Day One June 25, 2014
Day Two
Day Three
The Day Before
Now that I had the adventurers safely back in Ireland I could begin to think about my next trip. As I was waiting for the bikes luggage to arrive from the dealer, I had some time to sit at home and contemplate things. I have to admit, I had some real trepidation about making this trip. However, it would be really stupid to have just purchased a new bike and then let it sit there gathering dust. I tried to capture some of my doubts on a selfie. Here is the link: First daily entry. Before leaving 25 June, 2014
When I was reviewing this entry from my diary, I was shocked at how much I reminded myself of my father in both mannerisms and speech patterns. Perhaps we are all destined to become our fathers in
our old age. I am also shocked at how close to actual whining I sound. Bitching and complaining is something I have despised my entire life. I simply could not accept that I had become the type of person I so dislike. I will have to be on my guard to avoid any sense of self-serving from now on.
Day One 25 June, 2014 Reno, Nevada to Eureka, NV 248 Miles 400 Kilometers
I finally got a start although I was later than I had hoped. I really did not want to be making the trip in late July or August since the heat can be very uncomfortable. The last time I went riding at the height of the summer was nearly 10 years ago when i went down to Southern California to visit my friend Mike Holmstrom. The heat got so unbearable that I had to end up riding at night which kind of limits the scenic experience. This time I would be farther north but I was still wary.
I started with what I thought would be an fairly easy route on Highway 50 going east. I had covered this route many times and knew there would not be much to see and the road surface would be good. There is one section that runs from outside Fallon to just before Austin that parallels the main highway which I had not been on and I decided to take this on today. I was a bit surprised at the amount of the trees along some sections of this road and ran by some old cabins and homesteads. As I recalled the main route was mostly without and tree cover at all.
I would have taken this shot shown on the left, if I was up to stopping but I grabbed it off the web instead.
I was struggling when I dragged myself into the hotel room in Eureka. I was not up to going out to dinner so I settled for a couple of candy bars which I bought at the convenience store and gas station next door. I then settled down for my first diary entry of the trip. Not a very upbeat one.
Day Two 26 June, 2014 Eureka, NV to Caliente, NV via Pinoche 299 miles
I was feeling a bit better in the morning when I pulled out into the street in front of the hotel. This shot gives you a little bit of an idea of Eureka. The County Seat and only significant town (population 600) in Eureka County.
I have complained about Highway 50 many times before and in order to avoid as much of it as possible, I am going to take a partially paved and partially gravel road that heads south beginning about 10 miles east of Eureka and goes through the Duckwater Indian Reservation. This reservation is another of several Paiute Tribe locations scattered across Nevada and is centered on the small
village of Duckwater. After crossing the reservation I will connect to US Highway 6 and continue on to Caliente, Nevada located in the Southeast part of the State where I am planning on spending the night. I have stayed in Caliente several times before on other trips and might take this opportunity to go a bit further and spend the night in the town of Pionoche, located about 25 miles north of Caliente. As it turned out I did press on but found the additional 2,000 feet of elevation in Pioche really aggravated my difficulties so I turned around and rode the same path back to Caliente. I was pretty tired and when I rode up to the motel office to check for a room, I did not put the kick stand all the way down before I let go the the bike and dumped it on the spot. Mangling my leg in the process and breaking a few bits off of the left side. Fortunately there was a big strong guy working close by and he hurried to my rescue and was able to get the bike up and on its stand. I thanked him profusely once I was able to get my breath back. Dumping the bike after only two days was not the kind of start I was hoping for.
I started to rain just after I turned off the main highway and got much heavier right after the payment ended. I was entering some twisty bits and hoping that the gravel did not get so wet that I would
have to deal with muddy conditions. I stopped once to get a number of videos shots and pictures but somehow screwed up the camera so that I only ended up with one and that one included a wonderful shot of my finger creeping in at the top of the lens.
Stop by the side of the road in the middle of nowhere.
Day Three 27 June, 2014 Caliente, NV to St George, Utah
I woke up on day three realizing that it was probably the make or break day of the trip. I had experienced some struggles with my health on the way from Reno but had not really had an emergency. Is spite of that, I was still a bit apprehensive. I was planning on much more rural roads and possible some pretty poorly maintained gravel or dirt on the route I had chosen to get to St George, Utah. However before I get started I need to fuel up with a big breakfast at the Brandin Iron in Caliente.
