Day 1

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Miles: 469.7
Total Riding Time: 11.5 hours
Home -> Needles Outpost

After a hearty meal, we put on our riding gears and said goodbye to Jiro and Yama. Just as planned, kickstands were up at 9 am. I would have liked to leave earlier, but weather forecast showed that if we hit Vail too early, we would have encountered some snow.

Entire stretch on I-70 to Glenwood Springs was uneventful. It got pretty cold at around Vail and we were both glad that we each had a heated jacket. With heated grips and jackets on full blast, we were nice and toasty at 65 mph in 30 degree weather. Shortly after Glenwood Springs, however, we had to pull over and shed all of our heavy gear as the temperature began to reach the 90s.

We blasted through Moab at around 4 pm. This was later than I expected since we had to pull over for many breaks. We didn't hit the road to Canyonlands (UT 211) until around 5 pm. Map only showed 33 miles, but it took us a bit over an hour to complete this segment due to speed limits, road condition, and us being quite tired at this point.

The road into the outpost was soft dirt. I made a turn onto it and felt my bike wobbled as I plowed through it. As I was about to complete this soft patch of sand, I looked in my mirror and saw the headlight of Anne's bike began to slant. Next thing I knew, Anne was in the sand with her bike. After checking her and the bike (yes, in that order!) I was relieved that neither suffered any major damage. Her bike sputtered and sounded like it was not going to start, but after few cuss words and fists to the heavens, the engine finally began to turn. We later discussed what happened...she saw me wobble, and was about to slow down. But she had already hit that soft patch with too much speed and felt the bike begin to slip. She knew she was going to go down, so she jumped off the bike. Bike clipped her on the way down, but the boot saved her from any damage. Only few battle scars to the saddle bag and a lesson well learned.

By the time we hit the campsite, it was about 8:30 pm. Our site was underneath a rock wall with a view of the canyon. We still had some light left, so we quickly pitched the tent and began cooking. This evening's meal (instant noodles with green beans) was probably one of the most delicious meal we had after only having few power bars throughout the day. By the time we were finished, the night was illuminated by the moonlight. With a clear sky full of stars and a cool breeze on a warm evening, it couldn't have been any better.

As we were about to doze off, Anne made an executive decision that we were not going to ride more than 350 miles a day for the rest of the trip. I was not about to veto that decision. I shall re-plan the route tomorrow.

第一天上路就被Eric操死, 居然叫我騎了470miles. 完全不考慮我是新手 (在這次假期之前, 我一共只騎過300miles). 到了營地, 地上是很軟的紅沙, 我看Eric的機車在我前面開始搖搖晃晃時已經來不及了, 一轉眼我就發現自己摔在地上. 還好我全身都穿裝備, 所以摔倒完全沒事, 機車也好好的. 只有行李有一個小刮痕.

等我們搭好帳棚, 已經快九點了, 泡麵從來沒有這麼好吃過. 隔天早上泡咖啡時才發現水有一個很可怕的味道, 昨天晚上泡麵味道太重所以都沒感覺. 不過出門在外就隨便啦. 我們的營地就在岩石下, 景色真是美的沒話說. 經過今天之後, 我們決定不騎去加州了, 因為每天這樣實在是太累了.