Being Heard - Mineral Bottom Road

My blog report on the Mineral Bottom Road caught the attention of someone in Grand County.  They are working hard to put together the funding to get the road repaired but they need our help.  They have made an assessment of the commercial use in the area but not of the casual visitor, the weekend traveler who goes into this country without a guide or organized commercial group. 

They need us to let our local representatives know that this is important to us.  They need to know how we use the Mineral Bottom Road, what our financial impact on the Moab area is when we go down there and how this road being unusable will impact our future plans.  You can put together a short, personal email with details about your experiences.

Please write to your state representative and the Governor and tell them you want the road fixed so you can visit Moab and Grand County.  Contact Governor Gary R. Herbert (Utah) at gherbert@utah.gov, Senator Orrin Hatch at ron_dean@hatch.senate.gov and Senator Robert Bennett at Donna_Sackett@bennett.senate.gov.  I believe there is an underscore between the first and last names of each contact for the senators.    Please pass this plea onto anyone you know who visits Moab and Grand County.

Mineral Bottom Road Closed Indefinately

One of the things I really look forward to each spring is riding the White Rim Trail in Moab.  I have done it several times on a bicycle and a few times on a motorcycle.  This year it appears it is not to be.

Each July I submit my request to the National Park Service for a permit for the following March.  Usually my request is answered by mid August.  This year it hadn't come by mid September.

As it turns out one of the major access roads to the White Rim Trail was washed out in an August downpour.  If you look closely at the picture you can see two rangers, this will give you a sense of the scale of the washout.

The National Park Service has suspended all travel to this area and has stopped issuing permits, mine being one of them.  They say the road won't be repaired until sometime in 2011, they don't know when.  They don't have the funding and it will take 12 weeks to repair when they do.

If you want more information type in "Mineral Bottom Road Closure" into Google and go to the websites. 

Oh well, there is always next year.

My Mind is Catching Up With My Body

I am finally feeling like my mind is in the same place as my body.

I came from Spain on Saturday, 8 time zones ahead of SLC.  I did all the things they tell you to do; drink water, don't drink alcohol, set your watch to the new place as soon as you lift off, get a light nap and don't eat unless you have to. 

Until today I still felt like I was on another planet.  This weekend I was constantly tired, woke up in the middle of the night and couldn't get back to sleep and I said and did things as if I were drugged.

They say it takes a day for each time zone to feel right.  I have been doing this for a number of years so I feel I am ahead of the curve.  I can get back in about 3 days from a trip from Europe.  If I have to I can function in those three days (like when I went to Spain I attended business meetings the day after I arrived) but I won't be happy and I wasn't up for drinking after the meetings.  I just went to bed and crashed.

I really think your mind has to catch up with your body.  With modern transportation you can get to Europe in less than a day.  This trip used to take weeks, your mind had time to adjust.  Now you don't get this luxury so your mind doesn't quite know where it is until you can get your rhythms back in sync.  This is hard to do when you are awake in their middle of the night. 

My best remedy is not to do too much in the first few days and let yourself recuperate; let your mind catch up with your body. 

Spain Motorcycle Trip

Today I'm back in my own home and seem to be adjusting well.  I slept through the night last night and am not falling asleep today, yet.

I do have a few lingering effects from the bike ride.  My hands are swollen, my butt hurts and I feel weird not wearing layers of plastic motorcycle gear. 

Here are a few pictures from the trip. Basically we rode 100 to 150 miles a day across mostly dirt roads with a few trails thrown in.  The trails consisted of single track paths through the woods or up a mountainside.  It provided a lot of fun and challenge but was separated with some long stretches of relaxing riding. 

Every 20 miles or so we would come down into a small village and ride through the narrow streets.  The houses and the towns are all ancient relics of a past age when they needed to be close for defense.  The streets are coblestone and there always was a tower at the center of the town.  I never got tired of the beauty of the country side and these villages.

I really enjoyed the trip. I wished we had stopped more often but I feel like I got a realistic look at the countryside and the people.  We rode through a lot of fields on the way up the mountains so I saw and smelled a lot of farm animals.  There also was a lot of forest and logging operations.  I wouldn't thought of Spain as a wood producing country but I guess it is. 

One of the neatest things was when we came on a goat hearder and his charges.  We stopped and tried to converse with him.  We communicated through lots of hand jestures and attempts at single words in Spanish.  We talked for about an half hour.  He was very pleasant.  It doesn't get much more local than that.  

I can't wait for next year.

Northeastern Spain by Motorcycle

I have been somewhat remiss in my posting because this week I have been on another motorcycle trip. 

Two weeks ago I went for a week across northern Nevada on our annual fall motorcycle tour.  This one took off west from SLC and we moved relatively even with the Pony Express trail through western Utah and Eastern Nevada.  It was a week of camping, trail riding with a heavly loaded KLR 650 and some light duty days of circuit riding.  All in all it was an easy trip from the standpoint of technical off road motorcycling.

Last week I was in Barcelona Spain on business.  This week my business partners organized a week long motorcycle trip.  Unlike the previous motorcycle trip this one was fully supported by a van that met us during the day with lunch and got to the hotel every night to set up our accomodations.

This isn't a package trip, it is set up by one of the guys on the ride.  Sort of the manifestation of having taken many of those organized trips and saying "I can do a better job on a lot less money".

We have two young guys riding with us and all the other older guys have a lot more experience riding than I do.  This means we ride hard and fast most of the day.  We are riding KTM 450s.  A lot lighter and higher performance bike than my KLR.

Here are the bikes before we began.  They are nowhere near as clean now since we have had four days of riding and two of them were in the rain.  We do about 70% of the ride off road, about 10% is classified as difficult or very difficult.  The van on the right is our support vehicle.

We started from Barcelona and went north.  We do about 100 to 150 miles a day.  Tonight we are in Andorra, the country.  The terrain is very hilly and beautiful.  I wish I could paste a few more pictures but I broke my Blackberry phone which I was using as a camera.  The data on the phone appears intact but I won't be able to get to it until I get back home.

Anyway tomorrow we ride east through the Pyrenees strattling France and Spain.  I have a great life and a great wife don't I?

Dinner in Barcelona

I am traveling for work and have been in Barcelona Spain for the past few days.  Last night a few of my colleagues went out for dinner and I stayed back to finish up some work.

I went to the local supermercado to get some dinner.  I find it a lot easier to go to a supermarket and pick up some bread, cheese, meat and an apple than sit in a restaurant and look like I am not alone. 

Here is what I picked out.  I ate almost everything.  The flan cups were a real treat and the salad was surprisingly fresh.  Buenos noches.

Into The Wilds of Nevada

Last week I spent a few days riding my motorcycle across the desert.  We went west from SLC across what we in Utah call the "West Desert", into eastern Nevada and then turned north to the Idaho border.  Along the way we saw a lot of country.  I had no idea there was so much unspoiled landscape out there.

We usually think of this area as a wasteland.  I'm sure the people who live out there are glad this is the common misconception.  We ran into a few and they were nice but guarded.  You could tell they were apprehensive.  Whether we were seen as a symbol of the water robbing Las Vegas council woman who wants to stick a large straw in the ground and suck it dry, or just a momentary intrusion on their way of life, you got the feeling you were an outsider.

This land is very primative.  There isn't much out here and aside from taking enough water, you need to plan your gas stops.  You also have to be able to be self-sufficient.  If things fall off out here you had better be able to put them back on or you will be out there for a while. 

All in all it was a very enjoyable few days away from the hustle and bustle of the big city.  Here are a few shots of us on our trip.