I wanted to see Beaver Dam Nevada State Park. Not so much because it had a reputation for extraordinary scenery but more because it was the state's remotest, most difficult to reach and least visited Park. I was also aware that this day would be the real test of wether or not I really got any benefit from the new bike. I had justified the purchase by claiming that I wanted to be able to do back roads and specifically gravel surfaces with more safety and comfort than was possible with the old Tiger. This was really the only reason for the new bike since the Tiger had performed truly wonderfully for me on all the paved and highway miles that I had put on it. Nearly 20,000 miles of flawless performance which had included quite a large amount of gravel in Nevada on two different trips. I had made those roads without serious incident but I was never really comfortable off the pavement so it the new Explorer handled the back-roads better I would be happy with the its purchase. Butt having made the purchase and then been shy of testing its capabilities seemed pretty stupid to me. However, I was anxious enough to be prepared to be stupid, something I have always been reluctant to admit even though having all too often experienced. So, as so often in my past, I did not let prudence dictate and headed out of Caliente on the way to St George.
Lonely road
Just where I had pulled off the road there were some wildflower growing.

It was only a few more miles when I came to a sign that indicated the Beaver Dam State Park was another 17 miles south. This was quite a bit farther than I had thought and the map showed that I would have to ride the same road back to where I was in order to get to St George. I was not too concerned about road conditions since the surface had been good so far but I was just not sure I wanted to ride another couple of hours just to get back to where I started. In spite of how wonderful the Park might be, I decided to keep heading east into Utah and give the Beaver Dam a miss this time around.
When I was reviewing this entry from my diary, I was shocked at how much I reminded myself of my father in both mannerisms and speech patterns. Perhaps we are all destined to become our fathers in
Day One 25 June, 2014 Reno, Nevada to Eureka, NV 248 Miles 400 Kilometers
I finally got a start although I was later than I had hoped. I really did not want to be making the trip in late July or August since the heat can be very uncomfortable. The last time I went riding at the height of the summer was nearly 10 years ago when i went down to Southern California to visit my friend Mike Holmstrom. The heat got so unbearable that I had to end up riding at night which kind of limits the scenic experience. This time I would be farther north but I was still wary.
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| Day 1 Reno, NV - Eureka, NV |
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I would have taken this shot shown on the left, if I was up to stopping but I grabbed it off the web instead.
I was struggling when I dragged myself into the hotel room in Eureka. I was not up to going out to dinner so I settled for a couple of candy bars which I bought at the convenience store and gas station next door. I then settled down for my first diary entry of the trip. Not a very upbeat one.
Day Two 26 June, 2014 Eureka, NV to Caliente, NV via Pinoche 299 miles
I was feeling a bit better in the morning when I pulled out into the street in front of the hotel. This shot gives you a little bit of an idea of Eureka. The County Seat and only significant town (population 600) in Eureka County.
I have complained about Highway 50 many times before and in order to avoid as much of it as possible, I am going to take a partially paved and partially gravel road that heads south beginning about 10 miles east of Eureka and goes through the Duckwater Indian Reservation. This reservation is another of several Paiute Tribe locations scattered across Nevada and is centered on the small
village of Duckwater. After crossing the reservation I will connect to US Highway 6 and continue on to Caliente, Nevada located in the Southeast part of the State where I am planning on spending the night. I have stayed in Caliente several times before on other trips and might take this opportunity to go a bit further and spend the night in the town of Pionoche, located about 25 miles north of Caliente. As it turned out I did press on but found the additional 2,000 feet of elevation in Pioche really aggravated my difficulties so I turned around and rode the same path back to Caliente. I was pretty tired and when I rode up to the motel office to check for a room, I did not put the kick stand all the way down before I let go the the bike and dumped it on the spot. Mangling my leg in the process and breaking a few bits off of the left side. Fortunately there was a big strong guy working close by and he hurried to my rescue and was able to get the bike up and on its stand. I thanked him profusely once I was able to get my breath back. Dumping the bike after only two days was not the kind of start I was hoping for.
I started to rain just after I turned off the main highway and got much heavier right after the payment ended. I was entering some twisty bits and hoping that the gravel did not get so wet that I would
have to deal with muddy conditions. I stopped once to get a number of videos shots and pictures but somehow screwed up the camera so that I only ended up with one and that one included a wonderful shot of my finger creeping in at the top of the lens.
Stop by the side of the road in the middle of nowhere.
Day Two Commentary
I woke up on day three realizing that it was probably the make or break day of the trip. I had experienced some struggles with my health on the way from Reno but had not really had an emergency. Is spite of that, I was still a bit apprehensive. I was planning on much more rural roads and possible some pretty poorly maintained gravel or dirt on the route I had chosen to get to St George, Utah. However before I get started I need to fuel up with a big breakfast at the Brandin Iron in Caliente.
A short while after I had gained the gravel, I stopped to take a short video and commented how lonely the ride had been. On this particular day I did not encounter more than a handful of people and while I enjoyed the solitude, I was aware of the nagging doubt in the back of my mind that I could be in real trouble if something happen to the bike or I got into terrain that I was unable to handle. The temperature was in the high 90's and threatening to go above 100. I had some water with me but would not have been able to walk very far in that heat with very little shade to be found. Here is that video clip
Just where I had pulled off the road there were some wildflower growing.

