Wagon Mound NM – Grand Junction CO
Fri Jul 1, 2022
(~915 miles)

When you reach the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on.
― Abraham Lincoln

For god’s sake, let this be the last time! was my thought as I arose from that rest area picnic table in New Mexico. Shortly down I-25, dawn’s light in the sky, it occurred to me that my ETA to the next bonus in Albuquerque was meaningless. After getting manhandled by the storm and all stops for napping over the course of the night, I had absolutely no sense of where I stood right now, nor whether my current plan of getting to Phoenix was doable and how much more rest I could afford to take. I just didn’t know anything! And now I was kicking myself for having just left behind a perfectly good rest area, where I could have planned things out. I had to have an f’ing plan!

When leaving the rest area, I’d spotted a corresponding one on the northbound side of I-25. The next exit was about eight miles down, and after much hesitation, I took it and headed back north. Now that I had come to terms with changing my plan, I was somewhat calmer, though no less disappointed. It did seem that my last nap and the growing light in the sky had now put me past the edge of sleepiness, so I should be good to go for the rest of today. I pulled into the rest area, almost an exact copy of the one I’d just left, dug out my laptop, and got right to work at a table.

First and foremost, to put any doubts to rest, I checked on my original timeline and confirmed that Gerlach was (probably always had been) out of reach. It was simply too far and there had been absolutely no margin for rest or error. It had definitely been a Bad Move changing my Leg B plan. Now, here I was on Day 6, both plans shot to shit, unable to maximize the Abraham Lincoln combo or multipliers and barely a chance to hold on to the Madonnas combo.

With that unpleasantness out of the way, I sketched out a new plan in Basecamp in about 10 minutes. I’d beeline to Phoenix first, since that was a Lincoln, and increase my multiplier before circling back to nab the two remaining Madonna bonuses in eastern Arizona and Albuquerque on my way back up through Colorado. The timing worked – barely – and I figured I could drop the Colorado bonuses if time was running short. Looking back from the future, I was clearly missing some important lessons from the previous night, but at the time I was trying to just come up with something to minimize the damage. I didn’t take the time to upload my new route to the GPS, I’d simply build the route out manually by editing on the device as I rode.

So now I have a full eight hours of riding to my next planned bonus in Phoenix…time to lay some rubber down! I cut back over to the opposite side of I-25 and motored south. It was beautiful morning, and after passing through Las Vegas NM early on, I tried to enjoy the scenery that was now being revealed in dawn’s early light, especially through the mountainous Santa Fe National Forest area.

I chatted a bit with Char, filling her in on my struggles of last night, how much I’d blown my rally, and venting my disappointment and frustration with my own mistakes. She provided only words of encouragement like before, telling me to keep my mind in the game and just continue to do what I could to salvage a route. As sometimes happens, I found that describing my plan out loud can reveal hidden problems. I kept working through things, second-guessing my new (third!) plan, and working out the angles.

On my approach to Albuquerque, I considered that the bonus there was worth 975 points. Waiting to grab it until after the multiplier Lincoln in Phoenix was therefore only netting me another 975 points. I played with the route on the GPS and saw an improved ETA If I nabbed it now on my way through. I wouldn’t have to circle back this way and could head more directly north after Arizona. The gain in time was worth the relatively low point gain – I made the easy decision on the fly to swap the bonus order.

I was getting low on fuel again and there appeared to be few exits with services, making me nervous about a repeat of yesterday’s faux pas. I finally pulled off an exit at 07:11 just north of the city. The gas station here had a maze-like entrance tucked all the way around to the back, off a side street, causing me to miss it the first time and having to circle around a traffic island near a busy intersection in morning rush hour, worrying that I was going to repeat my big out-of-gas failure from yesterday. Luckily, I made it back into the station lot and sighed with relief as I pulled up to the pump. Maybe it was the cooler temperatures that morning, but I somehow squeezed 10.6 gallons into my tanks, a new record. Clearly, I still need to pay better attention to my fuel gauge and trip meter today! SMH

That chore done, I ran the last few miles south into the city, taking the first exit past the big I-40 interchange. This part of the city was still fairly quiet at this time of the morning, and I cruised unimpeded for several blocks west at a moderate pace, as there were several LEOs out and about. Bonus BPI10, my tenth Madonna of the Trail, was installed on the corner of a large block occupied by the federal district courthouse and was an easy grab from the sidewalk.

