USA
May
23, 2012 - After breakfast in Durango, which we had in a
small hole-in-the-wall place where only locals seemed to come, we rode to
Mesa Verde.
Mesa Verde wasn't our scene. It's not a very accessible site and
although the sites are nice, they are all tour guided and we
were in no mood to shuffle in a pack of tourists, peppered with
esoteric details for half an hour by an over-happy park ranger
before you got even remotely close to the site. Even at that,
there were so many people that taking pictures or even getting a
flavor of the place was diluted by screaming kids with water
guns and popcorn. We passed, took some pictures from a distance and rode on.
Unfortunately, the day went from bad to worse. On the way to Monument Valley, we got battered by side wind so severe we had to slow to a crawl and let people by us on the highway. By this time we were well away from civilization in the very northwest corner of New Mexico.
The surroundings were dreary and even the GPS showed the nearest motel to be 60 miles away. We decided to make a run for Shiprock, NM and get whatever accommodation we could there. Shiprock is a wide spot on the road with a few fast food places, surrounded by native land and not a motel in sight. We fled to a McDonalds to get out of the twirl of wind, sand and dust. Even with the aid of the Web, we were stymied and our closest motel option was in Farmington, a good hour away.
Somewhere along the way, Jan managed to break his side stand and yet another point of frustration was created. The hotel we ended up in was a dump, but at least there was no wind. Determined to find some good food we headed out, but the Mexican restaurant closed it's door right when we arrived. So a Subway dinner was our only option at that point.
We were packed, fed and rolling by 7:30 AM the next day, determined to have a better day. It was sunny with clear skies and no wind.