Days 16 and 17 - Heading home

The last 2 days of our journey would be a final push through the desert with an overnight stop at Brad's Mom's house.  I was a little nervous because I had become sick on our first day out when temperatures hit 108.

We said our goodbyes to guys from The Ride Central and head south on I-15 through Las Vegas.  One of the best parts of the ride between So. Utah and Las Vegas in the Virgin River Canyons you go though in the north west tip of Arizona.

We hit some wind heading across, stopped at Las Vegas Harley to pick up a shirt for a gift/donation to an active service man. 

The winds seemed to subside slightly as we moved across the desert and the traffic for a Sunday was not too bad between Las Vegas, NV and Apple Valley, CA.   I was wearing a cooling vest and happy to see the "World's Tallest Thermometer" was only reading 102 degrees when we hit Baker, CA. It was much cooler then it had been only a couple of days ago and even though it did make it to 106, it was only for a short period and we managed to make it to Brad's Mom's with out trouble.

Monday around 11am we headed for home the wind was kicking up pretty bad and we didn't want the hassle of extreme wind.  We were too late though.  As we neared El Mirage park near Atalanto, CA we thought we saw a fire but instead it turned out to be a huge sand storm.  Luckily we seemed to skirt the major sand storm areas and only got sand blasted a bit. 

Finally home we have been mostly just vegging out and catching up on things.  I have to work in the morning so recovering from the trip will have to wait for the weekend.  I'll probably post some final thoughts on the trip in a day or two.  In the mean time I've finished uploading pictures to our album at http://picasaweb.google.com/BradnBev/Vacation2009.

Day 15 - Riding with Friends

We met up with our friends from The Ride Central...BillK, Airborne (Don), and Marcss. The day looked to be a really good one so after a hearty breakfast we headed out on what was supposed to be a 260 mile ride.

First we rode through Zion National Park.  The ride through the park is only about 13 miles but the views are pretty awesome. 

About 1/2 way though the park we road though the Zion-Mt. Carmel Tunnel a 1.1 mile tunnel in the side of one of the sandstone mountians which in July 1930 was the longest tunnel in the U.S.

There is a section of the park you must take a shuttle to access by vehicle.  This time around we did not stop and take the shuttle in though.

From Zion we headed toward Bryce Canyon National Park The ride took us through several interesting areas including Red Canyon.

Bryce Cayon National park is basically a single road that travels about 25 miles in and 25 miles back.  Right after we entered we stopped at the visitor center and some of us discussed going to the end of the road and then stopping at the sights on the way back since they would be on the opposite side of the road.

Don (Airborne) evidently didn't hear the plan and thought we weren't stopping for anything.   =P  and tried to slow me down...hehehe.   We did get to see several stops from the end of the road to the great Bryce Canyon Amphitheater.  In the second picture to the right.

After Bryce Canyon we rode toward Escalante, Utah thriugh an area called the Grand Staircase.  We stopped for lunch at a great little place called the Escalante Frosty Shop and bakery because they had a sign that said they had the "best hamburger in Utah".  Now since most of us really had not had another burger in Utah we really can't say...but I will say the burger was pretty darn good and the buns are made fresh daily. The owner was very nice also.

There is not much of an available loop to ride so we headed back the way we came.  We did take a detour over a 10,400 ft mountian to Cedar City, Utah befor returning to the hotel near Zion.

All in all it was a great day.  The weather was perfect and the scenery was awesome.   The ride turned out to be 360 miles instead of 260 miles...but who's counting?

The Guys have plans for Sunday that sounded fun but we need to head for home.

Day 14 - Rest Day/ Off to Zion National park

Day 14 was another day of rest..we did little more then hang out for most of the day and watch a movie...that was just awesome! 

Early in the evening we said our goodbyes.   I had to get the picture of the brothers, Kevin and Brad,  before we left. 

We only had 68 miles to travel to get to our hotel and meet the folks from The Ride Central. The change in scenery from our earlier travels was drastic though.   This is our second time to visit Zion National Park. 

I can't decide if I like the scenery from earlier in the trip or this better...the picture here is the scenery on Hwy 9 as you approch Zion.

Day 13 - A day of rest and fun

After pretty much continually riding for 12 days it was nice to have a day of rest.  Our plan ws to get up and clean the bikes a bit but we just couldn't muster the strength.  We were going to go for a ride with Brad's brother but even though it sounded like fun we never made it to the bikes.

Brad's brother had another toy that also looked fun, a Polaris Ranger which is basically a 4x4 golf cart on steriods! We climbed in and headed for his brother's back yard (he lives against the mountians).  Riding around was a lot of fun, that thing sure can climb!   The views from the area were great.

Afterwards we just hung out some more.  Brad's brother just couldn't leave the mud on my bike alone though ....This is a sight I never thought I would see....heheheh

More of relaxation for Day 14...then we'll be heading out in the evening to the a meet and greet with The Ride Central folks near Zion National park and a ride on Saturday.

Day 12 - Evanston, Wy to Cedar City, Utah

Again today we were mostly in travel mode. Still a day ahead we headed for Brad's Brother's in Cedar City, Utah.  Of course we can never ride in a straight line so our trip included a ride on a National Scenic Byway called  the Nebo Loop Scenic Byway. As a bonus after talking with the BWB Members in Evanston Wy and Utah we decided to take 150 - the Mirror Lake Scenic Byway.

The Mirror Lake Scenic Byway extended from Wyoming to Utah and ran up into the mountians.  The road actually hit heights around 10, 400 feet and afforded a few little views of early fall colors.  We actually stopped at Mirror Lake but the surface was a bit choppy so we didn't see a mirror effect but the lake beautiful none the less.

