ROAD TRIP 2011

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ROAD TRIP 2011



This trip was 12 days and 4 states, starting in TEXAS, going thru NEW MEXICO, ARIZONA and COLORADO, back thru NEW MEXICO and into TEXAS. We did touch UTAH but that was only at 4 corners, this trip took place in early June but can’t remember the exact dates.



The planning for this trip started in December while I was in Kuwait. At this time I was still riding a Harley Davidson sportster that was in the shop being upgraded to a 1200 and having some other stuff done to it. As on the majority of my trips Steve was my riding partner and we had made several weekend trips with our girlfriends, usually no more than 2 nights, until this trip our longest had been 4 days in NEW MEXICO and the pan handle of TEXAS.



There were a lot of emails sent and talking on Facebook to get this trip planned, a lot of Google earth and map quest was used. We both had ideas and places we wanted to see and things we wanted to do. We picked out the things that we both wanted to see and do and than tried to pick our roads to give us the best scenery and the most interesting ride, as a bike rider I like hilly twisty roads, straight a ways usually put me to sleep which is not good on a bike.



We finally get the trip planned about the end of March the first of April. I call the shop where my bike is and check on the status and find out that it may not be ready in time for my trip so I start looking for another bike. I figured I would look all around the states and if I find one I will fly into that state and pick up the bike and ride it to Texas. Well after 2 days of looking at just about every Harley shop across the united states I found a bike at Texas Harley Davidson which is just outside the south gate of Dallas Fort Worth airport. I call the store and speak to a salesman, after a few issues with having to hold the bike for about 60 days I paid for the bike with my debit card.



On the day I flew into Dallas, Steve met me at the hotel I had chosen to stay at since I got in after the shop had closed and was scheduled to pick up my bike the next morning. The following morning after checking out I got a taxi to take me to the shop which was only about 2 miles from the hotel, I was a little early and the shop wasn’t open yet so I walked around peeking into the windows to see if I could see my bike. I was able to see the bike and it was sitting right in front of the salesman’s desk. Steve asked me how I knew it was mine, I told him the same way a mother knows her own child. I just knew. And I was right. After the store opened it took about 45 minutes to get things done and buy a few things I thought I needed and than we were on the road.



The ride from the shop to my house is about 4 hours but I think we did it in about 3. The bike took some getting use to as it was twice the size of my sportster, the motor is a 103 cubic inch, or about 1700cc



I think I was home for about 3 days before we hit the road. As with all our trips we hit the road at first light after eating breakfast. We headed south towards I10 as our first sight seeing stop was going to be the old FORT LANCASTER just south of I10 on a scenic loop. This fort was just one of several that was built to defend the settlers from the Indians during the early days of Texas History. We rode the interstates all the way to the scenic loop as we had ridden most of the roads in between our houses and the fort on many occasions and we just wanted to get into a new area. This fort sits in a large valley and the narrow winding road getting down to it is a nice ride in its self. After coming around 1 turn in the road you look out across a wide valley with no man made objects in site and you can almost imagine what the old soldiers and Indians seen in this place. We spent about an hour or two at the old fort and its cemetery. We left the fort and rode the scenic route back to I10 this route is about 30 miles long and winds thru the valley with only one town on the whole road and it has a population of less than 500. Our next stop would be Fort Stockton on I10.



After reaching I10 from the scenic route we headed west towards Fort Stockton and the town it’s named after. We elected to take I10 because the speed limit was 75 and we had over 200 miles to go to get there and this would be a lunch stop. The ride to Fort Stockton was uneventful except for a gas stop and a couple of leg stretching stops.



When we pulled off of I10 on to main street in the town of Fort Stockton our first stop was the Fort itself, I had been thru Fort Stockton several times on other trips but had never stopped at the fort. The fort itself was well preserved and we were able to go into many of the buildings to see how the soldiers lived when posted here. Surprisingly the barracks look relatively confortable, including the mattresses made out of straw. We spent about an hour wandering around the old fort trying to soak up some of the history. It was getting to be lunchtime so we decided to look for a place to eat. As we were riding down Main Street we came upon a giant concrete roadrunner. I had heard about this guy but have never seen it so we stopped for some pictures. We finally found a place to eat. It was a Mexican place and the food wasn’t bad although it did catch up with me later down the road. After lunch we filled our tank and hit the road.