It was only a few more miles when I came to a sign that indicated the Beaver Dam State Park was another 17 miles south. This was quite a bit farther than I had thought and the map showed that I would have to ride the same road back to where I was in order to get to St George. I was not too concerned about road conditions since the surface had been good so far but I was just not sure I wanted to ride another couple of hours just to get back to where I started. In spite of how wonderful the Park might be, I decided to keep heading east into Utah and give the Beaver Dam a miss this time around.
The state line was marked and it was only a couple of miles into Utah that I unexpectedly picked up pavement again. I had thought that all these roads would be dirt or gravel. However, it was pretty poor pavement and I still needed to be a bit careful. I passed a couple of small ranch houses and some corals so my guess was that the state had paved out to the last ranch and then stopped. My GPS map application was not much use in this rural an area and while it showed me my location it did not show any of the roads in the area. I knew I was going to have to guess on the right route if I encountered a road junction. I wasn't very worried however since I have a good sense of direction and could just continue to head east and south and would either encounter a major road or find St George itself. The next junction was marked as heading south to someplace called Enterprise Reservoir which sounded good to me and I started down a small picturesque canyon that ran along a small stream. Once again the pavement stopped but the road was still pretty good so I continued on to the reservoir. I was shocked as I came around a corner and saw that I was at the bottom of a dam that obviously had created the reservoir. Shocked because of the manner in which the dam had been built. It was constructed entirely of small native rocks that had been placed in some kind of mortar and built in an arch shape to hold back the waters. It look very old and very fragile. You can bet that I would not have ridden below it if I had known the condition of the dam and I sped as quickly as possible to get out of the canyon and up to the top of the dam. On reflection, the dam had obviously been there a very long time without collapsing but that realization did not quite still the initial racing of my heart. Here are a couple of picture of the dam.
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| 100 Year Old Enterprize Reservoir Dam |
Here is the video. Enterprise Reservoir Utah
As I rode up the road and along another reservoir with is directly above, I thought I had lost the road completely. There was a very narrow dirt track that continued along the ridges and ran generally south but I thought this was just a ATV trail and not the only way out other than the one I had come in. Wrong! That's the thing about exploring, you never really know what you are going to get and in this case I got a road that was much worse than the one I had avoided back in Nevada. Rather than return with my tail between my legs, I decided to give the track a try with the conviction that if it got much worse I would turn back. The only problem with the plan is that when the road gets worse, it is sometimes nearly impossible to turn around without running a serious risk of dumping the bike. That danger, notwithstanding, I pushed on. It did get worse but not so bad that I could not handle the surface. Very narrow and the dirt surface was deeply rutted from where the road had been flooded at some point in the past. Sometimes these ruts are so rough and so deep that they can throw your tire around to the point that you can't really control the bike but I was lucky that was not the case and I was glad it was dry. I would never have been able to negotiate the mud if water had been present. I saw no one except for two ATVs who I came up behind. The track was narrow enough that I was unable to pass them until they reached a spot that was more level and a bit wider. They pulled off to one side and I was able to get by with a quick wave of thanks. I was very pleased to have them behind me since if I ran into trouble it was likely they would eventually come upon the difficulty and might be able to help.
There was more water available in this area and the trail ran along steep-sided and small but fairly deep canyons that were sporadically covered with Scrub Oak and Pinion Pine. The modest shade these provided was appreciated since the temperature had been climbing all day and was now at or above 100℉ (38℃). I carry water on the bike but with this heat it wouldn't be long before I would be in real trouble if something happened to the bike. After a few more mile, the landscape changed again and I entered an area of rolling hills. It was also much dryer and the desert condition returned so that I was constantly in the direct sunlight. While very warm, as long as I was moving the temperature was bearable but I certainly wouldn't have wanted to spend a long time exposed. With the ground more level, the track conditions improved and widened which allowed me to stop the bike for a moment to take some bearings and assess where I might be. I shot a quick video of the area.
I also tried to capture the damage I had done to the bike when I had dropped it at the motel the night before. It was not extensive and except for a shorter clutch lever and a bent bracket holding the left rear bag, the bike was still working well. The wind had picked up pretty briskly, making things seem even drier. Only a few miles further on I once again was on a paved road and quickened my pace so I could reach St George and get out of the heat for a while.
