My wife and I recently got back from our trip to the Grand Canyon. Thought we would share our adventure. We got a lot of recommendations on rides, routes, etc and we incorporated as much as possible. We were concerned about the heat in July (others mentioned we were crazy as well) but, what the heck. Honestly, it wasn’t that bad. We rode early in the mornings, finished early in the day, no problems. Some mornings it was actually very cold. We also alternated drinking water and Gatorade throughout the day. There were only two days we both felt the heat kicked our butt. We found out it was monsoon season in the area and every night I'd watch the weather report. Look awful for next day every night, but we had rain gear just in case. We never got rained on once. It was close a few times. The storms were chasing us all over. Not a drop. We did see some smoke from the fires in Colorado, but all roads were open. On a side note, if you have ever been thinking about getting a backrest for yourself but wasn't sure if it was worth it, GET THE BACKREST. Two days before we left I decided to get the HD adjustable. It made the ride MUCH MORE comfortable. The original plan was to leave early on July 5th, but we decided to leave July 4th around 5:30 in the afternoon to get a head start.

Day 1: San Antonio to Ft. Stockton- 326 miles: Pretty uneventful other than almost squashing a raccoon in the road and a bat missing my helmet by an inch going 80mph. Here's the bike packed and ready the night we left.



Day 2: Ft. Stockton to Alomogordo- 296 miles. Went straight to Carlsbad Caverns on hwy 285 N. Very cool. Amazing natural wonder.





After Carlsbad we rode on 82 W through Cloudcroft to Alomogordo. Great scenery. A storm blew through before we got there so we went from riding in the low 90s to mid 70s in a matter of minutes. Felt great. No pics from Cloudcroft, we thought we were gonna get rained on. Here's the tunnel on 82 on the way to Alomogordo.


Stayed at the BW in Alomogordo that night.


Day 3: Alomogordo, NM to Silver City, NM: 179 miles. Leaving Alomogordo we drove by White Sands National Monument where they did missile testing.




Stopped by the HD in Las Cruces, NM for the T-shirt stop then off to Silver City on hwy 180n. Right when we were checking into the hotel (Econolodge) , we met a guy who had been hit by a car on his 2012 soft tail at the intersection. He was ok, kinda limping around. Bike was being shipped back home and he was trying to rent a car. Felt bad for the guy. Someone turned left in front of him, rolled over the car. He seemed shaken up but physically was ok. I parked the bike right outside the window under the overhang!


More to come soon...

 

Nice pictures, awesome scenery.

 

Nice pictures, cant wait to see more

 

Great so far, looking forward to the rest!

 

Thanks, looking forward to more.

 

Thanks for the comments:
Day 4: Left Silver City for Winslow. 315 miles. Left the hotel around 5:30 Am and it was a brisk 50 degrees. We were supposed to ride the Coronado trail, but to make a long story short, we didn't. We went 180 N. It probably wasn't as nice as Coronado trail but I must say it was absolutely beautiful all the way to Alpine, Az.




We then arrived at the Petrified Forest.



Painted desert



On to Winslow- we hooked up to I-40 to make up some time. Pretty drab, boring ride. We got to Winslow and found the La Posada hotel. It's a throwback from the '30s. Lot of history and the train pulled up directly behind the hotel. It's an original Fred Harvey hotel designed by Mary Colter. My wife says that's significant.?





We stayed in the Gary Cooper room






And of course we went and stood on the corner which was cool


We left the next morning to get to the Grand Canyon. On the way we saw a sign for the meteor crater...had to go check it out.


It was mind boggling...this is a replica of the meteor they say created the crater. it was small, about size of small carry on bag. Crazy.


On the way to GC we rode through Flagstaff. We really like the town a lot. Very nice.

We stopped to get more stuff at


After the quick stop at the HD, leaving Flagstaff we went up 64n towards the GC. I remember that road being flat and hot. Not a lot to look at along the way.

Gotta stop for now...stay tuned

 

Thanks for the share can't wait for more..

 

Great postings and pics!

I was car camping on the North Rim at the same time...

 

Day 5: Winslow to Grand Canyon 138 miles. We arrived at the Holiday Inn Express around 11. Several months before we tried to make reservations in the canyon park at one of the lodges, but everything was booked already. Getting there early, we couldn't check in. Everywhere we stayed prior to this, all the hotels were very cool about me parking the bike right under the entrance cover if they had one. Since we couldn't check in, I asked the lady if I could park underneath, she NO. I asked why? Her answer No. Ok whatever. We weren't sure about riding into the Canyon park, so I parked the bike at the hotel, they held our luggage for us and we changed clothes (it was about 95 already). We caught a shuttle to the park and got there within 20 minutes. The ride was nice, after many days on the bike it was nice to ride in an air conditioned shuttle and get dropped off. I had never been to the GC before. From the minute I got off the shuttle, I couldn't believe how many foreigners were there. Not that there's anything wrong with that, just unexpected. Still the first day, we took the shuttle back to the hotel around 7pm. We were able to check in and I asked a new lady at the desk if I could park the bike under the cover, her answer, "Sure, no problem, keep it there as long as you like." Hmmm? So I did. We didn't ride for the rest of the day or the next.

Day 6: 0 miles- 2nd day at GC.

What can I say...nothing really, just an awesome place. It really is Grand!












There's so many more pics of the GC, but we've all seen in one form or another so I won't post many. I'll say that I was and am very proud of the natural beauty of this great nation. It made me even prouder to be an American that people from all over the world come here to see what makes us so great. We sat for hours and hours sometimes not even speaking to each other just taking it all in. We could've been the only ones there for all we knew. If you've never been, try to get there.

Day 7: 370 miles. We left the next morning (day 3 at GC) very early. This was when we actually rode the grounds





We rode through the park on hwy 64, then 89, then 160 through Tuba City, Kayenta, up to Utah into Bluff city (just to say we went into Utah, I've heard there was good riding there so we'll be back one day), then back on hwy 160 to Cortez, Co. Let me say that from Kayenta to Cortez KICKED OUR A$$. There was no place to pull over really, it WAS HOT. Don't know if we were exhausted from walking all over the GC the previous 2 days, but we were hurting. I'm not sure why the bike didn't overheat. I know heat...I'm from Texas, but it was hot! We pulled over under an abandoned gas station that was turned into a native american info center. We downed 2 gatorades, filled them up w/ cold water and just sat there for about an hour. This was only the 1st day we felt the heat. Up to this point, it's been very cool and pleasant. After feeling a little better we left for Mesa Verde NP.
Gotta run...come back for more

 

Thanks for posting the pictures and the ride report. Looking forward to the next installment.