We left late today, mostly because it was a rough night, some inconsiderate jerks who were in the room beneath us though it was ok to let their sub-10 year old daughter to squeal and a scream at 1am. and stand out side the door smoking and laughing, and slamming their car and room doors.
Not having kids myself - I am of course - an expert on them :), and any child that squeals should be de-barked like a dog, or at least made to wear one of those shock collars, except wound up to give a fatal charge.
For people who don't know me or reading this blog for the first time - yes - this is a joke, although if your child squeals near me and my ear drums touch together in the centre of my skull - all bets are off. (yes this is another joke.... maybe :)
We left Great Falls and turned onto Highway 93 which would take us into Nevada. As the agricultural plains of Idaho fought a losing battle with the desert landscape of Nevada, we saw fewer and fewer Wheat, potato and Hay crops, and more and more brush, scrub and rocky outcrops.
Pretty soon corners were a distant memory, the roads were flat, covered in a heat haze, and the desert carpet stretched away in all directions. There were still a few rocky outcrops in the distance, not the boring billiard table flatness of the Australian Stuart highway.
For some reason the cops were out in force on the highway, we saw 12 cop cars on the highway, most of them were doing speed traps, but there were 4 at an RV park where it looked like there was some sort of accident. Before this we had seen about 5 cops total in about 5,000km.
Both the temperature and the wind started to pickup it was 10:30am and already it was 27 degrees.
We hit a small isolated town called Wells about 140km from Twin Falls and stopped for brunch. We had not yet eaten anything, and we stopped for fuel, rest and a quick bite.
Journeying on, The basin we were riding in opened up further, and the wind picked up until we were getting blown around in our lane.
At one stage, I nearly got blown into the path of an on-coming truck, and after that started riding in the very right hand side of my lane. The wind was very 'squally' often hitting you from one side, and then the other without a break.
The temperature climbed to a maximum of 34.5 Celsius, and we soon hit the first of 2 sections of roadworks that required us to wait for a Pilot car.
The wait for each car was 10-15 minutes, and I had time to get off the bike, throw rocks, talk to the controller, and generally piss-about.
Both times, it turned out that the Pilot car had us riding on fresh tarmac, and not dirt like the Alaskan Highway. Not really sure why there was even a pilot car to begin with!!. all in all we wasted about a hour in road works, and we eventually rolled into Ely (ee-lee) about 3pm.
It was a long and hot day, but some amazing riding through the desert.
Tomorrow we have a short ride to a place called Alamo, not sure if it is the famous one or not - as we have seen a few towns called Alamo so far. We could have made Vegas in one hit, but to stay a Saturday night in Vegas doubles the room rate. Believe it or not we saved ourselves about $300 by checking in on a Sunday instead of Saturday.
(edit - after googling - it is NOT the famous one)
Not having kids myself - I am of course - an expert on them :), and any child that squeals should be de-barked like a dog, or at least made to wear one of those shock collars, except wound up to give a fatal charge.
For people who don't know me or reading this blog for the first time - yes - this is a joke, although if your child squeals near me and my ear drums touch together in the centre of my skull - all bets are off. (yes this is another joke.... maybe :)
We left Great Falls and turned onto Highway 93 which would take us into Nevada. As the agricultural plains of Idaho fought a losing battle with the desert landscape of Nevada, we saw fewer and fewer Wheat, potato and Hay crops, and more and more brush, scrub and rocky outcrops.
Pretty soon corners were a distant memory, the roads were flat, covered in a heat haze, and the desert carpet stretched away in all directions. There were still a few rocky outcrops in the distance, not the boring billiard table flatness of the Australian Stuart highway.
For some reason the cops were out in force on the highway, we saw 12 cop cars on the highway, most of them were doing speed traps, but there were 4 at an RV park where it looked like there was some sort of accident. Before this we had seen about 5 cops total in about 5,000km.
Both the temperature and the wind started to pickup it was 10:30am and already it was 27 degrees.
We hit a small isolated town called Wells about 140km from Twin Falls and stopped for brunch. We had not yet eaten anything, and we stopped for fuel, rest and a quick bite.
Journeying on, The basin we were riding in opened up further, and the wind picked up until we were getting blown around in our lane.
At one stage, I nearly got blown into the path of an on-coming truck, and after that started riding in the very right hand side of my lane. The wind was very 'squally' often hitting you from one side, and then the other without a break.
The temperature climbed to a maximum of 34.5 Celsius, and we soon hit the first of 2 sections of roadworks that required us to wait for a Pilot car.
The wait for each car was 10-15 minutes, and I had time to get off the bike, throw rocks, talk to the controller, and generally piss-about.
Both times, it turned out that the Pilot car had us riding on fresh tarmac, and not dirt like the Alaskan Highway. Not really sure why there was even a pilot car to begin with!!. all in all we wasted about a hour in road works, and we eventually rolled into Ely (ee-lee) about 3pm.
It was a long and hot day, but some amazing riding through the desert.
Tomorrow we have a short ride to a place called Alamo, not sure if it is the famous one or not - as we have seen a few towns called Alamo so far. We could have made Vegas in one hit, but to stay a Saturday night in Vegas doubles the room rate. Believe it or not we saved ourselves about $300 by checking in on a Sunday instead of Saturday.
(edit - after googling - it is NOT the famous one)
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| Welcome to the country of Flat-i-stan - population - YOU. |
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| Outcrops |
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| Waiting in the Desert for the Pilot car |
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| 20 minutes later... |
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