The Long Way Home

Friday, July 31, 2015

The Long Way Home - Day 32 - Good Gates, Bad Gates

Friday, July 31st

Today's plan takes us from Seligman on Route-66, to Wikieup, Arizona.

Leaving Seligman, we got a chance to snap photos of some of the cool shops and buildings on Route-66, like this diner:

Soon after leaving Seligman, we came across this guy. He's just a young one at about 2' or a bit more. We didn't try to pick this rattlesnake up. Crikey!

From here, we headed up into some higher ground for some fun forest trails.

I locked up both brakes when I caught a glimpse of this in my peripheral vision: The perfect tree that we have all modeled our elementary school drawings after. It really does exist!

The gate story continues from yesterday and we found that there are good gates and bad gates (just like Wizard of Oz's witches). This is a bad gate, it's all about big chains, locks, and NO, NO, NO. We came up to this gate from the inside and had to disassemble and then reassemble part of the fence to get out.

This is a good gate. It was unlocked and it used words like Welcome, Please, and Thank You. YOLO (You Only Live Once) Ranch rocks!

After working our way through the maze of good gates and bad gates, we dropped down out of the highlands into Bagdad and had some lunch at a diner. -yes, there is a Bagdad, Arizona.

We even got to park next to an FJ40 Landcruiser

After lunch we were at a lower elevation and it was starting to get really hot. When I say really hot, I mean maybe the hottest weather I've ever been in. I was so thankful that our bikes ran perfectly because if we had to stop, I'd seriously worry about our safety. It was so hot we had to limit our speed to avoid the hot air from penetrating our helmets and jackets but we had to keep moving to have some airflow. I found that if I opened my mouth, it would dry out in seconds, and the first water out of my Camel Back hose was almost too hot to drink. When we heard it was 110 today, it explained a lot. Crazy hot.

I had to stop briefly to take a photo with this Saguaro cactus. There were hundreds of these around here.

Just before our destination, we came across this little town of Nothing. I think they should really work on their self-esteem. You can have All (mart) or Nothing - looks like they chose nothing.

When we arrived at our hotel in Wikieup, we threw our reins over the hitching post, hung up our spurs, and went to dinner at the Trading Post Diner.

Tomorrow's plan takes us to Blythe, California!

Thank you for following us.

WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

The Long Way Home - Day 31 - Canyon Stop

Thursday, July 30th

Today's plan takes us from Tuba City, past the Grand Canyon, to Seligman, Arizona.

The ride from Tuba City to the Grand Canyon went just as planned. Much of the roads approaching the park and inside the park were paved with no dirt options but we did include the few dirt roads that the park had to offer.

What can I say about the Grand Canyon: Everyone knows it's spectacular.

We even got a glimpse of the Karate Kid

It was a bit hazy today, so the photos don't show the detail as well, but in person, it was as awesome as ever!

I think we've been on the road too long because the crowds at the Canyon were starting to bother us and we got anxious to leave, so we hopped on another of the dirt roads inside the park and headed south. Eventually, we were riding through wide open prairie land and making good time (no more pesky people!).

But sometimes, these remote roads we ride on don't go through as planned: We were on a great pace with only 30 miles to Seligman and we were confident we would arrive around 3:30 pm. First we came up to one of our roads that was completely grown over with waist high sticker bushes. We've pushed our way through some roads like this but this was completely taken back by nature and we could only discern the very start of the road, then it completely disappeared. We could see other roads in the area to route around on so we started down another trail. However, we eventually hit a very well secured gate and couldn't get through. This continued for hours. At one point we tried to just head off cross-country to see if we could meet up with a road 3 miles away but we were thwarted about 2 miles in by more fences.

When we finally gave up and routed around the extra long way, our last 30 miles turned into 120 miles and we rolled into Seligman around 8 pm. The good news is that our new route took us through 20 miles of Route-66 as we approached Seligman.

Route-66 is packed with these old businesses. Some of them are closed but many are still open, giving a very fun, nostalgic feel.

Tomorrow, our target is Wikieup, Arizona. It is really starting to feel like we are on our home turf and we are only one day away from the California border!

Thank you for following us.

WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

Thursday, July 30, 2015

The Long Way Home - Day 30 - In The Zone

Wednesday, July 29th

We left Escalante, Utah and headed south. passed by the west end of Lake Powell, and eventually reached Tuba City, Arizona.

Much of the morning, from Escalante to Lake Powell was spent in Utah's Grand Staircase National Park.

It's impossible to capture this landscape with my iPhone. These rock formations are unbelievably large. Even the pieces that broke off and rolled down to the foreground here would dwarf a person.

