Coast to Coast: Day 10: San Francisco, CA. Saturday, May 17, 2014

     San Francisco was a neat city. Traffic wasn’t as bad as LA, but it felt like absolutely no thought went into layout of the streets. Maybe the civil engineers weren’t paid enough. The city was a maze. In some places, the roads went up at such a high angle that I thought I was going to fall over backwards on my motorcycle.

     My first stop was at a Starbucks. I had a craving for a white mocha frappuccino early in the morning. Then I went to a motorcycle shop since Liz really needed an oil change and new spark plugs, but they were closed. After a little research on my phone, I found another shop just a mile away.

     R.C. Engineering in downtown San Francisco was as good of a shop as the “Cafe Racer” in Kansas City. It was significantly smaller; the width of the shop was about as wide as a small alleyway, but the staff was extremely knowledgeable. They inspected my bike and found deep crevices in my tires, so I decided to save myself the risk and get two new tires. I asked one of the shop owners out of curiosity if they had a replacement turn signal lens for my bike, and to my surprise, she gave me a straight “yes”.

     She took me upstairs to a small room filled to the brim with hundreds of spare parts. It was mostly a mess, but we went through a few boxes of turn signal parts and found the lens I was looking for out of the assembly of a turn signal for a different Honda. I took it back to my bike, and it fit perfectly.

     I had two hours to kill until the mechanics finished servicing Liz, so I went for a walk around the city. I stopped at the bike shop where I was originally going to get my bike serviced. I really needed a windshield, but they didn’t sell them anymore.

     I passed into a BMW Motorrad dealership (Motorrad is German for motorcycle), and saw an R 1200 GS Adventure. This was the bike I would have used on my trip if I had all the money in the world. It had a surprising amount of features that would take away all the touring issues I was having with my bike. It had a larger gas tank that I didn’t have to fill up every hundred miles, It had plenty of cargo space, and twice the horsepower. I was still a pretty heavy Honda fan though, and Liz was my bike for life.

     After a conversation with the BMW salesman about several models of BMW motorcycles, he told me I could go into the lounge for a Coke before I headed out. It was hot, so the coke was extremely refreshing. I walked down the street to another motorcycle shop with the same question, and still no windshield. This shop was neat because is sat on a small road, and there must have been fifty or sixty vintage bikes in varying conditions across from the entrance of the shop. With just a few minutes left on the two hour service, I went back to R.C. Engineering, paid $590 for parts and labor.

     I discovered further proof of R.C. Engineering’s competence when I had a small chat with the mechanic. He said that when he changed my motorcycle’s oil, the metal gasket between the spring on the housing and the filter was gone. As long as I have owned that motorcycle, I have never seen it and no one had ever mentioned it to me before. He said that most people throw them away, and of course he had a spare that he put in the filter housing. The mechanic also mentioned that my bike needed new rear fork bushings, and I asked him if my bike would be able to make it back to Ohio. He was unsure, but I didn’t have time for him to order the part. With that, I left the shop and shot up the street on my refreshed bike.

     Elizabeth was riding nicely again, but my phone battery was low on charge. I lost the external battery which charges the phone at the hotel the night before, and I only had the charger for the external battery. I wasn’t going to go back to the hotel to get it. It was a piece of junk. I decided to go to the apple store a few miles away for a car charger adapter, but traffic was really heavy. A little lane sharing solved this problem. I got the adapter for my iPhone and saved my battery just in the nick of time

     I really wanted to cross the Golden Gate Bridge, as it was really my only reason for coming to San Francisco in the first place. When I first saw the bridge, I found it hard to believe that this massive feat of engineering was completed in the 1930s. When I crossed it, it seemed to go on for miles. It probably did.

     On the other side of the bridge, I turned around and took an exit before crossing the bridge again. I went uphill and found an excellent spot to take a picture.

The Golden Gate Bridge 

     This was the only picture I took in San Francisco. It wasn’t that I didn’t find anything else interesting, it was just that the purpose of my journey was Golden Gate, and that was all I was really concerned about. I spent another hour looking for a hotel for the night. There was a major event of some kind going on in San Francisco, so all of the hotels in the city were booked. I found a Hampton Inn in Livermore about half an hour from the city. I rode there, and spent the rest of the day updating my journal.

Coast to Coast: Day 9: Los Angeles, CA - San Francisco, CA. Friday, May 16, 2014

     Traffic, Traffic, Traffic. I thought even though it was about 9 or 10 am before I hit the road that I would avoid rush hour traffic. But in LA, rush hour traffic lasts all day, and LA is the most congested city in the United States. My GPS told me I would reach the other side of LA to Route 1 in 3 hours. My time is precious, and this was unacceptable if I wanted to get to San Francisco 500 miles away. I started riding more aggressively; changing lanes often and weaving through traffic. However, traffic was still at a crawl. Then I saw another motorcyclist lane sharing, and it was at that moment that I realized I was in California, where lane sharing is legal.

     For those who are unfamiliar with lane sharing, lane sharing is the dangerous act of passing cars between two lanes of traffic. In any other place in America, I wouldn’t have done this, but I cannot describe just how bad the traffic was. I was passing between stopped cars at 40 mph with just inches of clearance on either side. If a car was pulled out too far for me to lane share, I would pull up behind him and pass from the other side. I wouldn’t lane share if there was any doubt as to whether I could pass. A good combination of lane sharing and traffic weaving got me to the other side of LA in heavy traffic in about 30 minutes.

