We Can't Stop Here....This Is Vet Country.

Day 9 Motorcycle adventure. Nevada. Desert. Long straight boring roads. So after waking up to a park ranger informing me that my $3 change would be on the picnic table in my site under a rock, a quick stop at Starbucks for a decaf latte and use of the WiFi, so as to not to add to the McDonald's counter, which is still at just two, I hit the road. I found that the long straight boring roads of Nevada left me a lot of time to think. And all the thinking I was doing was making he miles just fly by.

They started to fly by a little too quickly in fact. I found myself on what the map shows as a section of US50 called the Loneliest Highway and was getting close to empty on fuel. Uh oh, wait for the next road sign indicating the next town. Austin 65, uh oh. I promptly tucked down on my tank bag as low as I could go, backed off the throttle a hair and began to focus on fuel economy. 5 miles in, still going good.

Look close there is a motorcyclist wandering the desert

10 miles, still good. 20 miles, things are looking up a bit. 30 miles, starting to relax. Then with 25 miles to go, fuel light on, running on reserve fuel. Tuck back down onto tank bag. Back off throttle again. Just watching the miles pass with agony. Finally I rolled into town having done 25 miles on reserve fuel. I breathed a sigh of relief. One of the most stressful moments in the trip.

Trip F means reserve fuel.

I set out from Austin in good spirit, as I had not run out of fuel. Up and over a little Nevada pass and there are signs for construction and "30 Minute Delay Possible". Hrmm, not really keen on the idea of a 30 minute traffic jam in the middle of nowhere. It turns out that there was a crew working about a 10 mile section of road and had it closed to just one lane. They had a pilot car running the section (sort of a theme for my trip I think this was my 5th or 6th time following a pilot car) As I neared the place where the crew had the cars stopped, I was immediately accosted by one of the grizzly looking construction workers. "What kind of bike is that?" "Yamaha, 600." "Boy I bet that gets good gas mileage!" "Yeah, about 60." just then an old grizzled, tattooed guy on a Harley tricycle rolls up behind me, this distracts the construction worker, and he starts accosting the Harley guy instead, clearly good gas mileage takes a backseat to Harley Davidson's potato, potato, potato (say potato many times fast, you sound just like a Harley) exhaust note.

 Fine by me, I get off my bike to stretch my legs, bad idea, I get accosted by the construction worker again, "Hey look at this thing! (referring to a GPS the Harley rider has mounted to his bike) You got one of these?" "Uhhh..." cutting over top of me, "How does that thing work?" he directs the question to the Harley rider, I watch as the two baboon like men fumble with the GPS trying to get it to work. "Now whats the deal with this thing?" the Harley rider says. For the next 15 minutes waiting for the pilot car to arrive, I am unwillingly regaled with tales of Harley rides he has done, his "Old lady" back at home, all about how he was in the Army in the Vietnam war, the various mechanical difficulties he's had with his Harley, how "back in 81" how he busted up his leg when he crashed riding too fast, and how afterwards he could support a motorcycle, so go the tricycle instead. How, as soon as you buy a Harley you have to put pipes on it and a different breather so that it runs properly, and on, and on, and on. I was so excited to be stuck behind a slow moving truck for the next 10 miles.

So after saying a heartfelt goodbye to my new biker buddy, I was on the road again. And I hit another milestone somewhere in the Nevada desert. 3000 miles of adventure in 8.5 days. So I stopped to take some pictures. And was back on the road again.

Not an entirely bad place to stop and reflect on the past 3000 miles

So I was on the road again, and the miles were really flying again. Before I knew it I was nearing the border of Utah. I stopped in a little town called Ely, and just rested in the shade of tree for a while, as I was making good time, and was feeling a little tired. I used the opportunity to call and catch up with my amazing girlfriend back home, and after about an hour was ready to hit the road again.

The Utah border came and went and I was on an incredibly desolate stretch of highway when I saw a snake on the road, I slowed and turned around intending to take a picture of the snake, but I made my U-turn right behind a guy on a little scooter, putzing across the desert. So I decided to chat with him. Turns out he was making his way from Grand Rapids, to northern California, all at 30mph on his $500 Yamaha scooter, that brave, crazy, stupid and awesome all at once. After a chat, I turned back around and after stopping to admire another amazing sunset, pulled into Delta Utah. I was hungry, and after asking around, I found a pizza place called Lotsa Motsa, which was actually really good. I had a pepperoni, pineapple and jalapeno pizza as per my usual. Then found an RV park through some online queries that gave me a discount on the usual tent rate and set up for the night.

Motorcycling Reflection: Inside the Helmet. I thought a lot today about how the human experience is both so unique to individuals, and yet universal throughout our species. While we may do different things to bring joy, and while different occurrences bring sorrow to us all in unique ways, we as humans all feel these emotions. I think that's something that, especially in our society of egocentric thought, that we should be reminded of often. It binds us together, and makes singular struggles or triumphs, something that can be shared across communities, nations and the world.

Mileage Day 9 - 470
Cumulative Mileage - 3145
Song I sang most in my helmet - I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts
Continental Divide Counter - 8
McDonald's Counter - Still just the two from the first two days.

P.S. I want to thank everyone who has been following, reading, commenting via the blog or Facebook. I appreciate all the kind words, the support, and encouragement. I wish I had time on the road to respond to it all, but finding time to do this is hard as it is, but it has not gone unnoticed!

Dinner! AND Breakfast!