At one of our little rest stops or photo stops we had talked about where to stay for the night and decided to try to make it to Carlsbad New Mexico which was still about a couple hundred miles away. We pulled into town at sundown and were able to find a decent motel at a decent price. With almost 700 miles for the day and a time zone change by 1 hour, we checked in cleaned up and found a place within walking distance to get a bite to eat. While eating we discussed the next day and which way we wanted to go and what we should make as a final stop for that night.



The next morning we were up at about 6am wanting to be on the road by 730am. We knew we wanted to make it to Santa Fe by dark but we were going the long way to get there. We went north on highway 285 until we found the road that we needed to take us towards Cloudcroft, which was 82. We spent a little time in Cloudcroft and then rode to Ruidoso by way of Tularosa. These roads are nice to ride lots of tall pines to shade you as you ride; the roads are twisty and hilly. We did get sprinkled on but nothing major while we were in that are. We continued riding on 70 until we hit 380 and went west to THE VALLEY OF FIRES RECREATION AREA. This is an area of a massive lava flow and looks like it belongs on the moon or some other planet. After leaving the VALLEY OF FIRES we went east on 380 to highway 54 and turned north to catch our next road which was NM55 which was a 2 lane country road that had very little traffic and in a round about way would take us to Albuquerque NM were we would spend the night. What I don’t mention is the times that I stop to take a picture of something or to change the batteries in my gopro cams I have mounted on my bike. We only did a couple hundred miles this day but there was a lot of sight seeing in the old towns we went thru. We did stop at one casino and took a little money from them but not enough to retire.



Day three had us heading north towards Gallup NM but once again it would be a round about trip getting there. We spent a lot of this day riding thru the Indian Reservations, I like these parts of the ride due to the history and that not a lot has changed. We had a lot of gray skies on this day and even got into a rain shower that turned into pea size hail, but at 55 to 60 mph on a motorcycle with no helmet it hurt and by the time we found a place to pull over and put our helmets on the weather changed about 15 minutes later and the sun started peeking thru the clouds, however in the direction we were heading it was still very gray. We would find out later that the gray we were seeing was a very large wild fire on the Arizona and New Mexico state line. As we were just kind of wandering north to get to Gallup which would be our over night stop we seen a sign that indicated a photo op. The sign said Zuni Canyon and Morro Rock since Morro rock was further away we opted for Zuni Canyon this is where I wish I had turned my gopro on. Steve was leading this part of the ride and since we were going thru what appeared to be a neighborhood I didn’t think about turning on the cam. But as we came around a corner there was a cliff with a small cave and I guess the sound of the bikes scared the birds but several hundred birds flew off the wall of the cliff and right into Steve’s path, how he missed them I don’t know. But it sure looked awesome. About a mile down the road we went from pavement to rocky dirt so our speed was reduced dramatically .the road is about 18 miles long and has a few places to stop with some information plaques to explain some of the activity that took place. It was a beautiful ride although very dusty, sometimes a vehicle would fly by us and throw allsorts of dirt and gravel up at us. It would make me so mad I just wanted to chase them down and slap the. But I didn’t I just asked that the powers to be give them a flat tire down the road. It took us a couple of hours to travel this road but when it ended we were on a paved road and ironically just a couple of miles from Morro rock. We stopped at Moro rock and I’m glad we did, There is a lot of history at that place, people that passed thru here as far back as 1709 scratched there name into the soft limestone walls. This was the only watering hole for many miles so the Indians and travelers alike used it. We left Moro rock and headed west as we knew there was a highway that would take us north into Gallup, however the further west we went the more smoke we could smell and see eventually the smoke got so bad we thought we were going to have to turn around and head east and go back up Zuni canyon road, but we seen a road just in front of us that turned north and took it about 20 minutes down the road we could breath easy again We finally made it to Gallup and stopped at the railroad café the food was very good and it was a mom and pop shop which I prefer over the chain food places. There was a native lady in there selling silver and turquoise jewelry so I bought a pendant for my mom. The price was very reasonable. After supper we went to find a place to spend the night. There is an historical motel called the EL RANCHO, which is where the movies stars stayed while they were filming in the area and the owners have named all the rooms after the stars that stayed there. Stars like John Wayne, Lucille Ball, Jimmy Stewart. And many others. We were able to get a room in the new part of the building which was across the parking lot and that was fine with me. Evidently there was some type of teacher’s thing going on and the lobby was full of teachers trying to register and get rooms. We were able to park the bikes right in front of the door to our room which made it nice to unload them, you would be amazed at the amount of crap you can carry on a bike. After unloading I cleaned up and took all my SD cards out of my cameras a total of 4 of which 3 were video and I grabbed my laptop and walked over to the bar and had a beer while I down loaded everything to my computer. I guess Steve took a nap because I didn’t see him for about an hour. While down loading my pictures in the hotel bar I talked to a couple who said that the locals but on a good show in the middle of town with some native American dances in full dress so I talked to Steve about it and we went on downtown to see what it was all about. While riding thru town I noticed that a lot of the buildings have murals painted on the walls depicting the history of Gallup. I decided to park the bike and walk around and take a few pictures until the show started. I have a lot of respect for the Native Americans; they have endured a rough life since the European settlers invade the Americas. The show was excellent and after it was finished I was hungry so we went looking for some place else to eat. And then it was time to hit the sack.



