On the Road Again

[Tombstone]

After leaving Wartrace after the state match, we fought hard wind for about two hours before we hit rain. That knocked the wind down but we had some really hard areas of storms heading west. Our original plans were to drive two hard days to get to Ruidoso New Mexico. Due to the Polar Vortex that is blasting its way through our country (picture the movie Day After Tomorrow) we regrouped and decided we would take two pretty easy days and go to Oklahoma City to ride out the freeze. Yes it is going to be below freezing in places we were going this week with snow predicted. We figured we could go to the Cowboy Hall of Fame again and maybe hit the casino one night. Inside activities for a few days. Depending on the weather, we will probably drop south and find some warmer weather so Doc and I can ride some. I was thinking Mexico maybe. They are talking South Texas and South New Mexico; Probably a better idea than mine. Anyway, Ruidoso is pretty much out on the way out to Tombstone but we still have it on our radar for the trip back if the weather breaks.

First stop was Little Rock where the high today was at midnight, temps dropping through the day down into the low 40’s. Heading to Oklahoma City today where the high today is in the 40’s, low tonight is predicted to be in the 30’s. Don’t see any bike rides for a few more days. I will let you know how it progresses.

Although we did lose Cactus we have found a stand-in for him. I will try to post a few pictures of our journeys with our new Cactus which by the way always runs on time, does not eat much and is much quitter and a little brighter. (This one lights up)

How do I insert pictures on our forum? I am some dumb when it comes to computers.

[Anita Margarita]

Tombstone,

Hope you find some more temperate weather soon.  Jackalope and I know a little something about riding motorcycles in freezing temps with snow on the ground in New Mexico.... in late May.

To add a photo to a post, look for the "+ Attachments and other options" just under the box where you type your message.  Click on that and you can select a file to attach.

Safe travels!

AM

[TN Mongo]

I love your updates on your travels!  Be careful on your bike (avoid Mongos in SUVs).

Please keep your reports coming.

[Fast Harley]

Keep the Road Trip reports coming and congrats on your CLEAN State Champion Outlaw win!
Harley.

[Anita Margarita]

Correction:  To put a photo *in* the message, click on the "Insert image" icon above the box where you type the message (first icon in the second row... just below the one for "Boldface").

AM

[Tombstone]

We made it to Oklahoma City Monday afternoon around 5:00. Temp had dropped from 50 to about 43 degrees but the sun was out so was not too bad. We got set up and settled in and decided to have an evening at the casino which is about ½ mile from RV Resort we stay in.

Nothing much to report for a day of driving except it went well and we never hit any real traffic. Lots of construction along the way so hopefully the interstate system is under repair and will get better over the years.

We did have dinner at the casino which is also a horse racing track. The restaurant overlooks the track but no horses until Wednesday evening. We did find out that they race everything imaginable during the year which is pretty much spring and fall. One week they have dogs which would be fun to watch but they also race camels, ostriches, zebras, and a few other strange animals you would not see at the Kentucky Derby, they also have one week they race motorcycles on hard pack dirt. It would be fun to watch but you would need to be winning to afford to stay or at least I would need to be winning.

We had a relatively early night or at least relative to what we were doing in Wartrace. Not sure if we will do the Cowboy Museum again or try for something new, plenty of other museums in OK City and plenty of interesting sights to see so we may just head downtown? Uptown? Heck not sure which way is up right now but we may head into the center of the city and see what we can see. I would like to see the memorial but have been told to go at night and my night eyes are pretty much shot these days so we may just have to see it in the day light and google the view at night. There is also a Skeleton Museum we have talked about going to and it sounds pretty fun. Toby Keith has a bar and grill called I love this Bar and Grill of course. May have to check that one out too. Like I said, plenty to do other than the Cowboy Museum which I have been to 3 or 4 times. We plan to stay here until Thursday morning and head south so Doc and I can ride the bikes. The Gila Mountains are calling us again.
 
Hope the weather breaks soon but at least a few more days of cold. See everyone down the trail.   

Side note: I am not the only Outlaw to have a clean match at Wartrace, Fast Harley also cleaned it. It was only my second clean match at that level, I am pretty sure Harley has more clean match pins, plaques and awards than I will ever see. Congratulations Harley.

