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October 13-14, 2006
Yes, it's true... I departed Nashville,
TN on Friday morning and arrived Phoenix Saturday night having
covered a little over 2,100 miles in the process. Here's the story
behind “what happened?” (as the Matriarch said)....
I had planned to make my way back to AZ
through Missouri mainly because the Weather Channel showed on their
“Fall Foliage Color Map” that MO was “near peak.”
Being that I really enjoy the brilliant colors of the trees during
fall I was quite excited to see the display of colors and do so in
what was forecasted to be super weather. When I left my Dad's
house in Nashville his thermometer hanging outside read 33 degrees.
I was quickly reminded that 33 degrees in the South (or a
place w/high humidity) is very different from a 33 degrees, say, out
west where the lack of humidity doesn't have the cold bite through
your clothes. Needless to say I waved goodbye in heated gloves and
jacket. The first hour of the ride was on I-40 west towards Memphis
and was done in single digit temperatures when you factor wind chill
going 70+mph. I thought about how I had left AZ five weeks ago in 107
degrees and now I was essentially riding in single digit
temperatures... that's 100 degree swing! Yikes! Suffice to
say during the last five weeks while riding the lap around the
country I extensively used the mesh jacket, the cooling vest, the
heavier jacket, and the heated gear and am VERY glad I decided to
bring them all. :) Being comfortable is a big key for me to putting
in long days and/or consecutive higher mileage days. Battling
elements creates fatigue and makes the ride less enjoyable for me.
I wanted to go to the Tennessee
Wildlife Refuge in Paris, TN not because they had a stamp but because
I wanted to say I rode to Paris. No, seriously, it's one of the
selected “Globally Important Bird Areas” and I kinda
wanted to see what such a place would have flying around. The roads
leading to the site would take me down a few Scenic Byways as well.
One of the reasons I'm considering doing a “Wildlife Romp”
and visiting every wildlife refuge in the US is because they are, not
surprisingly, almost all located in remote areas. Remote usually
equals scenic in my experience and the ride to Paris was no
different. Here's an example (be sure to note the slight changing of
the leaves):
Unfortunately, when I arrived Paris I
could not find many signs pointing to a central place within the
refuge so after driving around aimlessly I decided it was best I just
keep moving. This probably comes as no surprise but I saw a road here
and a road there and decided to explore them and just ignore the
continuous “off route, recalculating” mantra coming from
the GPS. I eventually found myself in Kentucky just across the TN
line getting gas and being questioned by a local “whar ye
headin' today?” I met “George” who told me a back
way to get across the Mississippi River into MO. His directions
included “just past the big 'ole Oak tree that wuz struck by
lightnin' last week” and “it'll be a loooong 2 miles
beyond the break in the fence.” I asked him if any of
these roads had a name (so I could input them in my GPS) and the only
one he could recall was “The Great River Road.” Not sure
if I found the exact Oak tree but I did find one of the roads he
mentioned and it did indeed save me a 25 mile detour to Dyersburg,
TN:
I crossed the Mississippi River into
Missouri and spent the next hour or so wandering around MO back
roads. During the meandering I came across a large billboard sign
that, much like the one in North Dakota that said “Livestock
Eat 94% of North Dakota's Soybean Meal,” left me dazed as to
what I was supposed to actually do with the information. I stopped to
take a photo of the sign so I could prove I wasn't making up this
algebraic looking sign:
I guessed that the advertisement
involved cotton but couldn't figure out what the average American
driver passing this roadside billboard was suppose to buy or support?
:| By the way, take note of two things in the photo... one, that gas
is less than $2/gal and secondly, look at the “near peak”
color of the trees. Yeah, brilliant, huh? The only color I
saw other than green while riding in Missouri was brown and that was
from trees that were dead. The Weather Channel might reconsider their
information source for their fall foliage map as it pertains to
southern Missouri! I was disappointed by the complete lack of colors
but enjoyed the ride nonetheless and made it to the site of another
stamp, the Ozark National Scenic Riverways:
After riding the area I jumped on US-60
and headed towards Springfield where two other stamps are nearby. I
wasn't on US-60 very long when I came upon the road construction
delay from hell. I waited and waited and given I'm of the
“patience can be someone else's virtue” type I decided to
reroute. If you're not familiar w/MO roads they are named by letters
like “V” or “HH” and I have yet to figure out
what, if any, reasoning went into the naming. It's definitely not
sequential and it certainly doesn't tell you anything about the road
except I'm thinking if it has 2 letters it's a good chance the
pavement might end along the way. I went down several of these
lettered roads only to have the pavement turn to gravel which turned
to dirt which then turned into either something I'd only take while
on a horse or it looked like it went through farmer Joe's back yard.
:!: My GPS couldn't differentiate between roads that stayed paved
and the ones that became essentially dead ends so I did a lot of
turning around. I finally was able to reroute around the construction
and made it to Springfield where I stopped to eat. While regearing
and preparing to depart a trucker noticed my AZ plate and asked if I
was headed there. He said that he had been warned that the intense
weather system was suppose to bring snow to Flagstaff on Saturday
evening and maybe Sunday. I rechecked my weather updates and the
radar and sure enough it looked bleak. Being that I also had to pass
through Gallup & Albuquerque, which are prone to heavy winds and
snow, I decided it was best to maximize the good weather and whittle
down the miles between me and Phoenix. I rode from Springfield to El
Reno, OK on the Will Rogers Turnpike. I had to deal w/several toll
booths along the way because if you exit to get gas you must show
proof of previous toll being paid upon re-entering. This is
not a fun process especially when wearing snowman like gloves that
you must disconnect (the wires from the heated gloves) in order to
get the receipt out of the tank bag.
Spent the night in El Reno (the lady at
the front desk who relocated from Phoenix called it “El
Ghetto”) then hit the road Saturday morning in hopes of
averting as much of the intense system as possible. As I expected
I-40 west bound was full of snowbirds who were making their way back
to AZ for the winter in their gargantuan sized motorhomes that were
towing a vehicle w/a northern state license plate. Each gas stop it
seemed like one of these birds would ask me if I knew about the storm
forecast for snow in Flagstaff and then would ask me “where ya
been riding?” I could answer the first question but found
myself stumbling for an understandable answer for the second.... “um,
ah, well, kinda around the entire country and Canada.”
I had visions of getting to Flagstaff
with all these fair weather snowbirds in their motorhomes who would be
freaking out at the site of a snowflake so I opted to detour (imagine
that!). At Amarillo, TX I took US-60 to US-70 going through New
Mexico cities of Roswell (yes, Area 51), Alamogordo, Las Cruces then
hit I-10 at Deming. Rain was also forecasted for southern AZ & NM
but the temperature was in the low 50's versus the 30's in northern
AZ. I indeed hit rain outside of Roswell which became fairly heavy in
Alamogordo but I could see the sky was clearing ahead so I just kept
riding... and riding... and riding... until before I knew it I was
looking at the “Welcome to Arizona” sign and, well, I
wasn't about to stop. I pulled into my garage at 9pm.... looked down
at my GPS which read:
Miles from TN to AZ: 2,187 miles
(which included pavement, gravel, dirt, and 39 hours)
Miles since leaving the exact place in
the garage 38 days ago: 12,222 miles
I had just put the kickstand down when
I got a call from a friend that said “hey, you back yet, let's
go riding tomorrow.”
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