known as Highway 170. Allot of people ride this road each year because it's scenic, twisty, hilly, and just allot of fun.

When we got to the town of Presidio I was leading and just kind of looking around. Before I knew it, I was nearly across the border into Mexico. I stopped about 20 yards shy of the entry and did a quick U turn (which I'm sure wasn't suspicious at all). John just stopped, hopped off his bike and took a picture.

We stopped to gas up and drink some water before starting 170. I bought a genuine Mexican fruit bar and contentedly munched on it. If you've never been to Mexico, they make and sell some great frozen fruit bars. I think it is just cut up fruit with a little sugar, mashed into a mold, a stick inserted, and frozen. It's yummy. (Yes, I said yummy, and I mean it).

The temperature by this point felt like it was up into the 90s. The sky was clear and the sun beat down pretty hot, but it wasn't scorching hot. Especially while riding, it felt really good out.

We headed out of Presidio East on Highway 170. The road follows the Rio Grand, but it doesn't follow closely. So most of the time, we just knew the river was off to our right somewhere, but we didn't really know how far. When we finally did see the river, it didn't look like much of a Rio, and certainly not very Grand. It was only 10 to 20 yards wide and was a pretty vibrant shade of green. The first 10 miles were fenced off, but after that, there was nothing at all to prevent crossing in either direction, except for the mountains and desert around us.

We stopped at a few overlooks to take pictures, and I took allot of pictures from my bike. I keep my pocked cannon camera on a long lanyard around my neck. I cut the index finger out of my right hand glove, so I can lock the throttle, reach down with my right hand and grab the camera, turn it on, hold it up over the windshield and take a picture. If for any reason I need to, I can just drop the camera and grab the handlebar without worrying about the camera going flying.

Highway 170, as I said, generally follows the Rio Grand. That means it drops down into the river valley with green trees and shrubs, then it climbs out of the valley onto parched dry, and hot ground for a while, then back and forth between them. Sometimes we'd be a mile or more away and you could see the green stripe of the river valley off to the right. It also meant the temperature kept dropping around the greenery or rising up on the desert.

I've been riding motorcycles for about 5 years, which means I have .... allot of years of not riding motorcycles. I ride pretty well, and I know my limitations and how to ride safely. But John has ridden for 30+ years, and was a motorcycle officer. His skills are way above what I'll probably ever attain. So when I'm leading the ride, I tend to ride fairly slow. I'm a rubber necker and I constantly look for good photos and pretty views. I'm sure that John is often frustrated because he knows what the road can be ridden like.

I started out in front on Highway 170, but after about 10 minutes, John had had enough. I heard the throttle twist, and John was off. I just happen to be taking a photo at the time, and you can see what it's like when John's on the go.

Rather than straightening and flattening the terrain like our modern roads do, this road follows the landscape. It undulates over hills and down into streambeds. It curves around bluffs and winds with the river. That's what makes it such a fun Motorcycle road.

The final piece of the road is a climb up and over a small pass out of the valley. It gave a beautiful view back down the river.

We left the river and wound our way into the town of Terlingua. It's not much of a town, and the hotels were sketchy enough that we opted to pay a bit more to stay inside Big Bend National park at the Chisos Mountain Lodge.

Heading into the park we stopped and took pictures at the park entrance sign. The park road was really nice. Smooth, curvy, and very fun to ride. I knew roughly where our lodge was, but I didn't really know what to expect. As we turned off the main road toward the lodge, we started a gentle climb between some sharp mountains. Then the climb got steeper and steeper with switchbacks. We climbed up to a pass, then descended into something like a little hidden valley. It was awsome and very beautiful.

We had dinner at the restaurant in the lodge, then sat on the porch enjoying the cool desert evening and the sunset. This is a really great lodge. No Cell service, No TV, but it does have wifi.

I-10 between Las Cruces and El Paso. Could have been I-10 anywhere from CA to TX though