One of the top films ever, in my opinion, was a movie from the early 80’s called The Big Chill. It had a great cast of young actors, including Kevin Kline, Glenn Close, William Hurt , Jeff Golblum and many more, who all became stars. What made it even a better movie was the soundtrack. It had some fantastic rock music from artists like The Stones, The Rascals, The Beach Boys, The Band, Steve Miller and CCR. For some reason I identified with that movie. As I was traveling down the road today listening to the soundtrack I laughed to myself that these past few days of weather have been the big chill. And thankfully we are pointed heading south tomorrow and into a different weather system.
Last night was our first night of camping and it got a bit damp. The rain started off and on around 3:00 AM . When we woke up at 5 it was still raining, 48 degrees and looking bad. We showered and broke down camp and were on the road at 8:15. It continued to rain until about 10 when the sun finally. The temperature fluctuated all day with the altitude changes we were riding over. At one point we even had hail on one of the mountain passes. The high was 78 and the rest of the day was a beautiful ride.
We headed west on 50, “the loneliest rode in America” towards Carson City. The road took us over 7 mountain passes. We would climb these beautiful winding curves to about 7500 ft., then descend into the flatland valleys and ride for about 25 to 50 miles on the straightest road with no traffic anywhere. Then do it all over again. We stopped in Austin, NV for breakfast and as we were getting ready to leave, the annual community parade for their founding fathers started on Main street. So we were stuck. We stayed and watched this small town celebrate their western heritage. We continue on route 50 to 28 North and picked up route 89 around the west side of Lake Tahoe. We stopped for some pictures right outside Incline Village which is a beautiful lakeside tourist town. We continued around the lake to pickup 50 again and stopped around 7:30 in the small town of Pollack Pines. I’m not sure what time zone we’re in so we may have gained an hour crossing into Pacific time.
Tom followed me home from dinner last night and when we arrived at the campsite he told me I was having some lighting problems on the back of the bike. The brake light on the rear spoiler has a safety device installed that flashes the lights when the brakes are applied. The trouble was they were flashing very rapidly all the time even though the regular brake lights were working properly. It was too dark to work on it last night so when we got back from diner tonight I took the trunk apart and disabled the device. Everything is working right now. There was still one more problem I had to deal with this morning. While getting ready to leave the camp, I was putting on my Aerostich suit and a zipper in the leg got stuck right below the knee. No matter what I did I could not free it up. So finally I got the tools out and really broke it. I pulled the tab right off the zipper. No problem because I packed a couple of extra bungees and I know bungee science 101. I road all morning with the pant leg bungeed closed. It should work fine for the rest of the trip until I can get it repaired. So that’s 3 problems so far. I hope it’s the last.
We’re still trying to decide what direction to go tomorrow. One choice is head to the coast since we’re so close. There is a NASCAR race at Infineon Racetrack tomorrow. That’s not too far either. Or head to Yosemite NP according to the plan. I’ll let you know tomorrow what we decide.
Total miles: 510 Butt factor: 5