     I made it to the southern end of Route 1 and parked my bike at a park that overlooked the Pacific Ocean. It was here that I saw the west coast for the first time.

My first view of the west coast

     Route 1 was supposed to be one of the most beautiful roads in the country. No. It was the most beautiful road in the country. Lots of small shops ran along the road until it was just the coast and fresh air. Hugging the very edge of the country, this road went on for hundreds of miles. I pulled off to the side of the road just after reaching Malibu to get to a coastal access point. I walked down the steep steps by the side of the road until I reached the beach floor which was nothing but large pebbles.

     It took me twenty feet to reach the water. I didn’t just touch the water. I let it soak me up to my knees as the waves pushed in. I knew my boots would still be soaked by the end of the day, but I didn’t care. I went up the steep cliff again, got back on my bike, and followed Route 1 for another hundred miles

     Unfortunately, I had to leave the Pacific Coast Highway for a more direct route on 101 because it was starting to get late. I would see the rest of the road on my way back from San Francisco. 101 took me through wine country, and it turned out to be a nice passage to San Francisco. Even though I wasn’t on Route 1, the view was still fantastic. I stopped halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco at a rest stop and talked to some Mexican bikers. Only one of them spoke English, and they were trying to figure out if they should head north or south to get on the Pacific Coast Highway to get to San Francisco. I told them that if they went north, they would almost be in San Francisco by the time they reached the highway, so they should head south for 30 miles before taking a back road to Route 1. I had a short Gatorade break and carried on.

     I pulled into a gas station about 175 miles from San Francisco. It was here that I met two members of the Hell’s Angels motorcycle gang. Like everyone else, I struck up a conversation with them. They were riding from Utah on a scenic route to Phoenix. It seemed kind of strange that they were this far west, even with the snow in the Rockies. One of the Angels was interested in my bike. He said a friend of his had an old CB750 “four-banger” like mine. We didn’t talk for too long and wished each other good luck before heading in opposite directions.

     I was about 50 miles outside of San Francisco when I made my last stop for gas at a Chevron station. I saw a beggar just outside the front door selling flower pens for a dollar, but he looked strangely clean. After filling my tank, I parked my bike to let it cool. I asked him about his story. He said he was from Idaho and did roofing for a living. A friend hooked him up with a guy who had a big project in California. Unfortunately, when it came time to receive pay, the guy ditched him and left him in the middle of California with no money. It sounded like a story straight out of Casablanca. I was feeling really good at that point, as I was about to complete the largest feat of my life. With very little thought whatsoever, I offered to fill up his tank.

     His eyes lit up, and he asked if I was being serious. I said I was, and to pull his car over to a pump. As I was filling his car up with gas, he introduced himself. "Phil". Sure enough, his beat up old green Dodge Neon had Idaho plates. He asked me if I wanted any marijuana. I told him I couldn't risk taking drugs on a bike. We then told each other good luck and he sped off north on 101. Maybe he was telling the truth, maybe he wasn't, but I didn't care at that point. I felt good, and that was all that mattered.

     It was dark by the time I reached San Francisco’s city limits, even though I took 101. I was on the highway, and I got a moment’s glimpse of the city from above before I passed into it. It was the most beautiful sight I had ever seen. Thousands of lights illuminated the streets and buildings below, and it covered the land as far as the eye could see. I was so overcome with joy that I started crying. My tears made it hard to see, but I wiped my eyes as I went downhill. When I got just outside the hotel, I called my family: my sister, father, and mother. It was the biggest accomplishment of my life. Most people I called didn’t answer, since it was 1 am Ohio time. I hugged my motorcycle, and checked into the hotel. They only had a room for one night, so I would have to find another hotel tomorrow. Worked for me.

Coast to Coast: Day 8: Flagstaff, AZ - Los Angeles, CA. Thursday May 15, 2014

     The temperature was in the 30s when I woke up early in the morning, so I waited an hour for it to hit the 40’s before I packed my bags and headed out. I wasn’t going to risk any chance of hitting ice. I passed the time by adding more details to my journal. I filled up at the Shell station just outside the campsite, and I saw an interesting old VW bug parked near the pumps. The Indian-hippie owner was smoking next to it, so I asked him about it. He said he converted the passenger seat into a makeshift bed, so he always had a place to sleep. The muffler was gone, so he took 3 tin cans and put holes in them and attached them to the exhaust, and the engine was out of a Honda scooter. The gas line fell off a while back, so he jerry rigged the windshield fluid line to work as the gas line. He told me that he was on an endless journey travelling the country, and his entire life was in that car.

The VW Bug

     In order to fund this trip, he sold bead necklaces for $30, but he didn't stop there. He tried selling me everything from a heavy leather trench to marijuana. He said if he couldn't make ends meet, he always had a $700 social security check to live off each month. He said his brother always asks him how he manages to live alone endlessly travelling, and his response is always that he meets people along the way. I can relate to that.

     There was a quick transition from forty two degrees in Flagstaff to eighty degrees by the time I reached Route 66 off of I-40. I took that old highway because I always wanted to travel on it, and the view it gave me was unprecedented. I stopped just outside an area that looked very touristy to get a picture of my bike next to the Route 66 sign, and then I went to check out the town. There were gift shops lined all along a short stretch of the old highway, and I stopped to get a Route 66 sign reproduction.

