BASH IN THE BUSH II 2007 - DAY 2

Morning broke early in T or C on Sunday, Beem and Croz had to go home because their wimmenfolk were expecting them for dinner, but the rest of us remained and were to head out in ONE group for a mellow day of riding. Like that was gonna happen.

We bade our goodbyes to the riders from Phoenix, fueled our steeds and our bellies and had a plan to ride nothing but streets. They did not say a thing to me about them not being dirt streets too.

When you head out 52 westbound it rises up over a range heading to Winston and Chloride.

Me and Betty zoomed ahead to catch some shots of the group.

TXEditor aka Rob handling the corners

Keith from Alaska paired up the Steve from SATX

Following the stragglers up the mountain

If you had not already noticed, this was the way we rode out the day before. Who was I to argue, in a group mentality there is no I, that is to say until there is a turn off on dirt road.

Thumper decided to go up the hill to take our picture as we passed by, something went sour, and he just picked up the bike in time for me to miss the shot

Rob likes to smoke and does each time we stop, and this gives a good vantage at just how little Anna can actually touch when she stops her red F


With the group behind me I led the way into Chloride


This is Al Gore's favorite, an electric H3 that only goes 25mph with a full distance of 70 miles

Dunno whether Steve really liked it or was just trying to make time with the little old lady who owns it.

Chloride makes a cool place for a rest stop (after all we had ridden almost 50 miles). There is a little art gallery / gift shop where I procured some real tasty buffalo jerky. Nice and not too salty. Next door to the gallery resides a very interesting museum that houses artifacts from Chloride's heyday when over 3000 hardscrabble folks resided there. Most of them were silver miners.

Various pharmaceuticals and some spices

Handtools

A beautiful cast iron stove

The proprietor spinning tales of times gone by


Edison often visited friends in Chloride

This is the good stuff

Almost like new

No, it's not a Nazi padlock, anyone know the story?


A representation of the town in the boom times

Local historical information

Deedledums place


Wanna ride some dirt Casey Jones?

There were some purchases made and a whole lot of shutterbuggin', then it was back to Winston for some BBQ sammiches. For most of them that is. TXEd and myself took a short side detour to a working mine on the way back and just made it in time for Heath ice cream bars.

Rob haulin' ass

After everyone got their feedsack on we headed northbound on 52 and hit some more dirt. Having studied the map earlier in the day I had a route in mind but several folks were skeptical about time left to git er dun.

There was a whole lot of map studying


This nice young lady kept her hounds at bay whilst her male companion told us about the local routes

After several minutes of pontification and regal posteuring Steve and Keith almost went with us on the backwoods route, that is until the kind young man said, "That road was good, but it's been about ten year since I was up over that pass". At which point those two's easyrider fate was sealed. They stayed on 52, while Thumper, TXEd, BMWGSRider and myself headed into the pineywoods.

The first thing we passed was a road closed washed out sign with barriers which I completely ignored. The surface had been freshly graded and we descended quickly into Bear Trap Canyon in the Cibola National Forest. The going was soft with a lot of rocks that were turned up by the grader's blade. The view was magnificent, however I neglected to stop and shoot the scene. It was about a 10 minute ride down into the canyon.

Amazing rock formations that photos can never do justice to

The group stopped here to drink in the energy of this wonderful spot.

As we motored along taking care on the soft surface it became apparent why the road had been barricaded and marked closed.

Several non severe emergency get offs where documented along this section

There are more shots of this section over here

After taking an hour to repair a flat on my bike we made our way back over to 52 and some smoother sailing. It was getting late and the consensus was to head north and catch the interstate back to T or C.

Of course my way of thinking is to take the "as the crow flies" route whenever possible. Being around 5 30 ish this thought pattern made my fellow riders nervous and agigtated. They succumbed to my will in the end and we rode a very rocky forest road where I broke my kickstand. As the bike spluttered and died my initial thought was, "SHIT, where am I gonna stash this bike overnight, and who's wants me to ride bitch on this rocky road. Luckily a blue bungee slung in a manner as to hold the stand in the up position and I was moving along again in less than a minute.

From there over to another flat smooth dirt highway (79?). 55, 65, 75, 85mph wiggling and twisting on the gravel mounded here and there, I was just happy to be out front because those guys were guzzling dust by the bucket behind me.

When we re grouped at I-25 and aired up there was a simple matter of blasting southbound for about 30 minutes at WFO to reach base camp again. I have to tell you that this section was the most difficult of the day and when I got back to the hotel I was completely knackered. Sitting here I cannot even remember what we ate that evening.

Here ends day two, thanks for riding along.