The following morning found us up and about at 6am drinking some coffee while we packed the bikes, we wanted to be on the road by 7am looking for breakfast. AT about 8am we were done with breakfast and headed west on I40 also known as part of route 66. We found our turn just a few miles down the road and turned north on US491 until we found AZ264 and turned west on it. We would stay on this rode until we reached Tuba city, part of this road is also known as KEEMS CANYON and is a really nice ride thru the reservation, as the morning wore on and the sun got higher the temperatures got higher and I don’t need to tell you that motorcycles don’t have AC. Steve started having trouble with his shifter lever so we pulled over at a gas station restaurant country store combination with a small trailer park to the side of it. He fixed his shifter and since it was getting close to lunchtime we figured we would try out the restaurant, which was pretty good. There was a Native American art gallery and gift shop next to the restaurant so I went in t look around. I have always wanted a Navajo rug and couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw how in expensive they were in this place, I picked up a small one that I liked which was 40 bucks, but as I looked at it I noticed on the back that it looked like a mat you would buy in a store not something that was hand made and then I noticed the markings on it said made in INDIA. I asked the lady in the store what was up with this. She told me people didn’t want to pay the prices for original Indian made stuff. I told her I worked in Kuwait if I wanted something made in India I could buy it there for 1/10^th of what she was charging. I walked out of the store before I got really mad. We hit the road again still headed to Grand Canyon natl. park. We stopped in Tuba city to fill up and get something to drink. After leaving Tuba city we made a few more stops at overlook areas to take some pictures. Our plan was to camp in the park but when we got to the gate there was a sign that said all campsites were full. So we went on in and went to the town of Tusyuan (sp) it was on US108/64 just outside of the Kaibab Natl. Forest. About 16 miles from the park entrance. We were worried about finding a room in this town and thought we might have to go all the way to Williams Az. There were a lot of people running around but we found out that this was where everyone was able to do air tours of the canyon. We got a room at the second hotel we checked at so we unloaded the bikes and cleaned up. We also rested a little since it was still early in the day. About 5pm we decided to go exploring a little around town just to see what was there. We found a place to eat and though it was a nice looking place the food was marginal and expensive.



