Ride 4 - Mesquite, NV - 7/11/09

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I finally did my long-awaited Mesquite ride, and an eventful ride it was! I had contacted two friends from motorcycle school, Renee and Dolores, and they wanted to come along with Stephen and I. I had set a time for 9am to meet in Santa Clara and head out. Stephen told me on Friday night "we should probably go earlier, like even 7am. This ride is going to be very hot". It's not like riding to cool Pine Valley. But I couldn't contact everyone in time, so we stuck with 9am.

Unfortunately Dolores had to cancel and then Stephen's rear brake went out that morning. So it was just Renee and I. We got going about 9:30am and hide a nice ride to Mesquite. Renee was worried she'd look like a newb, but she did great.

So we hit a convenience store in Mesquite and hung out for a while to rest before the ride back. I called my sister Janet who lives in Mesquite for a possible visit, but couldn't reach her and so left a message. As we were ready to depart, my motorcycle... was dead. Just wouldn't even make a noise. The lights would come on but that was about it.

Coincidentally, Renee had just learned from her dad how to push-start a bike and the poor girl pushed me around the parking lot forever trying to pop it into life, but to no avail. At least we didn't try this (haha):



To make a loooong story short, after talking to a Harley biker, after calling a bunch of people including my brother Stephen, after losing my glasses, after pushing the bike to two auto parts dealers, we finally got the thing jumped to life! The little lady at the Mesquite AutoZone rocked. Awesome customer service. Janet had gotten my message by that point and came out to meet us at AutoZone. She took my happy picture in the shade (it was HOT outside).



The funny thing was that I left my helmet in the helmet lock, so I had to (really fast) turn off the bike, pull out the key, unlock the helmet, and restart the bike. It worked (whew)!

So we rode back and I clicked a few pictures of the ride, shown below. Due to the casual pace of the ride and the hassle in Mesquite, I got home at 1:30pm. Four and a half hours after meeting. Much longer than I thought the ride would take (sorry Renee!). I also hadn't realized how truly hot it was. When I got off my bike from home, I was sweating like a dog. It took a while for my body to cool down. How did humans live in this area before air conditioning? (P.S. - I found my glasses after all, I had stuffed them in a pocket of my bike bag)

So that was the adventure. Let me describe the ride. It really was a beautiful trip.

North Half: The variety through the Shivwits Reservation was eye-candy. There are so many cool hills and types of rock. The road is very curvy which is always tons of fun to ride. And the trees! The dead trees are totally awesome. Apparently a major forest fire went through there years ago and the entire first part of the trip is filled with these gnarly, charred trees. I am so not an arborist, so I'm not sure what kind of trees they were (I think Juniper? no idea). Very twisted branches. Because the trip already took so long, I didn't stop to take tree pictures. I will do a "dead tree tour" another time though.

We passed an abandoned building that was falling apart. It had an old flagpole in front of it, so maybe it used to be a school or something? I'm not sure when it was built, but it looked very old. Click all pictures to see them large.



On the final edge of the curvy part of the ride we passed a funky cave. I think it was supposed to be the start of a mine-shaft or something.



I had seen the outside of the cave from the road on many car-trips in the past but never stopped before. I had this grand vision of some totally cool cavern or something. Well, in reality it went back about 20-30 feet and was unfortunately filled with litter, old couch cushions, and the smell of urine. We didn't stay in there too long.



Here is Renee's bike out in front of the cave. I believe she thinks her bike is cooler than mine. Hmm, you decide...



South Half: After the reservation, the curvy hills completely stop and the land spreads out in a vast, flat wasteland. Very cool to behold from the higher elevation. The road goes completely straight in a long grey line as it descends to Littlefield, AZ. As we dropped into the valley, I started to feel the heat kick me in the face. It didn't feel good.

The forest fire had spread to the first part of this stretch, and the trees had changed to Joshua trees. The dead joshua trees looked like they came straight out of a Dr. Seuss book. Insane shapes. Again, I will get some cool pics the next time I go.

The next time I do this trip it will be a little different. I will:

• leave earlier so the heat doesn't kill people.
• stop at Janet's house and swim in her pool. Partay!!
• take pictures of many dead trees.