Hopping back on the bike, I quickly found my way north several more blocks to I-40 and headed west. As much as this interstate gets talked about in Iron Butt circles, there are still sections of I-40 that I haven’t seen, including this one. The rocky New Mexico landscape was quite lovely to look at as I zinged along, thinking about my plan, checking ETAs, calculating. Closer to the Arizona border, I began to have even more reservations about heading to Phoenix. US 191 is the highway running up and down the eastern border of Arizona and would be the point of no return if I decided to change up my plan.

Up until now, I was still leaning towards taking an abbreviated roadside rest somewhere tonight, so whether I took a third meal bonus was directly related to that decision. Meal bonuses have no intrinsic points of their own, just increasing the value of the rest bonus. So there would be no point in taking another one officially, unless I also planned to take the rest. As I rode, my mind was feeling “swimmy” if not exactly sleepy, and I realized that a good solid meal bonus and food in my stomach was what I really needed and wanted right now. If I took one and then managed to get a full 8 hour rest in, that could be worth a LOT more points than what Phoenix’s points and multiplier would buy me. The bonus in Phoenix, while sizable at 4530 points, was a Lincoln, which means that it’s only worth face-value and no multiplier would apply.

Trying to do the math in my head took several attempts as I was motoring along, but I finally calculated that taking the meal/rest bonuses would net almost the same points as riding all the miles down to Phoenix. Plus, Phoenix would leave me no real time for rest, so I might end up spending another night like the last one (or worse) and fail to reach the finish in time. It all suddenly clicked, and now I had my fourth plan change of the leg: Phoenix was out of the equation. Now, I was free to take that meal bonus, sit down one last time with the laptop, and cobble together whatever points might be collected over the last 24 hours of the rally.

The decision was so last minute, that I actually passed by US 191 while still updating my route on the GPS. A couple miles later, I pulled off a small turnaround exit and headed back to the small Navajo settlement of Sanders to turn on 191 south towards my final Madonna bonus in Springerville AZ. It was a lonely road through some 100 miles of desert plains and ranches, passing very few vehicles on my journey down. Over the mountains near my destination, I could see a big rainstorm dumping water in a dark column, prompting me to pull up my radar apps and check weather conditions in the area.

Over the course of an hour, the radar didn’t change much, so I figured it was just an isolated storm and would just be staying up on the ridges and not cause me grief while collecting my bonus. I also looked up restaurants in town and found that the bonus was right next to a McDonalds. How handy! I was really looking forward to this meal break by now.

Coming into town just past 10:00 MST (Arizona time), I felt a few sprinkles of rain here and there, but it seemed that most of the nearby precipitation wasn’t going to hit me directly. I turned right at the intersection by the McDonalds, then realized I should have gone left. Trying to get turned around in a small gravel parking lot made me realize just how tired my body was, as I carefully muscled the bike around to head back. After getting around to the other side of Micky D’s, I saw a small group of local women and young girls tending the flowers for the Madonna of the Trail statue. They appeared to be finishing up their work as I pulled into the parking lot nearby and got my flag and phone ready. Perhaps sprucing things up for Independence Day.

Bonus BPI11 is my eleventh and final Madonna of the Trail, securing the full combo for 30,000 points. It was cool to think about how far I’d just come across most of the country, collecting photos of these monuments. Was I really in Bethesda MD just two days ago?

Pulling around into the restaurant parking lot, I found a space and started my meal bonus timer. Then I headed inside with my laptop, flag, and other necessaries. The place was pretty lively for late morning on Friday, but I ordered my food and found a table by the window to set myself up. After documenting the bonus with receipt/flag, I set to work on an updated route plan.

First I confirmed my saddle math about dropping the Phoenix bonus, which proved correct. Considering that I was still feeling the effects of last night, I thought it better to have control over the when, where, and quantity of rest rather than go through another hellish night of stopping every 30 miles, or even hitting a complete wall. I did not want to put my finish in jeopardy, now that a high finish was off the table.

Then it was just a matter of maximizing whatever points I still had available to me with the time left over. Once I’d locked in a route, I booked a hotel in Grand Junction CO for tonight, giving myself something to look forward to over the next seven hours of riding.