The next day had us on the road at 8am headed for the canyon. We planned to spend a few hours there before heading to four corners. We ate breakfast at the canyon and walked around a little bit. I got some pictures and then it started getting crowded so we decided to leave. On the way out I was able to get some pictures of a bull elk off in the wood grazing although I had to park about 100 yards away and sneak back into the woods to get a picture. We stopped at several over look areas in the park and the old ruins of an old Indian village before finally leaving the park the same way we came in. I don’t normally like riding the same road out that I came in on but in this case we didn’t have a choice. In fact we were going to ride the same roads all the way back to Tuba city where we would stay on US160 instead of turning back on to 264. US160would take us all the way to four corners. If you haven’t been there you’re not missing much. But we will get to that later. We stopped in Tuba city to fill up and stock up on water. We continued our journey east and seen a billboard for the NAVAJO NATL. MONUMENT we didn’t see this on our maps so didn’t put in our plans but I think we both new that we were going to visit it. So when the turn came up we turned and rode about 15 miles to get to it and it was well worth the ride. The place was beautiful even the ¼ mile hike to the overlook. The cactus flowers were in bloom and looking out across the canyon at the village that the Indians had built under an overhang of the cliff was well worth the trip. We left the area and continued our journey to four corners we made one small detour and went up into monument valley just a little ways before turning around and continuing our journey. This part of Arizona is high desert and we were reminded of that somewhere between Kayenta and Mexican water when we encountered a sand storm. The road we were on was just a two lane road with no shoulders so we really had no place to pull over to put on helmets or face covers and the sand really hurt, visibility was reduced to about 200 yards but I said the hell with it and just stopped in the road and grabbed my helmet and Steve did the same. About an hour down the road we came in to the village of Mexican hat, which was nothing more than a gas station with a store and what, appeared to be an old dairy queen that had been turned into a café. Yep you guessed it we pulled into the café and figured we would wait out the storm there. We both ordered a bowl of buffalo stew and a tall glass of sweet tea to was the sand out of our throats, I must say the stew was excellent along with the tea. The storm had let up a bit while we ate so after we were done we walked over to the store to look around we didn’t see anything we couldn’t live without so we figured we finish waiting out the storm at the café. As we walked out of the store the storm had pretty much stopped. The landscape in this part of Arizona is wide open and rocky with mesas and some canyons. As we left the café we could see a large red mesa out in the distance I now wish I would have stopped and got a picture of it. We finally made it to four corners, which is actually on the Indian reservation with about 30 minutes to spare before they closed. We went in took some pictures and left it is someplace that I will probably never visit again unless forced to do so. We continued up 160 to Cortez Colo., which would be our overnight stop. We checked into a hotel with a casino right there where 160 comes into Cortez, after I cleaned up I told Steve I was going to hit the casino for a bit he said he was going to take a nap and asked if I would play 10 of his dollars with mine I said sure. I played my money for awhile and was on a streak a losing streak but I still had 20 bucks of what I said I was going to lose before I quit, so I played 10 in a machine and won a little but than lost it, so I walked around for awhile just looking and walked by a machine that was calling my name so I figured I had 10 left and I still had Steve’s 10 so I put the 20 into the machine and won with the first spin. By the time I felt I should quit I was up a grand so I gave Steve 500 and I kept 500 but with what I lost I was only 200 to the good. After a goodnight rest and a good breakfast we hit the road and headed east to Durango where we planned to spend a couple of nights. We went right past Mesa Verde natl. monument not because we didn’t want to see it but because we didn’t know it was there. WE pulled into Durango Colo. And went straight to the Harley shop where I bought a new seat for my bike the stock seat was killing me. We than went and found us a nice old motel on the north side of Durango to stay at. After getting settled in we headed back into town to grab a bite to eat and do some exploring.



Durango is an historic old town with a college. After walking around town for a while we came to the conclusion that everyone in town was either retired, a collage student or a tourist. I don’t believe anyone is born there. There are a couple of old hotels the most famous is probably the stratter, and there is an old steam train that runs between Durango and Silverton we thought about riding the train but decided we really wanted to ride highway 550 also known as the million dollar highway. While walking around town we went down a back street trying to get away from the tourist and found a nice little quite bar where we were able to relax and have a beer the bartender was nice and cheerful and she told us all about the town and we meet a fellow military veteran in there as well. It was starting to get late and we knew we wanted to get an early start on the way to Silverton and Ouray on hwy.550.