I felt bad for the tourists, as much as one possibly could. They saw only as much of Route 66 as they could through the window of a greyhound bus while I was enjoying the full, uninterrupted experience on my motorcycle. Maybe I didn’t feel that bad. I don’t like tourists.

View of the mountains from Route 66 

Liz next to the Route 66 sign 

     Another 25 miles later, I took a Gatorade break on a clearing by the side of the road just as a Harley pulled in with me. I introduced myself, and we discussed motorcycling stories. He was even kind enough to take a picture of me on my bike, right before I was about to take off my last layer as the temperature was quickly increasing.

Me on Route 66 with Liz

     A short ride later and I was back on the interstate. I didn’t want to go through the Mojave Desert on Route 66 road because if I broke down again with no service, I figured that would die. I was learning quickly that death and dehydration are real problems in the desert. By the time I reached the desert, it was over one hundred degrees and I was drinking all my bottles of Gatorade every hour (72 ounces, or .6 gallons). Luckily, there was an isolated gas station in the first third of the desert. Everything was incredibly priced (premium gas itself was $5.49 a gallon) but I had absolutely no complaints. This was the middle of the desert.

     I filled my bottles full of Gatorade and bought a tank of gas before sitting at an outside table to catch up on fluid. I met another motorcyclist who was travelling on a Harley Davidson. We had a short conversation before he went over to his motorcycle and pulled two cans out of a cooler in his trunk:

“You want a beer?”
“Umm… I’m nineteen…”

He just kinda looked at me.

“Yeah… ok”

     Alcohol is the last thing I needed when riding a motorcycle, especially when battling dehydration in the middle of a desert. Yet surprisingly I felt very sharp, and the beer only did so much as to help take the edge off the heat. I just had to be a little more careful that I didn’t get dehydrated.

     The funny thing about the desert is that I crossed it without ever getting thirsty. That’s right. I was losing so much water so quickly that I experienced the effects of dehydration long before I would ever get thirsty. Tell-tale signs of dehydration are dizziness, dry throat, and the one that affected me the most: sleepiness. Since I was losing so much water so quickly, I can imagine that by the time I actually got thirsty, I was as good as dead.

     Every twenty five miles I would start to feel a little sleepy. I would pull off to the side of the road, and be taken aback by how much Gatorade I consumed (usually a bottle and a half). Water was a bad idea, because at the rate I was consuming liquid, if I drank water I would die of losing too many electrolytes.

     At the same time, the desert was gorgeous. It was peaceful and quiet, which seemed to balance the danger of the location. At one point I pulled over to take a picture, and the next motorcyclist who saw me slowed down and was about to pull over. I gave him the O.K. hand gesture, and he nodded and continued.

     That’s the thing about motorcyclists. So few people ride motorcycles that we have developed a strong community that supports one another. In fact, the motorcycle culture is the only group I know where one is instantly recognized as a member, and others in his group couldn’t care less about his age, race, gender, socioeconomic background, or beliefs. It is even considered rude and strange if a motorcyclist doesn’t acknowledge another motorcyclist when passing him, even if the two motorcyclists are going in opposite directions. I would certainly have stopped for the motorcyclist who stopped for me, although I would also do the same for a car out here.

A view of the Mojave Desert

     Having said that, I did see a semi-truck carrying luxury cars pull over onto an off ramp that went to nowhere. I saw the owner get out. Knowing how dangerous the desert is, I decided to pull over and see if he was ok. I pulled up next to the truck, walked around a bit, and then saw him get out of one of the cars he was hauling. He introduced himself and said he was ok; that he was just taking a break from the ride. He said that he worked for Nationwide Autogistics, and that he only transported vehicles from Vegas to Ohio. I told him I was from Ohio. He told me that he appreciated me stopping and gave me his business card. He went on to say that if I broke down in the desert, he would haul my bike back to Ohio for $250 dollars. I sincerely thanked him, and got back on the highway.

     The fear of my motorcycle overheating was also very real. I could tell she was struggling, and I was only going sixty miles per hour. Traffic was rushing past me, but I didn’t care. Even with insurance back to Ohio, I didn’t want to risk breaking down. Above sixty miles per hour, my bike started to groan and the acceleration was sluggish. I was taking no chances.

     I passed the “town” of Ludlow, which was really just an isolated Dairy Queen gas station in the middle of the desert. I even looked it up at the end of the day; Ludlow: Population: 10.

The entire town of Ludlow, in one picture

     As usual, the price of gas was expensive; $5, but again, I wasn’t complaining. Of course I had to stop in the Dairy Queen for an M&M blizzard. It was absolutely delicious. I topped off my tank, bought loads more Gatorade, and headed out. As the evening passed on, it got slightly cooler, so I was pushing sixty five. I arrived late at the hotel at about 8:30, so I wasn’t able to get a good view of the city. I was so exhausted that by the time I reached the hotel in Los Angeles, I only had the energy to take a shower and go to bed.

Coast to Coast: Day 7: Albuquerque, NM - Flagstaff, AZ. Wednesday, May 14, 2014

     I was out of the hotel very late; about 9 am. It was pretty chilly, even as I rode off into the desert. I took I-40 to get to Flagstaff, and then in Flagstaff I would route my journey to Phoenix. There was no safe route to get to Flagstaff without taking the highway, so in a change of heart, I decided to stick to using the highway for the rest of my journey. It was still a long ride, but I was feeling good about it.

