7/19/2010
By: C. Kent, aka (Superman)


So where have I been and why is there a gap between the dates of this blog? I have been on a vacation of about 18 days visiting New Mexico, Colorado and Arizona. Yes I took my bike and yes I managed to get in some rides but all in all I believe we are spoiled living here is Southern California. We have some nice places to ride and we have better than average roads.

I did manage to get in about three rides in Gallup and two in Colorado. I did ride into town in Gallup at least twice and stopped by the Cultural center and grabbed a picture of the Bronze statue of the Navajo code talker.


The roads were a bit ruff but the bike lane was about eight feet wide all the way into town. It was a bit less when coming back until you got back passed the business area and then it went back to eight feet most of the way home.

Colorado didn’t have real wide bike lanes or at least they weren’t in Cortez but they have a three foot rule in Colorado so the cars are supposed to give you three feet when passing you. Doesn’t always happen but it seems as if they tried. At least I didn’t get run over by any Elk while I was there.


I was looking forward to seeing everyone again when I got home and rather than sleep in I got myself up and into my kit for the Monday ride. I was pleased to see that at least ten rides showed up having heard that it had been hot while I was gone. We all talked for a while after getting to the parking lot before After Burner informed us it was Eight am. So we were off from the parking lot and down to Kirby is short order. I understand Rocket has had to stay off the bike for a while but he was back today just to get out.

After we turned off of Kirby I looked back at the group behind me and realized how much I missed the group while I was gone. I was feeling good and the weather was nice and the ride wasn’t going to be all that long or difficult. It was also good to see Tax man and Von Richthofen who I hadn’t seen in quite a while even before I went on vacation. Sidewinder and After Burner were looking energetic and Gambler and Bandit were looking very relaxed. The Hit man was riding easily with Duramax. With me we had ten riders and for a Monday after a heat wave I thought that was pretty good.

I managed to pull us onto Domenagoni and most of the way to Warren before giving up the lead and falling back to the back of the pack. We held a nice easy 19 or 20 MPH for the next few riders until we got close to Winchester and then we fell apart as a group. We regrouped at the Saddle and Rocket said he had to turn back while Von Richthofen and Tax man made the turn on Linderburger and the rest of us continued on towards LaLadera.


The group got a bit smaller as we passed the freeway on Newport when Sidewinder took off on a solo ride and Hit man left for a brief family check up. Turns out Hit man and Sidewinder ran into each other later on. The remaining five of us rode out to LaLadera, over to McCall and finally stopped at Chris’s. Duramax continued on to ride home on Domenigoni and I followed After Burner, Gambler and Bandit back to the Airport before heading for home. It was a quick 38 miles and a reasonable 16.8 MPH average. Not bad for the first day back. It is a great group to ride with and a great place to ride.