2020: across the prairie and down the rio grande

Moths, what is it about these moths?  i think i first ran into them in colorado.  i remember waking up and having to chase a couple out of my tent.  at lathrop state park in colorado, when i woke up they were in everything:  my tent, paniers, handle bar bag, they were even in my riding gloves.  and now here in albuquerque they're not renting the ground floor rooms because they've had a moth infestation. well, anyway, today was my final ride.  70 miles, including one healthy climb.  i stopped just before the crest to rest and enjoy the view.  while i was reclined on a guardrail, a convertible sports car came by, going uphill.  an older man driving.  and in the passenger seat was his bicycle laid out. he looked at me, i just smiled and waved. it was a day for convertibles.  and for motorcycles. sunny, not too hot, memorial day weekend.  cautious of gathering, why not just go for a ride in the mountains?  there ar...

sleeping in a real bed, warm and snug can be an unappreciated event some of the time. downtown to cruise the galleries.  part of the ride in is along an active railroad line.  well, it will be active again starting may 30th.  the new mexico railrunner, santa fe to albuquerque.  how nice is that?  it'd be like a nashville to knoxville or knoxville to chattanooga train.  wow, what a thought.   and the city promoted a development along about a mile of the route, including a park, some housing, art studio, art school, offices and farmer's market.  the farmers market was wide open.  masks and distance requirements in effect, though hard to maintain.          farmer's market inside and out (active rail to left off frame) santa fe survives off tourism now.  oh, and it's the state capitol, of course.  though interesting enough, i never saw the actual capitol.  but definitely some beaurocratic s...

after a cold night in the tent, there's the challenge of getting up.  it takes awhile.  fortunately, the camp site was legal and there was no need to hurry.  but eventually packed and up and riding again.  if i'm camping, i never take time to make tea or eat anything.  pack and start riding.  after 10, 15 or sometimes even 20 miles i'll find a place fo stop and get something. the riding is usually best early. in this particular time and place, the wind had died down over night and the ride was a slow, rolling downhill.  i slipped it into top gear and was off.  long sleeve shirt and riding jacket on. the landscape was more sage brush, but now the fields were sprinkled with run down trailers surrounded by dilapidated vehicles of all sorts.  i guess it must be pretty hard to find a place to get rid of some of that junk.  it just collects. then i started to see these strange structures, more earth covered, all facing south with broad bands o...

7:30 in the morning and i'm drinking a hot cup of tea and eating an almond croissant in santa fe plaza.  it's amazingly peaceful and quiet.  a few joggers pass through, an occassional automobile.   the shadows are still long, but it's starting to warm up.  the light is so much more intense here, colors brighter, yet earthy. it was cold again last night.  i was up early, tired, but packed up and immediately finished climbing up to the mountain pass at 7,400 ft.  turns out i had done all but a few hundred feet the day before.  i could feel that in my legs.  the road through the pass might as well be an interstate, 3 lanes and wide shoulder in each direction.  i got caught on it and couldn't get off because of concrete barriers limiting access, but traffic was light that early in the morning.  i reached the top and looked down on the valley.  saw the road i wanted to be on, but couldn't figure out how to get there, so ...

         leaving alamosa i left alamosa around 9:30, too late to beat the wind.  though to be honest, i don't know that there was an early enough.  but i left with the right attitude, it was going to be a long day, i wanted to be in santa fe in 3 days and any progress i made today would help in achieving that.  i was camping out, so it really didn't matter where i stopped.  i did have my eye on a piece of national forest about 60 miles away. it took 1 1/2 hours to reach the first town where there was food, la jara. 15 miles.  normally, that's closer to an hour.  i made a stop for what had become a reliable source of protein and what minimal vegetables i eat, a 6"tuna sub with everything on it, extra mayo (yeah, paul, mayo).  unlike in la junta, they ley me eat outside at their only picnic table, building blocking the wind and sun, staring at the old railroad depot.          la ja...