[Tombstone]

Friday Night Awards Banquet

[Tombstone]

Day Three in Oklahoma City:

Yesterday we went into town to do tourist things. The first thing we did was go to Toby Keith’s I Love This Bar and Grill. Had a good lunch and walked around the Brickyard area for a while. Saw the baseball stadium where Mickey Mantle made his name along with the required bronze sculpture. After the downtown visit we went to the Land Run Memorial, all I can say is wow. The artist that did the sculptures needs his own memorial. This is the most amazing group of Bronze Sculptures I have ever seen. Incredible detail on the horses, wagons, dogs, more wagons full of trunks and furniture, cowboys with pocket watches, a lady riding sidesaddle with a ribbon tied around her horses tail, one horse falling over a trunk that had fallen from a wagon, horses rearing at a water crossing. Truly a work of art. If you are in Oklahoma City I would strongly suggest going to this memorial.

After that we went to the Skeleton Museum, I never thought I would enjoy something like that but I got to tell you it was great. Learned more about skeletons than I ever wanted to know. Just about every animal was on display. It was truly a learning experience that was very enjoyable. I think we were all surprised by how much fun it was. One of the most fascinating things was that although evaluation shows we came from the sea to land, the whale, dolphins, manatees, and other sea mammals actually had early ancestors that went from land to the sea.

We returned to the RV Resort and had dinner here where they have a Bar and Grill that is owned by a former Marine (although once a Marine always a Marine) that served in the Korea War. Met some wonderful folks and learned some things about the war that were never reported.

We plan to go back downtown today and leave tomorrow for Lubbock TX or at least that area. Weather is still cold but looks like it may be breaking in a few more days.

[Tombstone]

Cactus sure get around

[Tombstone]

Well, I did not do a report this morning because we did not do much of anything yesterday. We saw the sun for the first time in days, and the temps got up to the high 60’s so we did some work on the RV’s and just relaxed after running a few errands. Becky and I went back to the casino last evening. The horses were running and she love horse racing. It was about my understanding so I stuck with the machines and just watched a few races. That was a lot of fun but still would not know how to study and make bets.

We have left OKC, and made it to  Portales NM for the night and heading to Elephant Butte NM tomorrow for the weekend. We did have a problem with the 5 wheel hitch when we tried to set up. It would not release the trailer. We are still attached and just set it up hooked up to the truck. Not sure what is wrong and plan to stop at a RV repair center tomorrow and see what they can do to help us. Really hate it when things don’t work like they should. Raining like crazy again and pretty cool and 5000 ft. But have hopes for the weekend. I will let everyone know how it goes but am keeping my hopes up that the hitch will be a relatively easy fix for someone who knows what they are doing.

[Tombstone]

Friday, the day from HELL. Hopefully writing about it will help purge it from my memory.

The last I left off the 5th wheel hitch would not open and we could not disconnect the camper from the truck. We left out of whatever little town we overnighted in and headed to Roswell to find a RV repair center.  Traveling down Hwy 70 our trusty (up until now) Garmin told us to turn down Hwy 208. After following 208 for many miles we finely turned on Hwy 380 which is the road we needed to be on for both the RV Center we needed and also the road we were going to take to Elephant Butte. The address and RV Center were in Roswell NM by the way. When we arrived at the Garmin location, you know when the little screen says “You have arrived at your destination,” we were looking at a big empty field. Lady T looked it up on her phone and we were 57 miles from where we should have been. That dang Garmin had taken us 70 miles out of the way. We had to drive another hour to get to the RV Center. If we had just taken Hwy 70 like I knew in my mind that we should have we would have saved about 1 ½ hours and 70 miles at 10 mpg. By the way, fuel is pretty expensive out here. Finely arrived at the RV Center, the service manager was already looking at my hitch before I even got my engine turned off. Maybe my day is improving finely. After trying to get the hitch to release, doing the same thing I had done the previous night they decided to lift the hitch out of the truck with the Fifth Wheel. Got the hitch out and truck out from under it. It took two guys and me about 5 minutes to get the hitch to release, when it did both jaws opened but would not close and lock any more. So there lays my very expensive hitch lying on the ground completely useless. To make a short story longer, I now have a very nice new 5th wheel hitch along with the original hitch which will have to be returned to Curt Hitch to be repaired or replaced. I now own 4 fifth wheel hitches of which I have two with me. Anyway, new hitch, old hitch and trailer back in place we did make it to Elephant Butte by about 4 o’clock. Garmin and the Curt Hitch turned a nice 5 hours day into an 8 hour day. I will say the folks at Main Trailer Sales in Roswell NM were fantastic, had a new hitch system installed in about 30 minutes once it was determined that was the direction we need to go. If they were closer I would have a new RV dealer, may anyway. Told then it would be fun to leave in one RV and come home in a new one. You never know, we may work with them on our next one anyway.