Approaching Lake Powell

After lunch at Lake Powell, we continued south towards Tuba City. This area was an unknown because all of the track goes through Navajo property. As it turned out, all of the roads were open and my tracks all went through.

We were in the Zone just south of Lake Powell

The roads I picked were all very sandy so It was a bit of a workout but made it very fun

No tall riders through this fence!

sand sand sand

Tomorrow we turn west again, making a stop at the Grand Canyon, and end up in Seligman, on Route 66. The green line on the map above shows tomorrow's route.

Now that we've entered Arizona, California is the next state - We are getting close!

Thank you for following us.

WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

Tuesday, July 28, 2015

The Long Way Home - Day 29 - Utaaaah

Tuesday, July 28th

Today was a relaxing day in Utah with relatively low mileage and mostly easy dirt roads. The day's ride took us from Bull Frog, Utah to Escalante.

The early part of the ride was centered around the Burr Trail. We were on and off it several times to include some more challenging roads.

This is an area known as the Burr Trail Switchbacks.

Capital Reef Park

After completing the Burr Trail, we started on a road called Hells Back Bone. This was slightly more challenging and it definitely switched up the scenery

Our second "Where's Waldo". This time it's Hank in the reeds.

Hank was looking for some extra credit so he rode around this rock for a while. That's him coming down in the middle of the photo (It's a really big rock):

Tomorrow we head south and pass by Lake Powell one more time before leaving Utah and entering Arizona. We'll be traveling through a lot of Indian owned land in Arizona and I'm not at all sure about how open the roads are. There is a good chance we will have some small adventures.

Arizona is one state away from California!

Thank you for following us.

Where are they now?

Monday, July 27, 2015

The Long Way Home - Day 28 - Ferries Are Real!

Monday, July 22, 2015

Today was all about Utah. The plan takes us from Monticello to Hite for gas. Then we head south and eventually come back to Lake Powell at Halls Crossing. At Halls, we take a ferry across to Bull Frog for the night.

The day started out with some fun, fast, mountain roads.

My self-portrait

Hanksville is exciting! ...Blanding is, well, ...not exciting

It was quite a change from the 13,000-foot passes we were on yesterday! It's amazing how fast the terrain has changed - just as beautiful but in completely different ways.

That butte in the distance is called Jacob's Chair. There are lots of great names on the buttes around here like Cheese Box and Bear's Ears.

We were trying to set a pace that would get us to Halls Crossing by 2pm. We had left at 6:30 am and figured that we needed about a 30 mph average to make the last ferry. We rode without fault or stop for two hours but found that we were only averaging 25 mph on these twisty roads. I rerouted us to shorten the route and eliminate the stop in Hite. When we reached a point where I could check the mileage, it looked like we would be about 10 miles short on our range. This forced us to head into Hite for fuel. From here we had 100 miles and about 3.5 hours so I added a few more road miles to speed it up and we made it to Halls Crossing with 30 minutes to spare.

When the ferry pulled in, we were the only ones waiting. It was strange to see the ferry run into the beach far to the left of the ramp. Then they backed up and came in again. This time they rammed the dock off to the right of where they should be with a loud crash and the solid poles of the dock flexed so much the entire ramp slid up the slope. We felt ourselves backing up!

At this point, we were questioning if we should get on this boat. The third try they rammed the post again, but they were closer to being lined up. Finally, they got it docked and the vehicles on the ferry were allowed to drive off. We were the only ones waiting and after a few minutes, the captain announced over the loud speaker that the ferry is broken and they are not going to Bull Frog! One of the crew came out to tell us that the front thruster was not working and they could not risk the trip (that explained a lot).

This left us with a new dilemma: Riding around the lake would take around 3 hours which was possible but the thought of 3 hours on pavement with these dirtbikes was not at all appealing. I was frustrated and ornery, but Hank convinced me to go ask around to see if someone else could get us across. I was not one bit confident that this would work, but I thought I'd honor his enthusiasm. One thing led to another and we were hooked up with "Captain Tony" . Tony got on his radio and got a hold of Captain Robin who just happened to be on her way to Halls to pick up an Ice Truck. She agreed to let us on her barge!!

An Ice Truck is a semi-truck used to haul huge containers of block ice. We learned from Captain Robin that Ice is the biggest $$ item at Lake Powell

Underway!

'with Captain Robin. She certainly made our day!

It was funny to throw the mandatory life preserver over our motorcycle gear.

This is the view from Defiance House (our hotel):

Another great end to another great adventure.

Tomorrow we head west to Escalante, Utah (shown in green). I've ridden parts of this ride before and I know we are in for some challenges.

Thank you for following us.

Where are they now?