     On the road out of Albuquerque, there were more signs than I could count advertising different Native American clothes, pottery, jewelry, and other knickknacks. They were everywhere.

“Stop Here!”
“Exit Now!”
“Indian Ruins Gift Shop!”

     It went on for tens of miles.

     Somewhere on 40 before going into Arizona, I found a back road that I wanted to take to get to a mountain I was looking at. The back road eventually faded into an unpaved path and then no path at all. That didn’t stop me. I went straight into the desert and carved my own path. My bike had plenty of torque to grapple the steep climbs, although the fishtailing of my bike on the sand was a bit fatiguing. I never dropped my motorcycle, and I managed to get some great photos.

     Further into the desert, it started to become even more dangerous. There were deep crevices just a few feet away from my bike, but I was determined to reach the mountain.

That’s a long way down

     Finally, I got to a point where I was surrounded on the front and right side by crevices, and a steep mountain on the left side. I had to turn back, but not before getting my bike stuck in the sand. I laid my bike down and attempted to pull a big rock out from underneath the rear fork. It was a stubborn rock, and it was then that I realized how deadly my situation was.

     I had no cell service, and the temperature had really worked its way up. As a result, the small amount of water I had left wouldn’t be enough for me to walk back to the highway ten miles away and get help. The rock was pressing against the tire, and if it blew as I tried to pull it out, I was done for. It was strange being in this kind of situation. I didn’t panic. I was anxious, but my mind was fixated on pulling out that rock and nothing else

     After much hassle, I was finally able to pull out the rock. I gave a big sigh of relief, and headed straight back to the main road. My clutch probably didn’t enjoy the experience very much, but it was still in good shape.

     I pulled into a gas station once again in the middle of nowhere. As I was waiting for my bike to cool, I checked out the gas station shop because it looked a bit touristy and caught my eye. Inside, I found a neat looking magnet that I bought and put on my bike.

My sweet new Magnet

     Outside the shop, there was another homeless person, but he was on foot. He was kinda crazy, and he provided an interesting conversation on how the carbon monoxide in the air from the cars was making him feel extremely dizzy. It was probably the carbon monoxide in his cigarette if anything, but it was still a fun conversation.

     I also met a fellow motorcyclist who pulled up to the pump next to mine as I was filling my tank. His name was Jarvis, and he was making his way across the country on a Yamaha R1. He was blogging on his website www.R1acrossusa.com. He took a picture with me to post on his blog before we went our separate ways.

Jarvis and me at a gas station in the desert

     I saw the mountain which carried the city of Flagstaff from over 50 miles away. It was kind of disorienting; riding minute after minute without the mountain appearing to get any closer. It took me an hour to get to the mountain from the time I first saw it. I checked in to the KOA campsite and rented another cabin. The temperature was going to be as low as the 20s overnight, and I really wanted to stay warm. The elevation of Flagstaff is about 8000 feet, I believe. The office staff first had me sign a strange waiver. The clerk told me that the campsite was owned by two lawyers. Figures.

     Like the other campsites, this site had Wifi, but it was a pain to get it “working”. It took me forever to set up a stupid account and password for the Wifi service which I never had to worry about before, and then the internet would randomly cut out. This campsite was much larger than the other KOAs, which meant that the bathrooms were much farther away. The distance between the cabin and the bathroom was about a quarter of a mile, which proved to be perilous in the middle of the night when it was thirty degrees. On top of that, the bathrooms had a number lock, so when I was groggy in the middle of the night and forgot the password at the door, I had to turn around, go back to my cabin and get the password off the camp guide, go back to the bathroom, do my business, and get back to the cabin again. I have no idea why the bathrooms were locked. No one is going to steal a bathroom.

Coast to Coast: Day 6: Amarillo, TX - Albuquerque, NM. Tuesday, May 13, 2014

     I slept really well, and was on the road by 7:00 am. This was late for me, but my body was still processing the steak from the previous night. I took Route 60 most of the day, although I-40 would have been more direct. I was still set on continuing my journey through back roads. After a few hours I made it to New Mexico, and took a road off the old highway to get somewhere where I could take a break from the ride. Since the temperature was a moderate fifty five, I was comfortably enjoying my time eating the food and drinks I brought along with me.

The spot where I took a break 

Another shot of my rest spot

     It was at this moment in time that I remembered my conversation with my short lived, motorcyclist friend in Kansas City. I had crossed two days of seemingly never ending rain, I was going through a desert, and I was about to pass through the Rockies. My motorcycle and I went through hell together, and I grew to love my bike more and more. The dependence I had on those two wheels was enormous. I recall hearing the "Rifleman’s Creed”:

This is my rifle. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
My rifle is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life.
My rifle, without me, is useless. Without my rifle, I am useless. I must fire my rifle true. I must shoot straighter than my enemy who is trying to kill me. I must shoot him before he shoots me. I will...
My rifle and I know that what counts in war is not the rounds we fire, the noise of our burst, nor the smoke we make. We know that it is the hits that count. We will hit...
My rifle is human, even as I, because it is my life. Thus, I will learn it as a brother. I will learn its weaknesses, its strength, its parts, its accessories, its sights and its barrel. I will keep my rifle clean and ready, even as I am clean and ready. We will become part of each other. We will...
Before God, I swear this creed. My rifle and I are the defenders of my country. We are the masters of our enemy. We are the saviors of my life.
So be it, until victory is America's and there is no enemy, but peace!