I was up early the next morning only to find out that there was no coffee pot in the room. I put on my shorts and a t-shirt and sandals and walked about a mile down the road at 5am until I found an open pastry shop that also served coffee. I bought 2 cups and a few pastries and walked back to the motel, it was kind of chili out but not what I would call cold, although the bank sign showed it was 46 degrees out. By the time I made it back to the motel Steve was up and about, we drank the coffee and talked about the things we have done so far on this trip and what was still ahead of us. At about 630 we figured it was light enough to hit the road; it felt nice to ride with out all the baggage we had been carrying. The bike felt lite. We started out the ride with out wearing our leathers but about 3 miles up the road we had started climbing in elevation and got pretty chili so I pulled over and put my leathers on and Steve did the same, the ride was a lot more comfortable than. Highway 550 is a twisty road climbing the mountains before dropping into Silverton and than climbing again headed to Ouray the corners are so sharp in some areas I swear I could see the front tire on my bike almost touch the bike tire. We got quite high in elevation I believe the second pas we went thru was right at 11,000 feet and we could see a lot of snow still on the ground some places coming right to the edge of the road. We made several stops to take pictures and just take in the scenery. Along this road you have beautiful green valleys dotted with pine forest and mountain streams, waterfalls and gorgeous blue lakes. We came around a corner of the mountain and could look down into a valley and saw the town of Silverton and what appeared to be some rafters sitting on the railroad tracks. When we made it into town you could tell it was an old place that has tried to keep up with the times. We rode thru town for a bit just to check it out but ended up coming back to the main paved road and parked the bikes and decided to walk around. There is still an old hotel here but I’m sure the prices have increased from what is advertised on the side of the building the town seems to have converted from a mining town to a tourist town, I guess you could say the towns folk are mining the tourist. We didn’t find any cell phone service in the town which was nice when we sat down to eat, people were talking to each other instead of shouting into there phones. The food was good and the prices were reasonable. Most of the old buildings have been turned into some kind of shop catering to the tourist that either drive there or take the train from Durango. I found a holster for a S&W 656 that I knew a friend had so I bought it for him and would of bought a lot more stuff in there if I had not been on a motorcycle. We left Silverton and headed for the old 100 mine. The road getting us there was hard packed dirt but in a few spots there was a lot of loose gravel so the going was slow. We finally made it up the mountain to the mine and went on the tour. The operator said that the owners had spent 3 million dollars on the mine and only took out a million in gold. They decided to shut it down but years later the relatives decided to turn it in to a tourist attraction. He said it has made more money since than, than it ever did as a working gold mine. When we got ready to leave Steve wanted to try taking the lower road, which ran along the river I said that’s fine with me since we had taken the upper road to get here. The lower road though not maintained like the upper one seemed to be in better shape except in one spot. There was a large water puddle covering the road and no way around it. There was a 15-foot bank on one side going up to the upper road and about a 6-foot drop into the river on the other. I got off my bike and walked to the water hole and tested the bottom to see how deep and soft it was, the bottom was hard like the road we were on and only about 4 to 6 inches deep. I told Steve I would go first but to wait until I told him to move before he started across, I wanted to get some pictures of him going thru the water. We continued or ride and proceeded towards Ouray, which was about 40 miles away. So up the mountain around the mountain and down the mountain we went. Again the scenery was outstanding, as we started down the mountain into Ouray we pulled off in a pullout to take some pictures, the valley here was narrow and steep on both sides and the mountains seem to rise forever. Off in the distance you could see a waterfall coming of the mountain. And up on top of one of the mountains there was an old building with the naked eye it looked like a shack but when I put my camera on it, and zoomed in it was actually a large building. I asked a man in town what it was and he said the miners slept there because the entrance to the mine was up there. He said all the material used to build it had been taken up by mule or donkey. The building and mine were abandoned years ago, but from where I stood looking at it I thought it would make a nice lodge for people wanting to get away from town. The view from up there must be awesome. The only way to get to it now would be by hiking up or maybe helicopter. We wandered around town for a bit and took a few pictures and figured we better head back to Durango. Normally I don’t like to ride the same road in the same day and we had actually planned to ride a loop but we spent so much time sight seeing that it would be well after midnight if we continued, so we diced we would turn around here and enjoy the ride back. It was dark when we pulled into the motel parking lot. We cleaned up and decided to go find something to eat, just down the road near where I found the coffee was a Italian restaurant that looked more like a Victorian house so we decided we would give it a try. The food was excellent and priced right. Now it was time to relax and get some sleep.



