Day 6 - Diverse

Day 6 - Diverse - 359 miles today - 1845 miles total!

Have you worked on a computer connection lately that was really slow? That is the hotels connection -really slow! That being said, my entry tonight is going to be a bit different. I will post my Captain's Log tomorrow night along with a Co-Pilot's Memo. Oh yeah, I got her in front of the camera! You'll see. So there will be fewer pictures too. Sorry.

So we left Dodge City, Kansas around 10am... yeah, I know, I know... real early start! Right? Well, we were exhausted from a night full of disturbances. One of which was the tornado they were tracking close to Dodge City, traveling southeast. It looked like the tornadic activity was going to miss us but I stayed up till it looked like a sure thing. Then at 3am we were awakened to giant hail balls pounding off of our hotel window accompanied by lightning, thunder, wind and rain. Sound familiar? Of course, I flipped on the tv to see if there was a change in the prediction and found this to be only a severe thunder storm. Good news, no damage to the bike and nearly all of the bugs were washed off the front.

Now we can literally say that we, "Got the heck out of Dodge!"

The feeding pens around there are huge and some of them span entire hillsides. WOW, do they ever stink! We drove past countless penning areas from Dodge City to Oklahoma and they were all the same - "plug your nose or you're gonna die" smelly!

The diversity in the land was quite amazing. Now, make no mistake about it - we drive for hours looking at the same thing. We didn't think we would ever get out of Kansas! The plains simply go on and on forever! Then, as we were actually nearing the end of the plains, some bugs decided that any moving vehicle was sufficient to test out its super powers on! Of course, the bugs lost. They were plastered all over the front of my bike. I wasn't alone though, every oncoming car was pelted with them too!

But eventually, the land actually began to rise and fall a bit as we neared Oklahoma, which was really exciting. The landscape began to transform into dessert reminding us of our stay in California's High Desert after we were married.

Then Dawn started spotting antelope. It was really cool to see so many of them - we saw more than twenty of them! "Where the deer and the antelope play" The only thing was, they weren't playing anything - must have been sick or something!

On our wildlife tour today, we also saw two coyotes. We had stopped to take some pictures and these cows behind us started calling. Dawn thought they were calling us. Then they started running across the pasture like we were going to feed them or something. That's when Dawn spotted two coyote running ahead of the cows and they too, had decided it was time to get out of Dodge! They left the pasture, crossed the road then stopped to look back - I'm sure they were embarrassed that the cows chased them away! Go figure!

Another very interesting moment was when we were cruising along on the two way raceway, Route 56 (a 65mph two lane that everyone goes way faster on!) when a mustang comes up behind me, then safely passes. There is hardly anyone on these stretches of roadway so that wasn't a problem. Then an oncoming vehicle throws on his lights, slams on his brakes, and whips his car around right in front of me, goes off the road and continues bringing it around in the dirt next to the road and swings it up into my lane. It's a policeman with all his lights a-blazing! I slam on the brakes (of course, at 70mph a vehicle doing a u-turn in front of you does not have to be right on top of you to seem too close!). Poor Dawn nearly had a heart attack!

The weather was fantastic all day for us. Mid 70's and spotty clouds. Thank you, Lord! And the deeper we traveled into New Mexico, the more impressive it became. We were thrilled to see a mountain way out on the horizon, and the closer we got to the mountain range, the more snow we noticed on the tops of them!

As we drove into the Cimmeron Canyon State Park, I simply could not take enough pictures! The roads were perfect motorcycle roads with tons of curves, some switchbacks, a stream running next to the road and fantastic scenery - all of this with very few guiderails! Then as we crested the summit of the pass, we were greeted with a fabulous view of Trout Lake in Eagle Nest, NM! Dawn just wanted to get to the hotel but was a great sport when I stopped to get one last picture!

We liked the area so much that we stopped in at the Econolodge, right here in Eagle Nest and decided not to continue the last 30 miles to Taos! I haven't seen an eagle yet, but we are gonna look some more tomorrow!

Actually, the plan is to finish our trek across Route 64 to Farmington. Sounds like a game plan to me! Till then, may God richly bless you, too!

This is the view from our room. The lake is on the other side. Too cool!