Route 66, Day 2 Here we go......

Day one was just a grind up to Denton,TX so we could get some miles behind us. Day 2 was a straight shot to Muskogee, OK. Tomorrow is a straight shot to Joplin, Mo so we can start Route 66 on Monday. Check the "Where is Dave" link on the right side column to see where I am and see the route that we are taking. It is more or less real time tracking, usually about 15-30 minute lag.

Enjoy

Dave

Quick trip to Ft Worth

I decided to take a quick trip up to Ft Worth to see family. It was a rather nice little ride. It was all interstate miles, just a chance to shake down a bit more before the big trip. I am starting to get used to the tank bag. It is kind of nice to be able to lay on it when I am tucked. I also ran the wire from the Garmin mount under my tank so I plug my headphones in under my seat now, and I don't have a wire flopping around in the wind. That was very nice.

The only real out of the ordinary thing that happened was a butterfly. I actually saw it come over the semi in front of me, get caught in the slipstream, and get sucked into the vortex behind my fairing. Basically, I got a cup-shot from a butterfly. I felt the impact, I kept going. When I made it to Waco, I pulled off to get coffee and gas, and here is what I saw:



Wow, one in a million shot.....

Two out of Three Ain't Bad.....

Here is the quick slide show of the pictures that were taken for the weekend.




After the top end work on the R90, there had to be a shakedown trip. This was it, and it was fun. Angela and I started off toward Kerrville to see if we could knock out all 3 sisters in the weekend. It really isn't that far, but it is a bit of work due to the curves.

Day one was just the ride out there. It was just a nice leisurely ride. No big excitement. It was nice to discover that the little switchback on Hamilton Pool road has finally been re-surfaced, it was actually almost easy this time. The bit thing that stood out on this leg of the trip was the flowers. All of them. We managed to go right at the end of the bluebonnet season, and right when everything else was coming up. There wasn't a real safe place with a lot of flowers to get pictures, but the smell of all of those flowers was trapped in my helmet with me for a couple days. Here was the route we took out there:


View Larger Map


Day 2 was the loop out into the hills. We got a late start on the ride due to the fact that a hailstorm blew through with 70mph winds Friday night, and we went out at 3am and moved the bikes under the hotel awning just before the hail started falling. We got the bikes back into parking spots and locked down in time to be in bed by 4:30. Needless to say, we started Saturday late. We decided to cut one of the sisters off because it required some back tracking and we wanted to take a more leisurely ride that day and get some pics. Here is the shot of the R90 in front of a huge field of yellow flowers and the hills in the background:






One of the big gripes everybody who rides has is that they get lots of pictures of their bike, and lots of pictures of them beside their bike, but no pictures of them actually riding. Well, there is a photographer that has set up on the curves on Ranch Road 337 to get some shots of you as you go through. You pay to download them, but it really isn't that bad. Here is the shot of me going into the big curve:



And here is the shot of me coming out of the curve taken by the second photographer.





After we got to Camp Wood, we decided to go back to Leakey, The Home of the Leaky Eagles (don't look up), and just take RR 336 north instead of RR335, that way we could go check out the Rio Frio Bike Stop.

The trip back up 336 was very.....busy. There are a pretty good number of curves out there, and they are fairly high stakes. This was the road where I met the redneck squirrel. Coming out of a curve I see a squirrel running across the road. About the time he gets to my front wheel, he jumps up and bounces off my fork leg and then runs back off the side of the road where he came from. I just know that somewhere off in those bushes there was a raccoon holding that squirrel's beer.

Getting back to the hotel went smoothly. There is so much awesome scenery out there. If you haven't been, go...if you have been, go back. Especially in the spring.

Here is the route for Sat:


View Larger Map

For the trip back, we decided to take the long way around. We went up TX16 all the way to Llano, and then wrapped back around 1431 through Marble Falls. TX16 north from Fredericksburg is not incredibly curvy, and it is pretty flat, but the scenery is actually fairly nice, especially when the flowers are out. Here is our route back home.



View Larger Map

to the gym....and back again....

I don't normally post about the little rides to and from work or to and from the gym....but today was kind of neat. I am trying to get my head settled for a little get away next week. This was a nice chilly day with the new jacket I am trying to get used to. It is a new cut, new material, and full level 2 armor. the weight is totally different, and it has a whole different feel in the wind.

Getting on the highway was normal Austin traffic, which is to say 3 lanes bumper to bumper at 10 mph. only 5 miles to the gym, and it will probably take me 30 min to get there. Just about the time I get to the exit before the gym, I realize that it is almost sundown. I notice because I see the bats leaving the bridge. Everybody talks about the bats under the congress ave bridge, but rumor has it that the colony under the bridge at McNeil and I35 is actually bigger. As I ride up on it I see the bats coming out in their slow spiral. Now, usually I am doing about 65mph through here so I would not have actually seen much. Today the traffic was at a standstill. I am feet down, waiting for the car in front of me to move, and I notice that there is a hawk making fast passes through the swarm of bats. I have seen that happen on TV, but never in person. I don't know why it struck me to watch, but it was mesmerizing. When traffic moved, so did I. I got to the gym, worked out, and went home to dinner.