     I know it sounds strange to someone who has never been on a journey like mine (I certainly thought so), but I decided to name my bike. It had earned it. "Elizabeth" seemed to ring a bell, and it sounded right. After about half an hour of eating snacks, drinking Gatorade, and admiring the view, I was back on the road.

     A short while later, I was doing well on gas, but I really needed to use the restroom. I went inside a Pilot gas station and did my business. Before leaving though, I felt obligated to buy something, since I didn’t purchase gas. I grabbed some bee sting energy pills, paid $2.99, popped one, and got back on my bike.

     Fifty miles up the road from the gas station, I began to feel very ill. My Gatorade that morning did taste kinda funny, and I believed it was because I wasn't washing out my water bottles that I may have been gulping down a lot of bacteria. I stopped at a Phillips 66 gas station, made it to the pump, and spilled my guts in the trash can. I went inside the gas station and washed out my water bottles in the bathroom sink with some soap.

     There was a subway on the inside of the gas station, so I took a seat at one of the tables and called my dad. I told him I was struggling but managing. He told me that the family had been really worried about me. We talked for ten minutes, but it was hard to concentrate on the conversation. I still wasn't feeling better. I was shivering like crazy, but I was warming up. After I ended the call, there was a man with his wife and kids in the station who must have overheard my conversation. He didn't seem to be intimidated by my leather and bought me a hot chocolate even though I didn't ask. People are awesome. We talked about my trip for a short period of time before they left. Fifteen minutes later I was fully warm, but still shivering. It occurred to me that the reason I was sick was that those energy pills must have been laced with something strong, so I pitched them and decided to ride it out.

     Gas station energy pills have a dark history. Truck drivers travel long distances on the road day after day, and so the demand for increasingly strong energy pills is very high. There are many shady companies out there that put illicit or dangerous substances in these pills to achieve such energy. Few of these pills are FDA approved, but regulating isolated gas stations isn’t high on the government’s agenda.

     It took three hours for me to begin feeling better, but I had still covered ground. By then I was in the middle of nowhere on a lonely back road, and I spotted a man who was walking a bicycle with a trailer attached to it by the side of the road. I slowed down and asked if he needed any help. He said he was out of food. I wasted no time in giving him everything I had: a bottle of Gatorade, 3 packages of beef jerky, 2 bags of candy. The guy was definitely homeless, but if it weren't for the kindness of strangers, I wouldn't have made it past Wakeeney, KS.

     I considered turning back to the closest gas station, which was a Valero about twenty miles away. I knew the man I had helped wouldn’t have enough supplies to make it to the next town, but I realized that it was not my problem. I had to be somewhere, and he was probably used to surviving on the road. He’d find a way to manage.

     As the day went on, I realized that taking the back roads to Albuquerque made my day much longer than I had hoped. I ended up taking the nearest road off of 60 on to I-40. The temperature slowly declined until it was in the low 40s. I made a stop at a travel center “Clines Corners Retail Center” to warm up. The travel center was a gas station, Subway, and gift shop all packed into one building. I parked next to an early 80s red Yamaha 250 motorcycle. The motorcycle was packed with lots of gear like my bike, and I saw it had a Wisconsin plate. I entered the lobby of the travel center, where I met the owner.

     He was in his 40s, and he was decked out in heated gear, something I really wish I had. He said he was on his way to a travel convention in Flagstaff. I told him I was going across the country, and that I was green. He told me that he had been riding motorcycles since 1991, and that everyone learns a lot from their first tour. He shared with me a great story about how he rode his 250 all the way from Alaska to the southernmost tip of South America, and that I shouldn’t listen to what the media says about the people there (they are friendly just as they are here). He was comfortable doing basic maintenance on his motorcycle like I was until he was smack dab in the middle of Chile with his engine frozen from a poor oil change. He opened up the engine and carved down the piston rings to get it running, and went to a place many miles away where he sold the engine and got help.

     He informed me of a website where other motorcycle tourers congregate. The site was useful if I was in the middle of South America, Europe, or anywhere in the globe and needed to know the nearest place where I can get a part for my motorcycle, or a place to stay. He wrote it down on one of his business cards which he gave me, but I must have lost it on the way out.

     Within a short amount of time after passing the travel center, I noticed I was going very steeply downhill for an exceedingly long time. Within 40 minutes, the temperature increased from 43 to 63. I didn’t realize how high up I was. I made it to Albuquerque after reaching the bottom of the mountain and checked into a Hampton Inn. I was too burned out from the energy pill I took earlier to make it to the campsite 100 more miles west. I hadn’t showered since I was in Kansas City, and I hadn’t done any laundry since I left New Albany. I took the extra time I had from cutting my day short to shave, shower, and basically do all the things I should be doing every day.

     The laundry was halfway done when I went to check on it after taking a long shower. The dryer wasn’t finished yet, and I didn’t have anything else to do, so I sat outside the laundry room. There was an older woman sitting just outside the laundry/vending machine room near me. She said that once she was at a hotel and someone stole her and her husband’s clothes out of the washing machine, dripping wet and all, so she didn’t want to leave her clothes unattended. I started a long conversation with her. She said she used to live in Albuquerque for 30 years, but she came back to the city with her husband because he was being treated for cancer. I gave her my apologies, but we quickly changed the subject.

