[ST] overdue ride report part three of ????

["triumph1@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <triumph1@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Sun is up, glorious sunrise and I can now see how absolutely horrible 
and barren west Texas is and the eternal straight line road as far as I 
can imagine keeps unfolding before me, UUHG!  This is about when I start 
losing track of time until San Diego.  Midland, Tx home of the 
president.  Why in gods name anyone would live there is beyond me, dirty 
smelly and desolate pretty much like everything else in this part of the 
state.  Odessa, Pecos and Sierra Blanca all the same mile after mile 
after mile and now getting hotter than hell.  I start to see signs for 
El Paso.  I just want to be out of Texas at this point not realizing 
that the rest of the trip is just as bad, but a lot hotter.  I think I 
reached El Paso around noon, not sure.  Stopped for a drink of water and 
more of those wonderfully crappy health bars and a few more red bulls, 
called home and told the better half I am amazed I'm not really very 
tired and I know I'll make it unless something bad goes wrong.  She was 
concerned that I had only slept for a half hour and I told her I'd stop 
and nap at the next rest area, but not this one.  I was too lazy or 
delirious to walk to the bathroom and pee'd in the middle of the rest 
area parking lot which drew a lot of very unfavorable stares and 
comments.  This is where my personality started to change.  My vocal 
reply to comments made from onlookers was something to the effect of WTF 
are you looking at and FO.  Got back on the bike and rode off into the 
never ending desert and heat.
I started hearing an uncontrollable siren going off inside my helmet 
from this point on and the RS started talking to me in several different 
rpm noises and all I could picture was I had no legs and the bike was 
part of me from the waist down.  Most people would probably realize at 
this point they needed to stop, but not me, I was perfectly fine.  I 
passed a couple of Harleys with ape hangers and was totally amused by 
them and finally got to a rest area and did the picnic table routine 
again.  One half hour later I woke up because I was sweating profusely 
and had the worst case of dry mouth ever.  Got a sip of water and got 
back on the road.  New Mexico cops everywhere and I became irritated 
with the silly speed zones in the middle of nowhere taking me from my 
nice 80-85 mph down to something ridiculous like 45 mph.  New Mexico 
didn't come and go fast enough and only turned into Southern Arizona 
which is more of the same desert and miles and miles of it.  The heat 
was unbearable and the road so hot my feet started burning and the 
sirens were really going off inside my helmet, but the bike was happy. 
SLEEP DEPRIVATION, it finally dawned on me, but I ignored it and figure 
since I recognized it I'd be able to cheat it.  Tucson, ss3000 mark, one 
of several gas stops to keep me awake.  Cussed out station clerk because 
my credit cards were starting the flagging process and wouldn't work 
without me going all the way inside.  Took off and forgot my gloves on 
the sleeping bag roll.  Lost gloves in the middle of a busy street and 
had to turn around and retrieve them.  Found a gas station and 
approached a guy at the next pump for witness signature.  He refused to 
verify my mileage and I had an alternate personality moment once again. 
 I thought I'll just get the verification when I get to San Diego. 
Shortly after leaving Tucson I saw something out of the corner of my eye 
up in the sky.  I look and there is a helicopter running parallel to me 
at a low altitude.  To this day I don't know if it was really there, but 
I choose to think it was.  I laughed at it in my semi psychotic state 
and waved and it came towards me, SHIT now I have sirens going off in my 
helmet, the bike is talking to me, I'm tired, hot and helicopters are 
following me, but I was ok.
I remember thinking to myself, probably out loud, how stupid people are 
for coming to this part of the country to live for the winter. RV areas 
and trailer parks all over this desolate place.
Yuma and the sun was starting to go down, THANK GOD FOR THE SUNSET! 
Last gas stop before San Diego, really pumped up now.  Call home give 
psychotic travel update to better half and get on the road for the home 
stretch. As I was riding along I remember a truck driver somewhere 
telling me something about mountains in California and I'd cool down 
there.  MOUNTAINS, cool, up one side and down the other is what I was 
thinking.  I had never been to this part of the country prior to this 
and thought mountains meant a few miles up and back down kind of like in 
Tennessee.  It gets dark, I am suffering big time from lack of sleep and 
 water intake.  I am paranoid of animals jumping out in front of me and 
wonder when the mountains are going to happen.  I think I was gradually 
going up for quite awhile and then all of a sudden I realized I was 
going downhill and the road started to wind and it kept getting worse as 
