Well I've been busy again. Not busy blogging, admittedly. I'm way behind in that department, but busy nevertheless. You know, riding and stuff. I dragged myself away from Santa Fe somewhat reluctantly and headed northwards to Taos. A trendy mountain town of more artists and craftspersons, and now a lot of rubberneckers. Dennis Hopper once had a house here I believe. I stopped for lunch, then decided it was too busy, and headed up the road to Colorado Springs. Time to rendezvous with Kaz and share the road for the next three weeks. I dodged another bullet, weatherwise. I no sooner checked in to a budget motel in the meth district when the heavens opened and the city was lashed with a furious hailstorm.
Fortunately the motel had something rare in a place so otherwise crappy......undercover parking. The stormwater drains backed up and flooded the car park but the bike and its owner stayed as dry as a pommy's towel. Interesting suburb though. Lots of dilapidated motels, (and much uglier than those in Tucumcari) but the real highlight was the walk to the bottle shop down the street. Just outside this particular establishment was derro's corner. I was a little edgy and expected trouble (eg abuse, robbery, knifing, etc) everytime I walked past. I had to visit the local laundromat to do a giant load of washing. I mean even riding clothes lose their lemony freshness after a few months. Even some of the hobos were in there doing their washing. At first I recoiled from the concept of sharing laundry facilities with life's malodorous unfortunates and neer-do-wells, but they fled in panic when I opened my laundry bag. After that, I had real street cred and nobody bothered me at all.
First item on the agenda now that we were going 2up was repacking. It took us a couple of attempts to get it right and set the bike up for it, but once we got to that stage it was all good. And having ESA helps a lot. Second item was attacking Pike's Peak. We could see it from the motel, alternately covered by cloud then clearing enticingly. Rumour around the manor was that it had been snowing up there. There was a narrow window of opportunity with all the flukey weather, so time was of the essence. Off we went, then took a wrong turn due to some confusion between the GPS and some roadworks detour signs and got thoroughly lost. Valuable time was wasted in locating the correct road, and when we finally got to the gate, we were told that the top of the ascent was closed due to snow. Bugger it. But we headed up anyway, expecting to find a barrier or gate at some point. The ascent was a bit tricky, and quite technical. Not to mention unnerving, with steep hairpins, no armco, and oncoming traffic. There were no signs saying closed, so we just kept climbing. The road became wet and slippery, and near the peak, heavy clouds were rolling in and we could feel the temperature dropping. Finally, within sight of our goal, and confronted by a very steep 180 deg right handed hairpin, I blinked. Very good chance of dropping the bike on that one! Kaz got off, I made a careful 3 point turn, and we decided to head back down. Oh well, too bad. People have turned back within metres of the summit of Everest. But it was a great ride, and one hell of a view from up there. As for racing up there, well, they're just nuts!!
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