Thunder Roads Magazine of Oklahoma/Arkansas April 2014 Volume 12 Issue 9 | Page 21

FEATURES

shifted to a side wind that pushed
us all off the highway! From
the panhandle, across Texas,
and into Clayton, New Mexico,
the temperature reached 117
degrees. We were rung out!
The next morning was
beautiful.
Ron’s bike had
overheated and blew a ring, or
so we guessed, and he had to
turn around and head back to
Sapulpa. We hated it and missed
him on the trip, but he was with
us in spirit. We rode to Capulin
Volcano in New Mexico to start
the fun part of the ride. This
volcano, called a cinder cone
volcano, erupted into existence
60,000 years ago. Though we
could have walked a long way
down into the cone, it seemed
like too much work for us. So,
we mounted up and rode on to
Colorado. We rode to Canyon
City expecting to go to Royal
Gorge, but fires this year had
burned all of the buildings down

leaving the entire place closed
to tourists. Pikes Peak here we
come! The weather didn’t cooperate all the way to Colorado
Springs. We were rained on for
at least 100 miles and, even with
wet gear, were pretty soaked.
Because it was so close to the
Pikes Peak highway, we decided
to stay in Manitou Spring. (Four
days later, we saw on television
that the town was wiped out by
a flash flood!) We were up early
and headed to the Peak entrance.
When we went through the gate,
the attendant said, “be careful,
there is loose gravel on the
road,” but we can handle gravel.
It’s 14 miles to the top of Pikes
Peak with 180 switchbacks all
the way and no guardrails. The
last mile and a half, there was no
loose gravel on the road, there
was ICE! Yippee! Rick put his
feet on the ground on either
side of his Fatboy. He laughed
and skidded along in fun, that

is, until the bike slipped over on
top of him! Pretty funny picture,
imagine three men trying to stand
on ice and pick up a 1,000 pound
bike. We were all dizzy from lack
of oxygen, wheezing, and sliding
all over the place when we finally
got the bike up and parked. Then
the reality dawned on us—how
are we getting back down?!!!
A snow plow was parked at the
top and after a two hour wait, the
driver cleared a path down. You
have some control going up on
ice, but down? Never want to
try that again. Been there, done
that.
We started up the Rockies
slopes after our Peak adventure.
Our goal today was to cross the
Continental Divide for the first
time on the trip and head toward
Utah. We drove to Flaming
Gorge, Utah to take pictures
of the dam and surrounding
canyon.
The water of the
Green River, almost turquoise
Thunder Roads Magazine of OK/AR

21