my anxiety levels have been unusually high this trip.  it's not because of covid, though i certainly think that plays apart.  not the virus itself, but the side effects. the rules, at least the ones followed, are different everywhere.  i've had different breakfast arrangements in multiple hotels.  One has a light breakfast of only prepared, prepackaged food; one has no prepared hot food but not necessarily prepackaged; and this one has no open breakfast area at all, they have a paper bag for each guest with water, an apple, and two granola bars.   the restaurants i've seen are take out only.  some won't let you inside, some won't let you sit outside, either.  If there is an inside counter, usually the employees are wearing masks, customers optional, distancing agreed on.  yesterday, i stopped at a cafe that only allowed me in to use the bathroom if i wore a mask and washed my hands.  they let me sit outside, i was the only one, and the s...

i'm sitting in my hotel room listening to the wind blow 30+mph.  if i look out the window, i see a dust storm billowing.  not unlike the one i had to ride through heading across the san luis valley from ft. gardner to alamosa. the day started out at sunrise, a little cool, clear, with the wind out of west.  which is where i was headed.  30 mi. to la veta pass and i shifted down multiple gears, eventually swallowing my pride and running on my 2nd largest back gear.  the front stayed on the big chain ring, keeping the smaller for the climb.  this was before the mountain. finally made the actual mountain and i never changed gears, 2nd largest in back, largest in front.  wasn't doing 60-80 rpm, mind you, but i made it all the way up like that.  hard work, but felt great to do that.   no great vista at the top for a reward, but there was a pleasant alpine valley on the other side with the road snaking down it.  sat in the gra...

day 8 i knew this was going to happen, but it's odd none the less.  a week ago i was wet and freezing, looking for shelter, preferably dry and with a hot shower.  yesterday i was praying for water and the sun and heat were going to waste me away. i did a stupid and naive thing, but got away with it.  i wouldn't want to test that kind of luck too many times.  i left john martin reservoir early in the morning under spectacular purple and yellow sunrise.  27 miles got me to bent's old fort, an adobe fort on the santa fe.  the inside was closed, but i could walk the site.  another 7 miles got me into la junta.  to a subway, where i got a tuna sub, a big drink, and illegally filled my water bottles.  seriously, it is against shutdown rules to refill a water bottle.                                           Old bent's fort, santa fe ...

i was thinking about what doesn't exist in kansas, or rather what i haven't seen since i've been riding:     let's start with the most obvious:  mountains .  there are the flint hills.  but these are hills in the sense of fort sanders, not the foothills, the foothills parkway.  no self respecting east tennessean would refer to these as hills.     trash .  there is no trash on the side of the road.  if you see an aluminum can or plastic bottle, it's an anomaly.  i could probably count on both hands the number of cans i've seen.     glass .  absolutely no glass on the shoulders of the road.  believe me, a biker's bane on highway shoulders is all the debris.  i watch for it all the time, i don't like getting flats.  don't know if they sell glass bottles, i've never looked.     churches .  i don't know where they are.  i'm sure they're here.  i remember the original immigrants were ...

i was lucky last night.  i stopped at the rest area to camp because it had good concealment and also a picnic shelter if i needed it.  there was a chance of a thunder storm.  as i waited, i could see some storms in the distance, but it looked like they would slide by to the north.   then towards dusk, the clouds filled out to the west, coming my way.  i could see the lightening miles away.  i opted to put the tent up under the shelter.  brilliant move, as it turns out.  in the middle of the night i woke up to the wind buffeting the tent, i was the only thing holding it down. gusts would blow, the tent would rock,  then everything would go still.  then the lightening, then the thunder.  finally the rain.  in the morning, the wind was blowing strong, but the storm had passed and me and all my gear were dry.  not long after i got up, packed, dressed, the wind died down, too.  a quick couple of mile ride ...