Who wants to come?!

Ride 3 - Pine Valley and Cedar City, UT - 7/3/09 - 7/5/09

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Over the holiday weekend I took a nice long ride up to Pine Valley and then to Cedar City via Enterprise and back, broken up by a few days. I had originally planned to ride with Stephen down to Mesquite to visit our sister Janet, but Tamari's family was having a reunion up in Pine Valley over the 4th of July, so I had to (got to?) attend that instead.

I decided I still wanted to ride because it had been a while since my last journey. I rode up Route 18 to Pine Valley during the afternoon of Friday, July 3rd. It was a beautiful and peaceful ride. I have driven up there a few times before in a car, but it's a completely different experience on a motorcycle. I just seem so much more aware of the surroundings and the mountains. I also am more aware of the nature close by... like the flowers on the side of the road and the birds zipping in front of and around my bike.

When I arrived at the West family reunion (Tamari's maiden name), I was quickly greeted by two of her bike-riding siblings, Annie and Terry. Annie said she learned on a Honda Shadow like mine and she has a Harley now. Terry told me of his 10 bikes (wow). They were both impressed by my ride and that felt good.

Unfortunately I had rehearsal shortly afterward, so I drove the car to Cedar City and back. But the next day, the 4th of July, I decided to ride motorcycle to Cedar City for rehearsal, a 64 mile ride one-way from Pine Valley. I was worried about the return trip because I wasn't sure what time we would get finished with rehearsal and I didn't want to ride back in the dark. But rehearsal ended at 9pm and it was still a little light outside, so I decided to skip the fireworks in Cedar and just ride back to Pine Valley that night.

Finally I rode back home to Santa Clara on Sunday, making a total round trip mileage of about 200 miles. On my way home to Santa Clara, I took a small detour to Mountain Meadow to view the tragically historic site of the 1857 massacre of 120 people.

This first picture shows the site where the original encampment was at the south end of the valley where the first fighting took place and some people died (click pics for larger view).



This second picture is about a mile North up the valley (to the right of the first pic) where the settlers were betrayed and massacred.



It was sobering to look out at the beautiful landscape knowing what awful bloodshed had occurred over 150 years ago. It's like the valley still held a melancholy about it.

I had a few milestones on this trip. The first milestone was that for much of the trip I rode at 70mph (a few times to 75), the fastest I've ever ridden before. It was rather fun and I feel confident that I will soon be ready for freeway speeds. The difference is that on a freeway there are multiple lanes with large vehicles passing you at even faster speeds. This included 18-wheelers. Yikes.

The second milestone is that much of my return trip from Cedar was at night. Luckily there was a full moon, but it was still a bit scary at 65 to 70 mph. The cool breeze was so refreshing and there was something about riding at night that was mystical. I was on some pretty middle-of-nowhere roads at 10pm on the 4th of July and saw almost no traffic. It was like the night belonged to me alone. Well, it belonged to me and the three deer I suddenly saw standing on the side of the road. Heart attack. "Stay there little deer, please don't jump in front of this speeding piece of metal!" Thank goodness for high-beams.

The last milestone was that this was my first solo ride, at least over any distance. I didn't have Stephen with me. It was good for me because I realize how much more fun it is to ride with other people. It's just neat to share the experience. The only way I can share this ride now is by writing this blog, but nobody has the memory but me. The good part about it was that I was able to ride over an hour straight without feeling the pressure to stop or wondering if the other person is tired or needs to pee or something.

I also made a few discoveries. I discovered that after about 45+ minutes straight on the bike going at high speeds, my nose starts to itch. I am not sure why, but I think it's because of all of the vibrations running through me start to tickle my nose after a while. Also, once you get off of a motorcycle after riding for over an hour straight, all of your extremities are practically asleep. Very funky "pins and needles" feeling going on all over the body.

Here are a few last pics of Pine Valley. The mountains are beautiful. I saw a few huge birds that I thought were large hawks or maybe eagles, but after seeing them more closely, I think they were buzzards. At one point I saw about dozen of them together perched on the trees or circling around.

View Southeast from our camp.



A nice rock formation on a hill riding out from Pine Valley.



Large buzzard in the sky that wanted to eat me.