Well Durango was just beyond the halfway point of this ride and it was all down hill from here so to speak, we left the motel early without breakfast we were riding on hwy 160 east towards Pagosa springs. We came upon a small bar and grill at chimney rock and the sign said open so we stopped for breakfast. The owners were a husband and wife team from Louisiana that had road an old Harley up there when they bought the place. She cooked us breakfast as me and Steve checked out the old pan head Harley they had sitting inside near the window. The bike looked to be in mint condition but not sure I would want to ride it that far. After breakfast we continued east stopping for some picture s along the way we seen a beautiful waterfall that we had to stop at and the town of Pagosa springs was nice. We also stopped at wolf creek pass to take a picture at the continental divide. We continued east until we seen a sign directing us to the GREAT SAND DUNES. This was an interesting place. The sand dunes where the biggest I’ve seen in the united states or Egypt or the middle east where I work. A lot of people were walking up the dunes so I asked a lady that worked there if there was a Harley shop or a bar at the top of the dune she looked at me like I was crazy and said no, I said well isn’t no reason for me to be climbing up there. Steve and me looked around the shop for a bit and picked up a memento of the visit and than headed south towards New Mexico. We made one more stop in Colorado and that was an old fort. Than it was 20 minutes to New Mexico. Riding south on 159, which turned, into NM522 brought us into Questa and the intersection of 38, which is also known as the enchanted loop. We have ridden this loop several times in the past and on this trip we headed for the town of red river. It was around noon when we pulled into red river which is an old mining town turned into a ski resort. We spent a little bit of time roaming around town and then took off for eagle nest, which is, were we would be camping for the night. After setting up camp we rode back into the town of eagle nest to eat some supper. After supper we headed back to camp we wanted to be off the road before dark especially in this area. We had seen large herds of elk and horses riding from red river and had seen many deer just riding into Cimarron canyon where our camp was. So we felt it best not to push our luck. As we got to the top of the hill where our decent into Cimarron canyon started we pulled off the road and looked back on eagle nest lake, the view was spectacular, even with the lake being low. On one side of the lake it appears that a mountain raises out of the lake and on the other just a large flat plain. This lakeshore is not messed up by million dollar home along the edge like most lakes this shoreline was mostly pristine you could see some elk walking along the edge in one area, it would be a nice place to camp except the wind was blowing so hard you wouldn’t be able to pitch a tent. We continued on into the canyon and into our campground to settle in for the night.



The next morning we rode thru the canyon east to the town of Cimarron. There is an old hotel there called the St. James that was a popular place for the settlers traveling on the Santa Fe Trail in the early days of the westward movement. The ride was a little chilly, as the sun had not warmed up the canyon yet. We went to the hotel and ate breakfast and drank plenty of hot coffee to warm us up. They say the old hotel is haunted but we didn’t see or hear anything out of the normal. After breakfast we headed north on a road that parallels the Old Santa Fe Trail. We were headed to the Whittington center, which is run and owned by the NRA. While riding up there we saw plenty of pronghorn antelope on the sides of the road and off in the fields. The Whittington center is an interesting place to visit if you are interested in guns, and I am, so I enjoyed their museum of old guns and new guns. After leaving the center we rode north to El Raton NM. This is a nice old town with some nice old structures. There was a large wild fire just north of town and we found out the next day that the town had to be evacuated that night after we had left. We decided to ride the highway back south as far as we needed to before cutting back over to Cimarron; this was almost a bad mistake. Just about 50 miles south of El Raton I spotted a dust devil off to my right in a pasture, I didn’t think much of it even though it was headed to the highway, I figured the thing would either cross the road before I got there or die off, I was riding in the right lane and ended up getting hit by the dust devil that turned out to be stronger than I gave it credit for and it knocked me clear over to the far side of the left lane almost into the median. Steve was riding behind me so as soon as I was able to control my bike I looked back to see if he was ok, evidently he saw it and gave it more respect than I did because he was a ways behind me and missed it. We eventually made it back to the campsite before it got dark without any more mishaps.