     She told me all about the sites in Albuquerque. There was a tram that used to be the longest one in the world until a few years ago, and that the best place for a burger was 5 Star Burger. I decided to have dinner there. There were some other touristy sites that she mentioned including a part of the old city of Albuquerque, but I found the tram to be the most exciting.

     She also shared her experience in Albuquerque as a balloonist. Albuquerque was a really popular city for hot air balloons, and she piloted them for about 20 years since the 80s. She said Albuquerque has a rare “box” phenomenon in which the wind will travel in one direction at a lower altitude and the opposite direction at a higher altitude. On a day with no wind, one could feasibly stay over Albuquerque the whole day. She shared some neat ballooning stories, and after the laundry was done, I left the hotel to get dinner. The sun was still making its way to the horizon when I had reached 5 Star Burger. The restaurant’s menu claimed that the burger was the best in New Mexico, and displayed a few awards. I was really excited to eat, but when the food arrived, it wasn’t as good as the restaurant made it out to be. Don’t get me wrong, it was a great burger, but “best in New Mexico” seemed like a push. I still finished it in record time, and brought the fries back to the hotel. Unfortunately, by the time I made it back to the hotel, it was too late to see the tram or do anything else in the city, so I packed up for the night.

Coast to Coast: Day 5: Wakeeney, KS - Amarillo, TX. Monday, May 12, 2014

     I woke up in the morning at about 4:00am with about 5 hours of sleep. It wasn’t a long rest, but it was enough to get me feeling good enough to get to Amarillo, Texas. Like in Indiana, there was rain coming that was going to continue for the rest of the day, so I set out immediately.

     The next two hours must have been the longest in my life. It was raining hard, but it was also forty five degrees; twenty degrees lower than my Illinois stunt. I was singing "California Dreaming" just to keep myself going as the rain pounded my jacket and jeans. I made it to Dodge City straight south of Wakeeney before I finally decided to throw in the towel.

     I stopped at a Kwik shop (a gas station owned by Kroger) and went straight inside. The cashier and his friend, who must have been around my age, saw me dripping wet and were quick to help me out. The cashier brought out a space heater and his friend even bought me a doughnut and some hot chocolate. They were curious about my trip, so I told them everything.

     I learned that the cashier, Erik, was also 19, and had been working for Kroger for about 8 months. His friend, Aldo, joked that Erik needed to get his shit together because I had been working at Kroger for 5 ½ years. I was still shivering and Erik told me I could change in the back bathroom since I had spare clothes. A few minutes later, I was in fresh clothes and mostly dry (except for my boots). I took another fifteen minutes to chatting and getting warm . I was at that gas station for about an hour. I made sure I picked up sunscreen before I left.

     I was about two miles away from the Kwik stop before my motorcycle started sputtering. I was so consumed by the cold that I forgot to fill up on gas. A white pickup truck and ford focus passed me and honked at me. It was Erik and Aldo, and they were waving me goodbye. I turned around, went back to the station, filled up, and left the city.

     I made it another hundred miles to a rest stop for a break, and I noticed something wrong with my bike. Somewhere along the trip, the screws holding in one of the rear turn signal lens had worked themselves out, and the bulb was just hanging there.

Lost a lens 

     I stopped in Liberal, Kansas at an Ace Hardware store and tried to pick up some translucent yellow tape. Tried to, at least. I guess the liberals used all of their yellow tape for warning labels on blenders. I found and wrapped some clear tape around the turn signal housing to keep the bulb from falling out. It was the most I could do for it.

     The rest of the day went by much more smoothly. I passed through the Oklahoma handle, but by the time I realized I was in the state, I was already half way through it. When I passed into Texas, I noticed that the "Welcome to Texas" sign had a substantial amount of bullet holes in it. Classic.

     Texas was extremely beautiful. Unlike Kansas which had a single road that went straight for what seemed like an eternity, Texas had a 75 mph speed limit and roads were spiced with nice curves. I stopped at a rest stop and got a picture of some of the hills. The terrain was slightly more exciting, but still pretty drab.

Only slightly more exciting 

View at a rest stop 

     I saw a huge cow pasture on my route, which was the most exciting thing I had seen that day until I passed a windmill farm. The farm was giant, and stretched many miles in all directions by the side of a railroad track.

Tons of cows in the distance 

Massive windmill farm 

     I made it to Amarillo pretty early in the day, so I stopped at a custom motorcycle shop before going to the camp. I told the owner (who I later learned is named Israel Vega) that I was on my way cross country, and a light bulb seemed to switch on in his head. He talked to me about all the nearby sites in Amarillo. There was the Big Texan, which serves the largest steak in the country. There was a biker bar on 6th Street, which was the street where all the major shops were. The 2nd or 3rd largest landing strip in the country was also across the street, and was part of a military base. They used the strip to land one of the space shuttles. A few miles outside of town, there is a nuclear bomb factory, which if I follow the road adjacent to the factory, a small army of military trucks will follow me from inside the fence.

Custom motorcycle shop. The owner (just behind my bike) knew everything about the town 

     He also told me about the history of the building to the right of the shop. He said that it used to be a popular gas station back in Route 66’s prime. In fact, the road in front of the motorcycle shop was actually part of the old highway. The gas station’s pumps were removed, but I could tell he was trying to restore the place. He said there used to be a bomb on the roof of the station that was deactivated after WWII, and he put it in the shed to the left of the shop while he was restoring the building. He said he was going to turn the old gas station into a biker bar, and put in 1930’s era pumps were the old pumps used to be.


