The hottest day, ever!

Saturday, June 25, 2016
Black Canyon Of The Gunnison National Park, Colorado, United States
We grabbed a quick bite from the hotel and then headed for Carbondale and up to McClure Pass. The canyons up to Redstone and Marble, I hate to repeat this all the time, was beautiful. The rivers are running extremely high. The pass and Somerset behind us, we headed toward Paonia. We came up behind a suburban, Rob in position 1, Nick followed a bit further than normal and Jeff in the tail gunner position. At one point, Rob caught out of the corner of his eye what looked like a mounted deer's head in the bushes on the side of the road. He realized that it was a real deer and it was moving....toward him....fast. He thought he was going to get blind sided and gave it a bit of gas. The deer passed behind him. From Nick and Jeff's point of view, they thought the deer hit Rob or visa-versa. The deer came down from higher up the hill rather than on than the road; it twisted in mid-air to miss Rob; it went down on its hind haunches; she popped back on all four feet and headed for the other side of the road. If Nick had been closer he likely would've hit the deer. Both guys were looking for other deer coming from the hill. Rob's heart was pounding fairly rapidly for a while.

After the excitement settled down, we got to Hotchkiss and headed south . After going south for a couple of miles, Rob saw a pheasant wander onto the highway and just as Rob got up to the bird, instead of going back off the road it decided to take flight. Rob ducked and saw the bird fly right over his head. Another narrow miss.

We need gas so we stopped at a little restaurant in Crawford. There was only an older woman and her daughter in there. The older lady started a conversation with us by asking Jeff where he went (bathroom). We were guessing her to be in her mid to upper eighties. They asked where we were from and we asked where she was from and she said "Penn-tucky." She referred to herself as the class clown. We heard all about their comings and goings.  

Back on the road we noticed a lot of cow piles on the road. The further we went the fresher they seemed. Finally, in the distance we came on as small herd of cows. Cowboys and cowgirls were pushing the herd off the road, finally .

We made it to the north rim of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison with roads with steep drop offs with no guard rails, Rob's phobia come to fruition. With only minor anxiety attacks, on Rob's part, we stopped at a couple of pull outs to enjoy the view. Again the descriptor, beautiful, is offered up. When we came to the dam at Blue Mesa Reservoir, Rob's double phobia raised it's ugly head. 1500 feet to the right nothing but a steep drop into the canyon and on the left 1500 feet of water. Repeating "loosey goosey" to keep himself from white knuckling the crossing Rob made it across without too much panicking.

We stopped at a gas station to make plans for eating, gassing, and cooling off. It was too close to dinner to eat a large lunch so we decided on light fast food. Jeff suggested Taco Johns. Rob said he loved the memories of Taco Johns from his youth but he did not know where one was. Jeff said behind you. Rob turned around and sure enough, there it was. The ride from Montrose to Grand Junction was the hottest sixty miles, ever!

We arrive at Rob's parents house where we unloaded the motorcycles and used one of their cars to drive over to Rob's sister's house where we were staying and dining. The motorcycles stay in the garage safe and out of the sun.
 

239 miles today
2637 miles to date
 
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Comments

Mark Ferguson
2016-06-28

Sounds like a close call with the deer - wow!

2025-02-10

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