The next morning had us packing up as were headed further south. We rode over to the Viet Nam memorial near angle fire and stop to look around; we do this every time we come thru this area. We than headed over to Taos to check out wild bill Hickok’s house and the earth ships just west of Taos. The earth ships are interesting structures mad from recycled material and rammed earth. And wild bills house was also interesting, after about 5 hours in this area we continued south to Santa fe with the exception of a stop at the camel rock casino to try my luck. I had lots of luck here unfortunately for me it was all bad. But I figure the up side was now my bike would be a little lighter since I wasn’t carrying the 200 bucks so I might save on gas. On this day we stopped early and spent the night in Santa Fe we new that the next day was going to be a long day.





We had several stops to make on this day and still wanted to be in Roswell NM. Before dark, the first stop was in Madrid NM. We had seen it in the movie Wild Hogs and thought we would visit since we were going to be close. The town is nice but when we pulled into Maggie’s diner for a bite to eat we found out it wasn’t really a diner but a gift shop. They did leave 1 table with chairs in there where the chair got thrown thru the window in the movie but that was it. We did find out from the owner that there was a place at the end of town called the mineshaft that was a good place to eat. After buying some mementos and taking the necessary pictures we headed for the end of town. This part of town was quite colorful with little buildings representing different artist and the whole town was peaceful. The food at the mineshaft was really good. Since we still had a long ways to go we got back on the road and headed for our next stop. The Gran Quivira, which is the ruins of an old Indian village, we actually visited 2 of these villages one was red and the other a gray due to the rocks and clay they used. The way I found them was during research for the trip I was looking at pictures on Google earth and seen the picture. These ruins were very interesting and one of the park rangers gave us a tour, as we were the only ones there. I would definitely recommend these as a stop on any trip thru this part of New Mexico. Also the Taos Pueblo, which we did in 2010.It, is over 1000 years old and still inhabited. I plan on making another trip there, as my pictures from the first did not turn out. On the way to Roswell we stumbled into Lincoln NM. This was by accident but we were glad we did. For those that don’t know this is where the Lincoln county war happened. It was a cattle feud. That involved Billy the kid. There were a lot of interesting things to see but unfortunately we got there after 5pm and they were rolling up the sidewalks. So we walked around and peeked into the windows and took a few pictures of the historical buildings. I really don’t think this place had changed much since the war except the road got paved. This was a really relaxed at peace town there was absolutely nothing open in it. After spending about 2 hours sight seeing and reading the markers we continued our ride towards Roswell in a round about way and made it there just as the sun was setting. The first hotel we stopped at didn’t have a room but since I had a points reward card the desk clerk was nice enough to call their sister hotel just behind them and booked us a room with 2 beds. This was a long day but not a lot of miles due to all the sight seeing, we settled in and cleaned up, I’m a firm believer that hotels should not use white wash cloths, after being on a bike all day and getting hit in the face with bugs and road grime when you take a white wash cloth and run it across your face it come down dark gray or black. We rode about a block to get something to eat than it was back to the hotel. I needed to down load my SD cards from my cams.



We slept in the next day because we were going to the Harley shop in town and they didn’t open till 9am. So we just took our time and ate breakfast. After breakfast we road around town looking at all the alien stuff they had, we were here the year before (2010) and visited the alien museum and research center. We finally meandered over to the Harley shop to get our poker chips however I also bought a set of rhinehardt slip on pipes and put them on in the parking lot, or should say Steve put them on while I tried to assist. I got tired of not being able to hear my bike next to Steve’s. About 11 o’clock we were ready to pull out of Roswell and head for Texas and I have to say this is pretty much where this story ends, we didn’t stop anywhere special in Texas. We made it home without any mishaps.



I would like to say that we did sight see a lot of places but some of them were very disappointing so I did not add them here, as we had already been to all the places on weekend trips.

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