TTFN

Dave

Gotta get away.....Wrapup

Well, I made it back home in one piece. Never really worried about it, but there were a few moments of WTFO..... On the whole it was a very calming ride. Day one saw me up and out of Austin around 9:30. The rule for the day was 100 miles or more between gas stops, and ride till I was sick of it. I made it all the way to Norman, OK before I was ready to stop. Once I crossed the border into OK, the wind shifted and started blowing across the highway. The last 120 miles in a 30mph crosswind took the steam out. By the time I hit Ardmore, I was ready to stop so I figured Norman would be a good place to end up. I got in around 5:00 or so. I probably could have made it all the way to Edmond, but that would have put me in downtown OKC during rush hour, and I really didn't want that. I figured, hit the shower, hit dinner, then hit the bed.

Saturday morning it was up and on my way to Pop's Route 66. Turns out they were having the Route 66 Corvette show that day. I rolled in on a classic BMW surrounded by Corvettes. It was almost surreal. I parked in motorcycle parking.....being on RT66, Pop's has a large area set aside for motorcycle parking. I don't know if they plan it this way or not, but the Harleys fill in the parking from Right to left, and the Beemers fill in the parking left to right. The others park from the middle out. This was where I heard the conversation that showed me the difference between people who ride Harleys and people who ride BMWs. While I was at the BMW end of the line, people were comparing gear. One guy was talking about how he can't imagine riding in anything other than armored boots. When I got down to the Harley end of the line, I listened to two guys discussing exactly how little coverage the helmet could have and still be legal. It really shocked me to come to the realization that it seally came down to that the Harley riders laugh at you for wearing too much gear, and the BMW riders laugh at you for not wearing enough. I never guessed it would come down to something that simple.

After Pop's, I followed old 66 down to I-40 to stop by the OKC BMW dealership. I like to stop by dealerships whenever I am near to have a cup of coffee and hang out for a few. It lets me rest and chat with locals and find out where the road construction is. After leaving there, I went up to Yukon, and followed Old 66 down to just outside of Bridgeport, OK to turn ad go to Red Rock Canyon over by Hinton, OK. I promised Angela I would bring back a red rock for her. I forgot that the place is made of sandstone, so I started off with a fairly sizable rock, and after riding back to Denton, I found a much smaller rock and a lot of dust..... While I poked around the canyon I saw another person on a BMW R1200RT. We chatted for a few minutes, and I saw a patch on his jacket that made me chuckle "I ride too often, too far, and too fast to ride a Harley". That just made me chuckle a bit. The rest of the day was spent filtering down various back roads and secondary highways to get back into Denton, TX.

When I made it back to Denton, I checked the forecast. It seems that Austin had been put under a fairly significant thunderstorm warning, and I really didn't want to mess with riding in a thunderstorm all the way home after such a nice trip, so I decided to head back on Sunday morning. I still have Monday and Tuesday off from work, so I will likely do some riding then, weather permitting.

Once the decision to head back was made, the ride was fairly easy. I rode straight through from Denton to Waco, and stopped at the Starbucks to have coffee. Of course, there was the same group of guys that are there every weekend on their bikes, so we sat around and talked for a couple hours while I had coffee and let my hands stop vibrating. I ended up having to shuck most of my layers in Waco, and I still ended up being hot by the time I got back to Austin. When I left Denton this morning, it was around 40 degrees. When I rolled into Austin at 3:00, it was over 80. I love Texas weather....Hope for the best, plan for the worst, deal with what you get.

Oh well, I am home and alive. My brain is in buch better shape than when I left, and I can really tell the time I have been spending in the gym is paying off in mileage. 350+ per day and I am not as tore up as I really thought I would be. My brain is mushy, but my body is still good.

Here is the last day's route:


View Larger Map

gotta get away.....Day 2

Up and running about 8:00 this morning. Made my way up to Pop's. Got a hold of an awesome vanilla cream soda. Here is a shot of the bottle:



I stopped on the way to get a shot of the bike in front of the RT 66 mural in Edmond.



I went ahead and ran route 66 out to the turnoff to Hinton to go to Red Rock Canyon. It was still about what I remember, a big red hole in the ground.



The trip back south got me to Denton, the weather wasn't bad, but the wind was fairly ugly across the middle of Oklahoma.

I think all of the bugs that didn't want to die in the first freeze of the year decided to commit suicide on my visor.



oh well, I am beat...here is the route for today:


View Larger Map

gotta get away.....

Today was a very nice ride. This day was all about riding until I was done riding. I just jumped on I-35 and went north until I was ready to stop. I made it to norman, ok. It was only about 370 miles or so, but i managed to miss them, but only barely.it was enough.

Only a couple real interesting things today. Just after the split at hillsboro, the car in front of me spooked a flock of birds that were hanging out beside the road. When they flew, they decided to cross the highway. That was exhilarating. The other little bit of excitement was just north of ardmore, ok. The speed limit up there is 70mph. The crosswind was about 30mph. I got passed by a semi who was going around 80. That little adventure was enough to convince me that I would be going however fast I needed to go to not get passed by another semi.

The route for tomorrow looks like I will probably go up to pops and get breakfast, then head over to redrock canyon, then start heading back south.

Here is the route for today:


View Larger Map