Started off
today riding down the yellow brick road. Yes, I’m serious, that’s what it was
called. It is Kansas
I suppose. It was the main road out of Liberal.
I gassed up and
rolled on out of Kansas and back into Oklahoma. Today I was
covering two more states – New Mexico and Colorado.
Initially there
was nothing of interest in the OK pan handle. It was warm and windy and quite
dusty. I went to get gas after a while and got back on the trail.
There was a lot
more of this type of thing as I approached the OK/NM border. I came across 4
Proghorn antelope that bolted away in front of me. They were off my right side
when they moved; they were so well hidden I didn’t see them until I was on
them! They wanted to cross the road ahead of me but the left side of the road
had a fence along it so they ran out into the road. I chased them up to about
35 mph before they veered of to the right again. There were lots of them
around, but none got this close.
I also came
across quite a large snake that slithered off to the right. It looked yellow in
colour, not sure what it was. It was the only snake I saw though.
As I approached
the New Mexico
border I came across a man and woman on high tech bicycles fixing a puncture.
They were in the middle of nowhere and were wearing cycling clothes only, so I
decided to stop. The guy wasn’t very friendly at all so I just made sure they
were ok and headed off again.
Lovely New Mexico!
Crossed over the
state line and the maps/GPS said turn right here:
Looks like that
wouldn’t be such a good idea! Being from the UK I wasn’t sure what this meant
exactly – did it mean no trespassing beyond this point? i.e. don’t enter this
gate. Or, did it mean use the road but don’t stray off it. I wasn’t sure. If I
saw this sign in the UK
it would mean no entry.
Anyway, I erred
on the side of caution and hit the pavement. The GPS unfortunately routed me
right through the northern half New
Mexico which took me past the biggest cattle holding
pens I’ve ever seen. I think I smelt them about 10 miles before seeing them,
the actual area was about 400 yards wide and about 3 miles long and the cattle
were shoulder to shoulder in there! Feeding America
takes a LOT of beef. I didn’t stop to take any
pics for obvious reasons.
The route took
me past a few of these historic signs, unfortunately they were largely defaced;
either by graffiti or shotgun.
Approaching Colorado and I could see the start of the Rockies. This was the riding I was looking forward to.
Got into the
Super8 in Trinidad and checked in. I was a
little early so I decided to walk across the parking lot while my washing was
going and have a look in the ‘Big R’ stores. These stores seemed to cater for
the ranch, kind of like a HomeBase but with BIG farming implements and lots of
guns! I went into the gun area and saw enough ordnance to start WWIII. There
was a couple of assault rifles mixed up amongst the myriad of shotguns and
rifles. They also had a fine selection of pistols and revolvers. Pretty cheap
too – a few hundred dollars would make you lethal.
Besides all that
they had some really good prices on things like boots and camo. I would have
bought a few things but there was no space to carry it all.
I went to Burger
King for dinner, just around the corner. Not a bad dinner actually.
Journal Quote:
Started
today from Liberal Kansas and rode to BoiseCity
to pick up the trail. The ride was 100 miles through nothing. The Oklahoma panhandle so
they look at you like you’re mad on the bike. There are a lot of towns on Oklahoma that look like
they are dying, but Liberal was ok. Drove along the yellow brick road out of
Liberal. Got to BoiseCity and gassed up and
rode out to get on the trail. Started doing the “Oklahoma left-right” this was ride west then
south then west then south, etc. Came to a point where I had to cross a
ploughed field almost lost it. Earth was like powder and bike sank into the
axles. Got through but covered in mud. Kept riding and got to see some
proghorn, four of them had a race with at about 30 mph. Saw a yellow snake too.
Got to New Mexico
border and stopped to help some cyclist with a puncture. They weren’t very
friendly so left straight away. Got over into NM and found the trail had a big
no trespassing sign on it. Not good. Decided not to risk it as road signs were
riddled around there and hit the black top. Rode past an old volcano and found
things were getting chilly again. Checked altimeter on GPS and was at 7,000
feet. Oddly the bike seemed to be loving it. Rode down and saw loads of snow on
the mountains, took pics as it looked awesome. Finally got onto I-25 and road
into Trinidad Colorado.
Seems like Colorado is on the up and up, much
better than Oklahoma.
Checked into the motel and went across the road to the Big R stores. Guns,
guns, guns – loads of them, I was in my element! Assault rifles too.
Dumped
more stuff of the bike. Went to burger king.
