The Windy Trip from Hell

Ever have one of those trips that develop into interesting stories?  Well, my trip to Taos, New Mexico was one of those.  It was early April and the weather, while cold in the morning, was warm in the afternoon.  The sky was clear and my sweetie let me take an overnight trip to New Mexico.  The original trip was to go from Black Forest, Colorado to Albuquerque, New Mexico, about 760 miles round trip.  Instead, I went to Taos and here's my story...

I left the house around 0730, the temperature was around 40 and Sun was out and the sky was clear.  The bike was in great shape (I'd just completed a tune-up the day before) and I was in high spirits.  Through Colorado Springs and Pueblo, all was well; wind was minimal and it looked to be a great riding day.  Past Walsenburg and into Trinidad for gas.  Still, everything was looking great and in a few miles I'd be in New Mexico.

Unfortunately, Trinidad was the last of the easy going, no problem ride.  As soon as I hit Raton, New Mexico (a few miles from Trinidad), I ran into a heavy head wind that was so fierce that gas mileage dropped from 46 to 31.  My eyes were burning from drying out and my body was becoming fatigued from the constant pounding from both the front and the periodic heavy crosswinds.  Only 120 miles into New Mexico, I decided to alter my plans and head to Taos; I exited the freeway at Las Vegas, New Mexico.   Still, I figured the trip would return to great.

I'll skip the trip through the mountains and the fun side roads and get to the end of the day.  Outside of Taos, I found a campground and found an open space at the end (actually, they were all empty).  I unloaded my gear from the bike and gave Lisa, my wife, a call.  While I was talking to her, a car drove up with four men inside and they parked right in front of my space and glared at me.  I told Lisa to hold on while I got my gun and put it in my jacket.  After a few minutes, the car backed up and drove about 50' away where they were met by two police cruisers.  By now I had put two tent stakes in the ground and was busy fighting the wind to put the other two in.   When the police got out and had the occupants of the car get out, I decided to put the gun under the tent just in case; I didn't want them hassling me about it.  After awhile (maybe five minutes), one of the officers came over to me, admired my bike, and then looked down at my tent.  Actually, he was looking at my gun that had become exposed when the wind blew that part of the tent up (this was not turning out as I'd expected).  He looked at me and asked if I had any more of them (guns) around.   I said no and he told me to keep my hands where he could see them.  You see, its not illegal to have weapons in the open in New Mexico.  The four guys in the car were in trouble for having open containers of alcohol.

The officer looked hard at me (all decked out in leathers with a gun on the ground, riding a Harley, and having long hair and all) and told me that I would probably be happier if I went to another campground because this one was used a lot by the town drinkers.  Looking around the site, it was obvious that he wasn't making it up; bottles were littered everywhere.  It was also obvious that he didn't want me staying at the campground although he was polite as hell about it.  He told me there were several other sites within a mile of this one and they were less frequented by drinkers.   Taking the hint, I packed up my gear and headed off.  Not surprisingly, the next "open" campground was about 60 miles away, a national forest site.

Now, I told my wife I had to leave but I didn't cover a lot of details because it was starting to get late and I needed to ride to find a place to stay; I told her I'd call her when I setup camp.  When I got to the national forest campsite, I pitched my tent, stowed my gear, and was invited over to dinner by an older couple camped next to mine.   No problem, food, talk, then put the money in the bin, sleep, and a new day.   Unfortunately, thats not quite how it went.  Oh, the food and talk part is correct but when I went to put the money in the envelope I discovered that I had no cash and no checks.  It was about 2100 hours (9PM) and I was out in the middle of nowhere.   Soooooo, feeling like a cheeseball, I set my alarm to wake me up at 0400 in the morning and beat it out of there before the rangers began their money collection.

A fine plan but...  Throughout the night, I heard the winds howling and was surprised that I was able to get any sleep at all.  When the alarm went off, I awoke and began to pack up my gear (inside the tent).  After I was dressed (this was a very cold morning - 20 degrees), I left the tent and began hauling my gear to the bike in the wind.  Now, my tent has a rain fly on it and rain flys are a bit like umbrellas which like to take off in high winds.  And... thats what my tent did.  The stakes were pulled from the ground and the tent went sailing into the river.  Now, its dark, cold, and I'm not in a good mood.  I run over to the river and fish the tent out, hoping (but not really caring) I hadn't damaged it.  I quickly shoved the tent into the sack, junked the stuff on the bike, bungied it all together, and started up the bike.   I hooked in my electric vest and went to hook up my gloves and discovered one was missing!  Oh, yea!  Its 20 degrees outside with a wind-chill hovering around 0 and I have no gloves.  This day can't get any worse!  I pulled my thermoliners from my carrier and put them on and I took off.  I made it about 20 miles before I stopped, realizing that having my fingers fall off was a bad thing.  I saw a well lighted manual car wash and went inside with the bike.  I decided to, just to say I did, check the tent for my gloves.  Besides, even though the wind was still raging, it was, inside the car wash, quieter and it was lighted.  Sooooo, this would be an excellent opportunity to properly repack the tent and check it for damages.  On a good note, I found the gloves and there was no damage to the tent.  On a less than good note, the wind changed directions and repacking the tent was less than enjoyable.   Oh well, at least I had my electric gloves..... :)

Once I got to Raton, I called Lisa who I discovered has slept little during the night fearing that four bad guys had done evil things to me.  Not surprisingly, she was a bit on the snippy side.  I won't go more into that.

Back on the road (I-25), I headed towards Trinidad and it looked like I might finally get a break.  Past Trinidad, I realized the error of my thinking.  I hadn't really noticed the trucks pulled over to the side of the road but as I came out of the mountain pass, I started getting hit with very strong side gusts.  After a few miles, I became concerned that the gusts were blowing me all over the road and I mean blowing me hard.  Now, I've been riding for 27 years and I put in around 30K a year so I've put in some miles.  So, I thought I'd been in high winds before but I discovered that this was different.  My bike weight 760lbs dry, I weigh 175, and the gear probably weighs around 60-100 or close to 1000 lbs total.  I had to pull over to adjust my glasses and the wind was so strong it was difficult to hold the bike up.  So I put the kickstand down and leaned the bike over.  The wind was so strong that it pushed the bike back up and that was when I knew I was in trouble.

I knew that I couldn't go fast and I couldn't stay where I was so I crept along about 30-40mph hoping I'd find ANY road going East (the wind was blowing from the West).   Finally, outside of Walsenburg, I found a road, hwy. 10 heading towards La Junta.   Now this is an exciting, nerve tingling, heavily populated area - not.  For about the next 60 miles there isn't jack, nada.  No gas stations, no rest stops, no buildings, zip.  There are, however, cows, etc.  Now, since I was going with the wind, I was moving along quite nicely and I soon forgot about the wind.  Until, that is, I decided to stop for a short break.  I got off the bike and was almost knocked down by the wind.  I promptly mounted the bike and continued on; the wind stayed with me all the way to La Junta and beyond. 

Needless-to-say, my hwy. 10 journey took me 150 miles out of my way.  When I got home I was beat, bone tired, and far more attentive to the weather channel and high wind alerts (over 60mph).  I should point out that I never heard any warnings but then I wasn't listening for them either.  A lesson well learned.   

Live to Ride,
Ride to Live