We were very glad we were urged to take the route it was definitely a better ride then the Highways.

Even after we left the scenic byway there were several nice twists and turns getting into Provo, Utah where we had lunch.

After Provo we headed down I-15 for about 10 miles to hit the Nebo Loop Scenic Byway.  Another really beautiful venture into the Utah mountians.  To find the loop from the north you travel through a small town to the end of a residential street and turn onto a questionable road.  We were wondering if we were actaully on the right road.  But from there the ride gets nothing but better.  The road is slow but the views are awesome.  I will say though, you will need to do some cow patty landmine navigation and watch for the actual cows while you are at it!

Finally we just hit I-15 and headed south.  Looks like Utah is doing some experimenting with speed limits.  twice we were running speeds of 80 mph...legally!

We did hit a bit of thunder on the way but no rain.   We were glad to be somewhere we were going to relax at for a few days.

Day 11 - Grand Teton, NP to Evanston, Wy

Due to the construction on the road between the Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks we decided to head south a day early. Day 11 became a travel day between Grand Teton NP an Evanston, WY.  

As we left Jackson Lake Lodge it was a whole 45 degrees, we turned south toward the Grand Teton NP Loop spending a few minutes on the Jenny Lake Loop.  Grand Teton NP is a very small National Park so it the whole ride through the park turned out to be fairly quick.

Shortly after we passed through Jackson, Wy  we found ourselves riding through mostly High dessert plains.  What I found interesting wsa that we never seemed to drop below 6000 ft.  I suppose this is only interesting to someone that lives near sea level and sees 2500 feet as the potential snowline...hehehe.

We mostly saw cows, and a few pronghorn with a background of rugged moutians.  We also saw a lot of snow drift fence along the road.

About 1/2 way to Evanston, Wy we stopped to get gas at Daniel Jct (the picture of the sign above the door is that gas station).  Brad went in to buy a burrito and while paying lost the keys to his bike.    I had an extra key for his bike but his single key fob would have been lost  so we went looking. One of the counter girls helped too.  After about a 1/2 an hour we finally found them right on the rug by the cash register (black on blak).  Whew!

Finally back on the road we headed for an early arrival in Evanston.  In fact I blogged the previous 2 days fron there but never did get to this day.

That evening we were set to meet a BWB motorcycle forum member named GeezerGlideWyo (bev and geezerglidewyo giving the BWB salute in the picture).  We were pleased to have dinner and drinks with him, his wife and another riding friend.  Seems everyone in the area mentioned the Mirror Lake Scenic Byway....so we sat down that night and added it to our route to Cedar City, Utah which was our next destination.






As usual I've uploaded more pictures to our web album at http://picasaweb.google.com/BradnBev/Vacation2009.

Day 10 – Exploring South Western Yellowstone

In the morning we took our time getting out of bed. Heck this was the first 2 night stay anywhere and we were a bit exhausted. Besides it had rained a bit over night and we wanted that road to dry up some before attempting another crossing. So we went to see the view of the Grand Teton for which this hotel is famous…it was not disappointing!

After a stupidly expensive, park food breakfast, yuck, we went back to the room and inspected the mud on the bikes. Every car around us was up to the door handles in mud from that road. We had lucked out and gone through at a time when the mud only made it half way up my lowers. (My chaps and boots had a bit too).

About 10 am we decided to hit it. The weather was predicted to have a 40% chance of rain in the evening and we wanted to make it back before the rain due to the road construction. The road construction area was still a bit wet and muddy but for the most part had dried out enough to make it back across with one very nasty area. Succeeding in that crossing we headed off to see Old Faithful.

When we arrived at Old Faithful we found we were only minutes away from the next predicted eruption time. We had just enough time to take a picture of the meandering Buffalo that decided to walk across the area and got the crowd excited, and get seated for the show.

Funny thing was Bumblebee Geyser just off to the left of Old Faithful, a geyser that goes off only once a day randomly started to go off. Its eruption is higher and longer then Old Faithful. No more then a minute later Old Faithful went off! We were watching 2 shows at the same time. I guess we were just lucky to get there when we did. It was quite a show!

After Old Faithful we headed north on the Southwest portion of the Grand Loop road and followed some scenic side roads. I think my favorite was the one to Firehole Lake. We saw some very neat features on that route and met some very nice folks from Ohio. Just riding around we were able to see several more geysers both large and small, a few more bison, and a very pesky raven.

Due to a park road closure and the sheer size of Yellowstone we decided that we did not have time to go back to the features we had missed the precious day. (another 50 – 100 miles round trip) so we started to head back to the hotel. Stopping at a few more water falls but moving ever south to beat the rain we found the last crossing of the construction zone dry and much easier to manage. Tough I did see the truck used to water the road and keep the dust down…it made my heart skip a beat.

The rest of our evening was filled with doing laundry, having dinner, and uploading some pictures. Since the Hotel only has internet access in the main lodge area I just didn’t get enough time to write and upload the blogs for the last few days. I did spend my evening finishing up writing them though.

We decided that with construction resuming on that 6 mile stretch of icky road and with promised long delays due to that construction it was time to head south away from Yellowstone. Hopefully we will get back one day to finish the tour but for now it is better we move on.

A side note: During the ride back from Yellowstone to Jackson Lake we crossed the Continental Divide 3 times which got me thinking. I figured by the end of our trip we will have crossed the Divide at least 10 times and maybe up to 12 times! Seems I’m going to have to get my map out at some point and figure it out….