They left on July 25th for 20 days camping, that would have put them back around the August 13th.
He was posting things that happened on the trip Day 1 (during trip), Day 2 (Posted on August 16th, the trip was probably already over). His post for Day 3 (July 28th) was done on August 17th so they most likely were already back and then he just stopped posting the rest of the trip.
Probably back at work without much time to finish the pictures etc.
I guess I'll try and finish the ride report as work and life always seems to get in the way!
Going back...7-29-15 and 7-30-15
Slept ok that night even with the raccoons checking the beer bottles we left on the picnic table for any leftovers! We headed out early as today we had scheduled an oil change for the wife's RK at Hideout HD in Joplin MO. Of course that is where they had an EF5 tornado back in May of 2011. The HD dealership was spared but the hospital across the way wasn't so lucky. Per Wikipedia- damage was $2.8 billion and there were 158 fatalities with another 1150 injured. Mother Nature is no joke! We had some close calls on this trip with her as well but that's later.
We were in and out in about an hour and back on the road looking for a hotel in Kansas for the night.
The original plan was to grab a hotel in Independence KS as I didn't know how long the oil change was gonna take but we were out so fast I decided to push it and ride around some incoming weather. We headed North on 75 to 400 then up to Park City KS for the night. We got there just in time. Hotel was one of the better ones we stayed at and staff was nice enough to let us park under the overhang. I always worry about hail damage.
Walked to a near by KFC then back to the hotel for some quality time. Rained most off the night right into the morning. Some decent sized nasty cells were coming so we waited as many of those out as we could before doning the rain gear and heading out.
We rode a good 3 hours or so in the pouring rain before hitting dryer weather. We rode 400/50 into Colorado. It was a tough day. After we dried out it got hot. Our headset batteries were dead and I was in auto pilot mode just thinking about Colorado and basically was going tank to tank without stopping. I hit the border and stopped for pictures. Then the wife let me have it. Hahaha. She was hot, falling asleep had to pee and just needed a break. We hit the rest area at the border for a bathroom and drink break as well as shredded a few layers. I told her I would look for a lunch spot. The entire trip she just followed my lead, I was the navigator, the planner and the tour guide. This was the only time she was mildly annoyed with me. 😁
Lodging tonight was the KOA in Colorado City CO. We had to ride through Pueblo so we did a quick chip stop.
We tasted/toasted those Rockies quite a bit during this trip. Nice KOA but a little pricey. Hit the pool for a little swim then back to the site. A couple that pulled in next to us had Mass plates. We chatted them briefly and they told us they packed up their belongings and cats and were moving to AZ. No jobs just a location to start over. Brave.
Another oatmeal and coffee breakfast and off we went. Heading south on I25 then picked up CO160. Rode by the Great Dunes NP but decided it was too far out of the way for some sand. We kept heading west. It got awesome climbing in elevation out of South Fork CO into the Rio Grande National Forest.
We made it to Durango and were a bit ahead of schedule. Tried to find a lunch spot and ended up riding right through town. Hahaha. We did that quite a bit always looking for a better or different place. We were heading up one of my favorite roads now, the Million Dollar Highway CO150. I was excited for my wife to finally ride it and experience what I've been talking about for the last year.
We did find a lunch spot north of town and oddly enough it was next store to a gas station I fueled up at last time I rode this ribbon of heaven.
Stopped a few times to smell the roses and get a closer look at the awesomeness we were seeing.
Got set up at the Ouray KOA then a quick hot tub soak and some beers and dinner. Really cool campground and one of the few I'll recommend. Nice little bar on site and a creek runs right along side. They had a BBQ dinner special so we did that with some more beers then crashed.
Packed up and chatted with a couple of bikers from Utah who were hitting some Colorado passes they haven't ridden yet. We headed out with the Jeeps and other off road rigs that filled the campground with a destination of Moab UT!
We stopped for a little breakfast and snapped a pic of this hot air balloon.
After breakfast we headed NB on CO550 then picked up CO62 west to CO145 which is a fantastic road. Though about checking out Telluride but that would have put us too far behind as I wanted to hit Arches NP today.
Out of the mountain and into a valley. Love the scenery changes today.
10-09-2015, 08:01 AM
