Miles Tuesday: 183
Hours in the saddle: 7:33
Cattle guards: 14
Tuesday we went to the VLA (Very Large Array). It was awesome. On our way in, we saw a satellite crossing the road on the rail system. Apparently the fastest it can go is 4 mph. Each one weighs 230 tons.
After waiting for the gift shop to open up after lunch, we got our tickets and did the self guided walking tour. It was cool. Hot, but cool.
Jaron is standing on the solar calendar here.
The antennas sit on blocks!
They are moved around by these transporters that go on rails as well as on the road.
The antennas can be set up in different configurations. So we were fortunate in that they were in close formation for us.
This one was in for maintenance.
Julie has been using her female privilege and just ditching the mc pants and walking around in yoga pants and mc boots. We’re doing the wicking layers under gear thing.
After the VLA, we headed to Reserve, NM for a gas and dinner stop and then went towards a campground 52 mi away. We were a bit too ambitious, though, and the road degraded quite a bit. Jaron was getting too far ahead and losing comm range, so Julie led and then Jaron went down because he’s more comfortable going faster. We considered continuing another 16 mi to the campground, camping right there along the road, and turning around. We decided to turn around and look for a motel. It took us about an hour to get this all figured out and turn the bikes around on a hill with loose gravel.
The ride down the mountain was also rough. Not long after we got going again, Julie started oscillating on the gravel and went down. I was off the throttle with the clutch out and riding my rear brake but couldn’t slow down enough. We made it quite a ways before one of Jaron’s gas tanks fell off. Then another bit until it fell off again, and Julie lost her footing while stopping and went down again. All this time we are watching out for wildlife, which was prevalent. We even passed a bull. There were deer jumping fences, too.
We were going so slowly for 23 mi that google thought we were cycling.
On our way down, we were working out our motel strategy. There was a motel consisting of a couple of adobe buildings in Reserve, so we figured we would try that first. If they were full, we would call the next one 6 mi away. If they were full, we would try to camp at an RV park.
So we find the motel with the adobe buildings at 10:30 and turn in at the vacancy sign. There’s a sign that says 24 hour check in and lights in the window. Then when you walk up, there’s a phone on the wall next to the door. Jaron has to try a couple of times between getting his call dropped. He talks with someone and gives a credit card # for the room. They have him open a safe in the wall where the keys are. A pretty efficient operation.
Now we have to find our room. We are walking around looking for the right room for a while and Jaron has to call back to get a clarification. Ours is behind a chain link fence. Ok…so we move the bikes and settle in. I am expecting it to be a total shithole, but it was pretty nice. I’m so glad that place had vacancy.
The next morning (Wednesday) we head to Silver City, NM where we will stay for a couple of days. It was 102 today. We drank a ton of water and pulled over for Julie to refill her platypus (hydration bladder) from one of Jaron’s water tanks. It was a pretty drive with some good twisties. Jaron got some good pictures of the mountains with the GoPro. We talked with a fellow rider at a rest stop.
We got lunch in Silver City, checked in to the hotel, and literally crashed until dinner. It’s a good thing we got a room with 2 beds, because one of them got used for a nap when we were completely sweaty and nasty. We decided that this is the furthest south we are going, and that we need to stay away from triple digit temperatures. We both felt heat fatigued today. And we only went 100 mi in 2:39. No drops today.
Tomorrow we plan to go see the Gila Cliff Dwellings and do some rides in the mountains. It’s too hot to go camping.
Leave a Reply