We made it to Elephant Butte and have better weather, still cool but warming up in the afternoons. Doc and I plan to ride today. We will dress in layers so we can shed them off as the day progresses. Looks like some wonderful mountain rides around here so things are looking up.
I will let you know how it goes on the first ride of the trip. I will say the bikes have never been this dirty after being hauled around behind Docs camper for about 2000 miles. First stop is a car wash about a mile away. Hope no one see us between here and the car wash.

If you are shooting today hope you do well.

[Keystone]

Hope today is a better day & y'all get to exercise your iron horses.

[Jackalope]

Just wondering how you wound up with the first two 5th wheel hitches...maybe that's a story for another time.

Hope your vacation soon becomes more vacation-like!

Safe travels.

[Tombstone]

For those that were concerned Friday was a much better day.

Doc and I were going to ride no matter what, we suited up about 9:00 and headed out at 9:30 at a balmy 58 degrees partly cloudy morning. First stop was the carwash to knock the top layer of grime off of the bikes. Dang I had never seen them so dirty. Got that out of the way had headed out to unknown destinations. Now anyone who has traveled with me as leader knows I really don’t have much of a sense of direction and rely heavily on maps and the sun. Anyway, I had a route in mind with the hwy numbers I wanted to take in my mind. And we were on our way.

We traveled up Hwy 52 about 35 miles and came to a sign that said “PAVEMENT ENDS.” Must have been fortuitous because it was right at the intersection of the next road I was looking for.  We turned on the Hwy 59 and this is the first sign we see.
See image 1 below

I stopped and asked Doc if he had seen that sign and did he have enough fuel to make it through and he did of course. Now if you know much about motorcycles especially the big ones you will know you get about 200 miles to a tank which is what I get if I will stay off of the throttle and keep it below 3000 RPM. After some higher math I decided I could make it to the next fuel stop with about 20 miles to spare if I would take it easy on the gas. Since we were traveling unfamiliar mountain roads I figured I had it made. We went back into the Gila National Forest, I say back because we have been in this forest twice before on last years trip. After about 35 miles of wonderful riding and a very high elevation for us we came to this sign. Also the pavement ended at this point.
see image 2 below

Still figuring we could make it, (also right at the point of no return for me with a little over half a tank of gas) we persevered. A hundred yards later we see this sign.
See image 3 below

Still going to give it a try, about a mile later we get on the single lane road which is rough gravel and rocks about the size of a childs fist. That was the end for me. Told Doc I did not think this was going to work for 56 more miles and we turned around. This was not a bad thing, the scenery was totally different going the other way and we may as well been on a new road. Also got to see a new pet that would have made a great hatband but was unwilling to work with me as you can see from this photo. (wont allow me to post another pic so I will try to post it next)

Got back to Truth or Consequence with about 20 miles to spare, met the ladies for lunch and Doc and I headed back out for a few more miles down around Elephant Butte Lake which is about 30 feet low due to the Rio Grand being diverted for other uses and also an ongoing drought.

Made it back to camp, the ladies had arranged to have the bikes, my truck and the campers detailed over the next few days. Weather today is questionable to whether Doc and I will ride but we will have clean bikes for a ride on Monday.

More tomorrow.

[Tombstone]

Tried to get a new hat band but he was having nothing to do with it. Notice there were no rattles on this snake but had a heck of a head and strike.