I went up, up, down, around, in, out and it was getting colder and 
colder, but I didn't want to stop because I would be in San Diego soon 
and I'd be in a nice city and find a nice motel and have a nice sleep 
and it would all be over.
After about 90 miles of mountains I am freezing and can see glimpses of 
San Diego off in the distance way the hell down below me and traffic was 
getting very busy and very fast on these twisting turning strange roads 
with 1 hour of sleep in the dark and 40-50mph gusts of wind thrown in 
the mix.  Don't forget that siren thats been going off for the last 
decade inside my helmet and the talking bike.  I was really messed up by 
all of the information that was trying to make it's way into my brain 
and felt like I was riding in some sort of live surreal motorcycle 
traffic video game.  I honestly thought this was the decent to hell and 
once in the city of San Diego realized I was going to probably die on 
the road.  I think there was like four lanes of 85-90 mph traffic and 
signs everywhere.  Everything was moving to fast to read the exit signs 
and I really didn't know where I was going except I was suppose to be at 
the Coronado fire department for my check in.  So I'm looking for 
anything that say Coronado this or that and it never happens.  Finally I 
decide to get off the four lane race track and gather my senses, which I 
lost long ago and make a bee line for the next exit ramp.  From 90mph 
off the highway onto this exit that almost immediately turned into a 
downhill 360 degree turn below the road I was just on.  Sign says 
something like 25mph.  I just stopped the bike at the side of the ramp 
and sat there thinking about all I had been through in the last 40 hours 
and I'm close to the end and I'm going to die before I finish.
I get out my cell phone a call the fire department get the guy who I am 
suppose to meet and start babbling incoherently about everything I'm 
going through and how lost I am and how I'm going to die. He immediately 
recognizes the state of mind and body I am in and tries to calm me down 
and send his wife out to escort me in.  He tells me I'm only a mile or 
so from the station and I tell him to give me directions and not to send 
his wife out at 11:00pm.  I did this routine a few more times circling 
the same area on off ramps and back by the same buildings.  I pull 
another bee line for the side of the road and this time stop right on 
the ramp where there is only about a foot of shoulder and this van goes 
by me and misses me by about 6 inches, Holy Crap.  He stops a the bottom 
of the ramp and is staring at me and I'm thinking he's going to beat me 
to death and steal my cash.  So I wait and wait for what seems like an 
hour, but actually only a few minutes and decide to go face the music. 
I went down the ramp slower than I've ridden in 41.5 hours and stop next 
to this guys van and he is wide eyed and screaming at me about crazy 
F****ing this and that in his best Mexican accent and I tell him I'm 
lost and have never been here and probably told him about the helicopter 
and siren and bike talking to me and that I just needed to get to the 
Coronado fire department so I could check in.  He just looked at me for 
a minute and said "I take you".  I said pleeeease go slow, no problem 
and he takes of through the back streets of San Diego going 45-50mph. 
He led me through so many turns and neighborhoods that I still cannot 
comprehend how anyone gets anywhere there.  And all of a sudden I see 
horrible fog and the road starts going up and up and up, I am on a 
bridge and cannot see anything because of the fog the bridge goes up and 
starts curving to the right and then a steep decent and bam, stop at the 
bottom almost rear ending the new found friend.  He points and says 
something about go here and turn and there and turn and you are there. 
I understood him and went to the fire station and my witness was outside 
with a flash light waving me to my finish.
Never have I been so glad or so thankful to end a bike ride than I was 
then.  It was like reaching heaven when I set foot on solid ground 
inside the fire station.  My fireman witness immediately notice how 
dehydrated and tired I was and set me down in front of bottles of water 
and gatorade and told me to just drink and to not talk.  He then said I 
wasn't fit to go anywhere and I took a bunk at the fire station and 
slept for 5 wonderful hours.
My 50cc was done in 42 hrs and I had to wait until morning to get my 
final gas receipt which made me nervous and also miss the ss3000 time 
limit, but I did get my gas receipt with 5 minutes to spare even though 
I arrived 8 hours early.  There are no bonuses for arriving early.  In 
the morning he took me to the beach to get my west coast sand and took 
my picture by some famous motel at the beach and escorted be towards the 
highway out of town and this is where I had a few thoughts of doing an 
ss 5000, but didn't decide to go for it until later that night.

part 4 coming

TimE



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