     He took me inside the gas station, and showed me his work in progress. He had put in fridges, a pool table, a stripper pole, and a map of the United States on the wall for travelers to see. I thought it was neat that he was breathing new life into this historic building, and it definitely had that bad biker feel to it.

The bomb that used to be on the roof of the old gas station

     I asked out of curiosity if he had a spare rear turn signal lens for my bike, and he said he did have one at some point. We entered an old house to the left of the shed, and there were cardboard boxes full of parts. It was kind of like the TV show American Pickers, but for real. He also showed me a 1979 CB200, completely original. It looked like it had just rolled off the factory line. We never found the lens. He said he must have thrown it away.


     The last thing I brought up with him was that I was constantly fighting the wind. He showed me a dusty cafe fairing, which was really neat. He said that I had to attach it with zip ties, and that it was $180. I had to pass. It was neat, but it needed to be held on by more than zip ties, and $180 is a lot of money. In retrospect, I really wish I bought it.


     I moved on to the campsite about a mile or two from the motorcycle shop. I decided to pay extra for a cabin, since I was going a long distance to Phoenix the next day, and I would need plenty of sleep. It was still pretty windy, but not as bad as Kansas. I unloaded my bike and headed to the Big Texan for dinner. It was only a few miles away from camp.

 

The Big Texan

     The outside of the building looked very touristy, but clean. The inside looked like an upscale cafeteria with a large gift shop attached to it. The eating area was filled with long, connected tables, and the kitchen was visible and open behind an elevated table. The first thing I noticed when I sat down was the substantial amount of butter in front of me.

The elevated table 

That's a lot of butter

     I was hungry, and this restaurant was home of America's largest steak. I couldn't pass up the opportunity to eat a 72 ounce steak. I placed my order, and my waiter seemed genuinely surprised. I guess people rarely order the famous steak; I couldn’t even find it on the menu. The waiter returned with a waiver that stated the rules of the 72 ounce steak challenge. I had exactly one hour to finish the 72 ounce steak. If I succeeded, the $72 steak would be free. A few minutes later, some lights illuminated the elevated table and the timers were set to 60 minutes. Just before my steak was ready, I was informed that I was to sit at the elevated table.

72 ounce steak. There is a baked potato in foil for scale

     When the steak was brought out, it was the most massive slab of meat I had ever seen. The waiter let me try a bite to see if it was cooked properly before the restaurant would start the timer. I took a bite, and it was extremely juicy and tender. The steak itself had absolutely no fat.

     After I O.K.'d the steak the timer started. I knew I couldn't finish the whole thing, so I just ate it casually. Tons of people were taking my picture and wishing me luck, and I even had a conversation with a few of them about my travels. A young girl actually asked for my autograph, for which I obliged. I made it halfway through the steak before I started feeling queasy and gave up. With 32 minutes on the timer, and half the steak eaten, I had had enough.


     As the waiter prepared my check, a lot of people approached me and told me I did well. My waiter brought me my check, as well as a t-shirt for the attempt. By the time I left the restaurant, I was too full and tired to do anything else in Amarillo, so I headed back to the campsite to get some much needed rest.

Coast to Coast: Day 4: Kansas City, MO - Wakeeney, KS. Sunday May 11, 2014

     I slept comfortably at the hotel, but I still got myself out of bed by 4:00am. I didn’t want to sleep in too late- I liked getting as far as I could before the sun scorched the roads. I had to move my motorcycle off the sidewalk to the entrance of the hotel so I would have room to load my bags. I went out to my bike and opened my pockets and tried to feel for my key. It wasn’t in my jacket.

     I went back to my room. I searched the whole room and I couldn’t find the key. I looked through all my bags. Nothing. I went back down the elevator and asked the concierge if he had seen it. He said that he had not. My key was completely lost.

     After a ten minute freak out experience, I remembered that I had planned for something like this to happen. I took off the side cover of my bike which shielded the electrical components. On the inside of the cover, I had duct taped a spare key in case of an emergency. I was good to go.

     My effort to make distance before the sun came out proved to be pointless. The roads turned out to be pretty cold that day, and it rained a couple times. The wind was also nasty, and it made me wish I had a windshield, but who was I going to complain to in the middle of nowhere?

     I went north on 169 before taking a few minor roads to 116. 116 was a road that just went straight for hundreds of miles. No curves, very few elevation changes, and extremely boring. It put me in a bit of a trance, and I probably should have taken more breaks by the side of the road than I did. \

Straight… 

and straight… 

and straight 

     Over the course of the day, the weather let up. Even though there wasn’t much to see in Kansas, it was still beautiful. It was even better since there were very few other vehicles on the road. I got to enjoy this strip of asphalt without any distractions- for better or for worse.

     I made my usual stops at different gas stations along the way. Most of them I had never heard of: Sinclair, Kum & Go, and some independently owned gas stations that didn’t belong to any recognizable franchise. They sold Pepsi gas, but since I wasn’t on the busy interstate I had to make do with whatever gas stations were available.

     By the time I was twenty miles outside the campsite in Wakeeney, Kansas, the weather and terrain completely changed. It was 90 degrees, there was tumbleweed everywhere, and the area looked more like a desert. The change was so quick that I didn’t even notice the transition. Trees were replaced by low lying bushes, and the air felt dry and arid. I slowed to about 50 mph because I didn't want to stress my motorcycle's air cooled engine.

