Cal group to Moab II

I move from the Slickrock RV park to the KOA in Moab....Much nicer!

Another road I've been told about is the road to Gateway, Colorado off of the La Sal Loop.

I ride it and find it is about 25 miles of good dirt road and 5 miles of rutty, miserable dirt road...

Hard to tell from the photo but it is VERY steep in some places.

Eventually I make it to pavement and then connect with Colorado highway 141 and ride to Naturita, Colorado where I stop for a burger at Blondies. While there I meet a couple from the Netherlands. He is enthralled with my darkside tire, and takes a photo because, "his friends won't believe it..."

They were real nice, I enjoyed talking with them.

I loop back into Utah and ride to the Needles overlook.

The next day I ride back to Naturita and wait for the California group to ride through. When I see them, they have ridden the Million Dollar Highway among many others on their way from the west coast.

And there they are...at least their bikes.

Back at our camp we take this photo.

 l to r - Yours truly, Bill, Sheryl, Don, Rick.

The next morning the Cal group wants to ride some of the places I've already seen, so I'll take another route. I ride south to see Hovenweep National Monument, passing the Hatch trading post along the way.

This place is fascinating!

The Puebloans lived here over 700 years ago. Apparently this area was once a thriving community.

I do the 1.5 mile walk around the parks wonders.

I rest and re-hydrate from the walk then I'm off to ride the Moki Dugway.

Stopping at the top I snap some pictures.

Back on the Moki..

And then riding toward hwy 191 I go through this formation just before Bluff.

On 191

The next morning I pack up to head for home...the Cal group has several more days ride before they will get to their homes. I leave reluctantly - they are a great group of people!

 On the way home I see these beauties near Price.

Another super ride in the books. 1570 miles. Southern Utah is absolutely beautiful, I love riding there

Thanks to Bill for letting me join his group (for a couple days..) and a million laughs.

Awesome Couples Ride 2016 (pt 1)

I've been hosting an annual "Couples Ride" since 2009. We missed a year, but otherwise its been an enjoyable activity each summer. 

Everyone on the couples ride have known each other for almost 30 years...we're all good friends.

This year we are going to southern Utah.

We depart on a beautiful Thursday morning and take a rest stop here. As we're snapping pictures a truck stops in front of our bikes and the man asks us if we want to see the inside of the building..?  YES!, we all answer and he opens up the door and stands patiently as we ogle over the antiques that are in there.

Harry checking out the antiques.

We then continue southward stopping in Helper, Utah for a great lunch at this place, Groggs.

Sufficiently overfed we hit the road again. After about 20 miles we run into a storm..... rain, hail, and WIND beat on us for the remaining 180 (or so) miles.

We make a quick rest stop....we had to get back on the bikes to keep them from getting blown over.

FINALLY.... we arrive (safe, but windblown) at our home  for the next 3 days, The (very clean) Stone Lizard, in Blanding, Utah.

The next morning at 9:00 sharp we depart for our first day ride.

 First stop, Natural Bridges National Monument.

Harry (middle) tells me a natural bridge is formed by water, a natural arch is formed by wind.

We leave the Natural Bridges Monument and ride toward the Gooseneck State Park via the Moki Dugway. The Moki Dugway road was constructed in 1957. The entire road is 33 miles long, but the most exciting part is 3 miles of unpaved road. As you can see it has sections of 10% grades and drop-off that can be a little concerning for a passenger. The views were incredible.

 After navigating the Moki we arrived at the Goosenecks SP.

And left there for our lunch destination, the Twin Rocks Cafe in Bluff, Utah.

Can you guess how the Twin Rocks Cafe got its name???

We leave the cafe and finish our ride back to our hotel via Aneth, Utah and some cool backroads.

Awesome Couples Ride 2016 (pt 2)

part 2

Saturday morning we ride to Monticello, then take a cool backroad (fr101) to Newspaper Rock.

We enjoy the "cool backroad" so much that we take it again back to Monticello, and gas up there, we make a quick stop to see the new LDS Temple in Monticello, then ride to La Sal, Utah - Bedrock, Colorado - lunch in Naturita, Colorado - and back to the Stone Lizard for one more night. It was a rainy day so not many pictures were taken...

Sunday we'll ride to Green River to stay overnight.

We find some good roads to get there by.

Something in the distance....

We have to stop and gear up for rain. Next up is the La Sal loop road to SR 128.

 Over the top of the loop road into Castle Valley....even on a rainy day this ride is spectacular!

Now on SR 128

We stop n eat in Moab....

Leaving Moab we ride into Arches NP

Rooster, Wendy, Ken, Jan, Chris, Harry, Bev, Me.

Two Angels in the Devils Kitchen..

We stay at the River Terrace hotel, and have dinner at the Tamarisk

The next day we're heading for home, but still hit some nice roads and stop to have Elevensies at this place.

I can only speak for myself, but I had SO much fun on this ride! And...had SO much good food that when I got home and stepped on the scale it said, "HEY...one at a time!" *sigh......*

Many thanks to everyone who came along and made this such a memorable ride!

1235 miles of smiles and super roads with Great Friends!

*ps - thanks to Bev for taking most of these pictures!*