I stopped at the first Starbucks I encountered in town and enjoyed the air-conditioning while I check on my tablet for an available hotel. I was surprised to find that nearly all were fully booked. I decided to ride on though the middle of town and take the first room where there was a vacancy. It was even hotter now I was surrounded by concrete and the temperature was showing as almost 110℉ so I was really ready to get off the bike and out of the heat. The Best Western showed a vacancy but when I got to the front desk I was told that all that was available was the bridal suite. Fearing that the entire town might be booked and not wanting to dare much more heat exposure, I took the suite. I tried to remember if I had taken a bridal suite before and vaguely recalled one previous time years ago when I was in the same predicament but even if the room was a bit frilly for my taste it was 40 degrees cooler than outside.
I took a quick video of the room, ordered room service and did not leave until the next morning. I was beat.
In hindsight, this was the most dangerous day of the trip. I realized that I would've been in desperate trouble due to the remoteness of the area and the heat of the day if I had an accident or a mechanical failure of some sort. I do not believe that I could have walked out and I might have had real trouble with heat stroke, if I had waited, perhaps vainly for someone to come along who might be able to help. Most people take long distance rides like mine with a group or at least with one other companion. I would like to as well but my unstructured wanderings and uncertain schedule and difficult for another to accommodate. I really enjoyed the last two big rides that I took with my friend Eugene Murray and that experience showed how much a trip can be improved with a companion along. Most of the time I am comfortable with spending quite some time alone with my own thoughts and other than the safety issues I am quite happy as solitary rider. However, at times it is a bit scary.
As I rode up the road and along another reservoir with is directly above, I thought I had lost the road completely. There was a very narrow dirt track that continued along the ridges and ran generally south but I thought this was just a ATV trail and not the only way out other than the one I had come in. Wrong! That's the thing about exploring, you never really know what you are going to get and in this case I got a road that was much worse than the one I had avoided back in Nevada. Rather than return with my tail between my legs, I decided to give the track a try with the conviction that if it got much worse I would turn back. The only problem with the plan is that when the road gets worse, it is sometimes nearly impossible to turn around without running a serious risk of dumping the bike. That danger, notwithstanding, I pushed on. It did get worse but not so bad that I could not handle the surface. Very narrow and the dirt surface was deeply rutted from where the road had been flooded at some point in the past. Sometimes these ruts are so rough and so deep that they can throw your tire around to the point that you can't really control the bike but I was lucky that was not the case and I was glad it was dry. I would never have been able to negotiate the mud if water had been present. I saw no one except for two ATVs who I came up behind. The track was narrow enough that I was unable to pass them until they reached a spot that was more level and a bit wider. They pulled off to one side and I was able to get by with a quick wave of thanks. I was very pleased to have them behind me since if I ran into trouble it was likely they would eventually come upon the difficulty and might be able to help.
There was more water available in this area and the trail ran along steep-sided and small but fairly deep canyons that were sporadically covered with Scrub Oak and Pinion Pine. The modest shade these provided was appreciated since the temperature had been climbing all day and was now at or above 100℉ (38℃). I carry water on the bike but with this heat it wouldn't be long before I would be in real trouble if something happened to the bike. After a few more mile, the landscape changed again and I entered an area of rolling hills. It was also much dryer and the desert condition returned so that I was constantly in the direct sunlight. While very warm, as long as I was moving the temperature was bearable but I certainly wouldn't have wanted to spend a long time exposed. With the ground more level, the track conditions improved and widened which allowed me to stop the bike for a moment to take some bearings and assess where I might be. I shot a quick video of the area.
I stopped at the first Starbucks I encountered in town and enjoyed the air-conditioning while I check on my tablet for an available hotel. I was surprised to find that nearly all were fully booked. I decided to ride on though the middle of town and take the first room where there was a vacancy. It was even hotter now I was surrounded by concrete and the temperature was showing as almost 110℉ so I was really ready to get off the bike and out of the heat. The Best Western showed a vacancy but when I got to the front desk I was told that all that was available was the bridal suite. Fearing that the entire town might be booked and not wanting to dare much more heat exposure, I took the suite. I tried to remember if I had taken a bridal suite before and vaguely recalled one previous time years ago when I was in the same predicament but even if the room was a bit frilly for my taste it was 40 degrees cooler than outside.
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| The St George Bridal Suite |
In hindsight, this was the most dangerous day of the trip. I realized that I would've been in desperate trouble due to the remoteness of the area and the heat of the day if I had an accident or a mechanical failure of some sort. I do not believe that I could have walked out and I might have had real trouble with heat stroke, if I had waited, perhaps vainly for someone to come along who might be able to help. Most people take long distance rides like mine with a group or at least with one other companion. I would like to as well but my unstructured wanderings and uncertain schedule and difficult for another to accommodate. I really enjoyed the last two big rides that I took with my friend Eugene Murray and that experience showed how much a trip can be improved with a companion along. Most of the time I am comfortable with spending quite some time alone with my own thoughts and other than the safety issues I am quite happy as solitary rider. However, at times it is a bit scary.










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