I felt like I was in the wild west 

     I reached the KOA campsite in Wakeeney too early to check in. The office hours were strange; something like 10am-12 and 4pm-6, and it was 2pm. All the KOAs I stayed at were privately owned, so different campsites under the KOA name had varying rules and amenities. They all shared a few things in common, such as the brand of cabins and most importantly, clean bathrooms.

     I had about two hours to kill before I could check in, so I took a tour of Wakeeney. It was a very small town, and there didn’t appear to be too much to do. Since the town flanked the interstate highway and there was nothing else around, I could only imagine the purpose of this town was to exist as a stopping point for passing motorists. I went to the other side of town (two miles away) to a dairy queen to cool off.

     The dairy queen was run by a staff of fourteen or fifteen year olds who seemed to have no idea what they were doing. There was one worker in her fifties who was running around essentially babysitting them and trying to get orders prepared. The line in front of the register was short but moved slowly. I ordered an M&M blizzard, but the older woman stopped one of the kids from bringing out my blizzard because he made it wrong. I then saw her instructing him on how to use the ice cream machine properly. I wasn’t bothered by it. I had plenty of time to kill.

     I made a few laps around the town in effort to find something slightly interesting until it was almost 4pm. Then I came back to the camp, checked in, unloaded my luggage and went back into town again to get my motorcycle a much needed wash. A few minutes with the power sprayer got my bike looking amazing again. I then returned to camp and introduced myself to an older couple who had their RV parked across from my motorcycle. The older man said they were RVing from the west. I asked him how the weather was, since I was going to be passing through Colorado, Utah, and Nevada to reach California. He said they had just passed through Colorado, and it was snowing hard. My route was to take me through Denver, but seeing as how it was snowing, I knew I would have to take a detour. Cars have plenty of trouble getting through snowy roads, but if a motorcycle so much as touches a patch of snow, it just falls right over.

Clean bike! (Cabin I moved to in the background, and part of the RV belonging to the couple who helped me)

     The man invited me into their RV to discuss my route. I had never really seen the inside of an RV before, so it was kind of a neat experience. It was like a small house. It was very clean, the furniture was sophisticated and comfortable, and the tables were granite. It was basically a house in New Albany that had been taken through a massive car crusher and put on wheels.

     He pulled out a map of the United States and placed it on the coffee table in front of the couch where we were sitting. His wife was in chair at the short end of the table. He told me that if I wanted to get to San Francisco, I would have to pass through New Mexico and go around Flagstaff in Arizona. He pointed out the route on the map. He said the desert this time of year wasn’t too hot, so it wasn’t as dangerous as I had imagined.

     I then talked to him and his wife about my trip from Ohio and their trip from the west. The man said if he was younger, he would have gone on a trip like mine. His wife seemed to be more interested in how I was able to live under such rough living conditions. I felt a little uncomfortable, since I lacked a sense of smell. I figured that since I hadn’t showered in two days that I probably smelled terrible. It’s kind of strange explaining this to people, but I have never in my life taken in the scent of a flower or a skunk. Even with today’s advanced medicine, doctors have been unable to find the source of my inability to smell. We closed up the conversation and I went back outside to my tent.

     It was neat, but I never really understood the concept of RVing. I spend at least $60,000 on a living room which I take across the country once or twice a year with a ton of stuff I don’t need, get seven miles per gallon, and stay at an RV park. At the park, I still have to pay for a spot and I have to dump the bathroom contents (which is a very dirty job) and hook the RV up to an electrical box. If that’s not enough, I also have to have a place to store it and I have to service it like any other vehicle. Why wouldn’t I just take a car across the United States and stay at a hotel every night for significantly less? Or, at that, take a 42 year old motorcycle across the United States with only what I need to survive and camp every night?

     Whenever I unpacked, I thought of the movie Spaceballs. Specifically, I thought of the scene where Lone Starr’s flying RV crash lands into a desert, and the characters are forced to walk through the desert. He instructs Princess Vespa, who he is rescuing, to bring, “Only what you need to survive”. Since she is a stereotypical princess, Lone Starr finds himself and his friends carrying tons of her unnecessary luggage through the desert. That was me. I found myself saying “Why the hell did I bring this?” more often than “I should have brought…”

     Setting up my tent was a serious challenge. The temperature didn't stay ninety for long and dropped to about fifty five in fifteen minutes, and thus was accompanied by the strongest winds I have ever experienced. I thought Ohio weather changes quickly, but the plains changed my perspective. Ohio has nothing on the plains. My tent almost blew away as I was setting it up, so I went to the camp office and upgraded to a cabin for $20. I didn't feel like I was cheating, as this was my trip and my rules. Even inside the cabin, I could feel the wind blowing through the cracks in the windows and door. There was no way I could achieve any kind of rest in a tent.

     The cabin was essentially a miniature hotel room, minus a bathroom. It had electricity, heating, air conditioning, a double bed and two bunks, a plank off the wall to be used as a desk, and a chair. I felt like I was living the life of luxury, and all for $50.

All the KOA cabins look pretty much the same. This one is in Oklahoma, with all my belongings gorgeously laid out 

View of the cabin from the back wall 

     I took off my shorty gloves, and my hands had terrible sun blisters. I didn’t even realize my hands were burning since the wind usually kept me cool. They were in bad shape, and I really regretted not wearing sunscreen.