day 5 what a day.  what a day.          ness city, ks public park spent the night in an abanddoned city park shelter in ness city.  worked out great.  temps finally rose a little to where it was perfect in just the sleeping bag.  got up for my usual pee in the middle of night and went back to get my glasses.  the sky was clear for the first time in 3 nights and the stars were magnificent.  i've never seen the dipper that bright. the morning started out well, sunny, a little cool.  a few miles out of town i noticed this cloud bank syraight ahead and to the north.  the wind had changed from yesterday's southern to out of the north, northeast.  cooler.  the bank moved in and soon i was riding in fog.  that lasted awhile, 30 min or so, then it broke up, but soon clouds descended and blanketed the area.  i had a cool, windy rain again.  after another 30+ minutes, i stopped at a convenient st...

Corona virus.  people in kansas seem much like tennessee.  i've been keeping to myself, of course, so i'm really not meeting anyone.  it's tough in this weather, because i would like to go inside, sit down and warm up.  but i can't. it was 30 miles before i even saw a store today.  little country place that you might not have even known was open if you didn't look hard.  old abandoned  gas station at the cross roads.  the pumps closed, service bays were storage.  inside was a clerk, no face mask or shield at the register, bathrooms were open, 3 tables in the back, but all very clean.  not a single face mask to be seen. 10 miles down the road was a rest area, historical marker.  toilets were open, everything was very clean.  didn't touch a thing except a door pull and that was with a single, gloved finger. and now i'm camping in a city park, having not seen or talked to a soul.  ness city, about 120 mi. from col...

Gray, misty, 45 deg all day.  an unexpected, but much welcomed, light tail wind and good, flat road made the cycling easy.  made it to great bend and a comfort inn. 85 mi.  feeling a little guilty, but warm and dry.  it rained lightly most of the night, everything is wet.  currently still gray and misty, but supposed to clear out and warm up to mid 60's. i'll fess up to skipping cheyanne bottoms refuge.  i even turned on the road, but when i looked down that highway and thought of riding 7 more miles out there and then back, i couldn't do it.  sorry chris. i've been lucky with the wind, so far, but today will change some of that.  15-20 mph with stronger gusts coming out of the south.  still not riding straight into it, but the crosswind, especially the gusts, may cause some problems.  the road is good, the shoulder is only 18-24 inches wide.  wasn't a problem at all yesterday, but the crosswinds may be an issue. the traffic is not ...

cold and wet.  i ran into the rain between the tallgrass prairie nature reserve and florence.  i did make myself take the time to see the bison at the reserve.  it required a mile hike to their pasture.  not supposed to get within a hundred yards of them, they're orenery and can charge.  on top of that, i noticed earlier in the day that the cattle seem particularly stimulated by my red jacket.  the tend to stare and come toards me.  i did see the bison, ,though, but being too close was not an issue, the were a 1/4 to 1/2 mile away.  had to use suzi's trusty binoculars to see really them.          kansas limestone barn at tall grasses to make it worse, i was cruisng so nicely for awhile on a 25 mi long, flat road, that i nissed a turn.  didn't realize it for 20 mi.  neede a 7-8 mi ride northward to get back on track.  in the rain, oc course. by then i was getting col and wet and i was ...

i'm in the flint hills of kansas, before things go flat, i'm told.  Flint is limestone and shale.  it's not to far under the surface, so this area has a fair amount of cattle ranches.  the hills are small, rolling and seem to come in ridges spaced relatively far apart.  the fields are green this time of year, apparently they burn the old pasture off in the winter.  in low areas there are tilled fields, the new plowed earth is dark and rich.  the hills are pleasant, especially the wave of green pasture against the sky.  the soil sloughs in a lot of places so there are gaping maws in the side of the hills, which creates a wonderful texture. the original tallgrass prairie is gone except in a few places.  coming down the road, heading to the tallgrass nature reserve, i saw the light brown, straw colored hills in the distance, markedly different than the green.  it was the tall grasses.  the nature reserve was acres and acres of r...