Now it felt like the pressure was off a bit. I had blown my rally up by not sticking to my original route, conceived in the comfort of the hotel room back in Pennsylvania. It seemed to me that someone who had either done a route similar to that one, or someone who skipped DC and managed to get to Gerlach with a bunch of Lincolns via a different route, would be winning this rally. I now thought that focusing so much on the Madonnas combo might have been a mistake as well. Everything is much clearer after having dozens of hours to mull things over in the saddle. All I can do now is minimize damage, reset my body/mind tonight, and enjoy the ride in tomorrow.

Right at the 45 minute mark, I clocked out and submitted my meal bonus. Then I headed down the street to find fuel. There was a Circle K a half mile down that was jam packed, and I pulled in line to wait. People did not seem to be in a hurry and seemed to think it was OK to walk inside the store to pay after filling up, without moving their vehicle. After more than five minutes with no activity from the car ahead of me, I walked up to the drivers side and realized the woman was sitting in there. I asked if she was all done yet, and THEN she gets out of the car, flustered, stating that she hasn’t pumped gas yet and had to go in to prepay. I was livid at this point, and gave her a serious dose of stink-eye. I went back to my bike and practically peeled out leaving this place in my rearview. I remembered another sign on the way into town and hit the 76 station, where there were no lines at all. That was 15 minutes I’ll never get back!

Then I pointed the bike back north on US 191, recovering the terrain I’d just been through very quickly, now that I knew there was nobody and nothing out there. Crossing I-40, I continued north through the Navajo reservation, and pulled into a service station in the village of Burnside to buy some fresh water. Though I didn’t need fuel, I decided to fill up here as well, so I could make it to my hotel without any additional stops.

191 continued to provide a desolate, fast, and scenic transit through the remainder of northeast Arizona. Bright blue skies and puffy white clouds improved my mood as I chatted with Charlotte and Ken off and on over the next few hours.

The riding through southeastern Utah was as beautiful as always, as I cut through Bluff. I was interested to finally ride through the world-famous Moab area for the first time. The temperature went up very noticeably as I zoomed through that valley in the late afternoon, taking in all the slickrock landscape. 4×4 trail systems were visible everywhere out in the desert, where you could see folks making tracks on bicycles and all types of motorized offroad vehicles. I didn’t really get too good a feel of the place from the highway, as everything was set back a ways. The heat was making me tired, though, so I didn’t stop for photos or anything else through this stretch. That hotel was calling my name!

Finally, I hit my old friend, I-70, once again and struck east into Colorado. On the approach to Grand Junction, I enjoyed distant views of a few isolated rainstorms and some really nice rainbows.

I pulled into the Shell station next to the EconoLodge just before 19:00 MDT. That made about seven hours ride time from my meal stop in Arizona and right on schedule. I broke my recent record and squeezed 10.7 gallons (!) in the tanks this time, leaving just enough room for a splash to generate an ending receipt in the morning. I’d been pretty easy on the throttle most of the afternoon and had probably been helped with tail winds on my way here, so that may explain why my gauge had still shown another 40 miles to empty. The receipt wasn’t forthcoming from the pump, so I had to go inside to obtain one. I verified they’d be open all night so I could get my ending rest receipt in a few hours.

After checking in, I set about my normal hotel routine. As I was filling in my scoresheet, I realized that I couldn’t find that starting rest receipt that I’d just obtained. It wasn’t in my receipt pouch with the rest of them…shit! I hurriedly searched all my jacket pockets and where ever else I could think of where I may have stashed it in in my tired state. Then I headed outside to see if I could spot it on the ground anywhere. The wind was blowing up a bit now, with some sprinkles of rain. I tried following the wind direction and checking in the ditches to that side of the parking lots.

Finally I headed over to the store and requested a duplicate, but nothing is ever easy when there are problems like this on a rally. The poor girl simply could not figure out how to find my receipt in the system. Other people had used the same pump by now, probably an hour later, but it should have still been possible to get a reprint. I had to explain why I needed the receipt with the specific timestamp, and stood there waiting patiently while she tapped keys. After 10 minutes or so, I told her to keep trying if possible, but that I was going to go double-check all my clothing and bags.

Returning to my room, I very carefully checked every nook and cranny of my gear…and found the receipt! It was inserted flat into a corner of my pants pocket, so I hadn’t felt it there on my initial check. This is why we have routines! Feeling I owed the convenience store girl a follow-up for her time, I jogged back over there and let her know I was good, then returned back to finish up my chores.

Looking over my final bonus options for tomorrow morning’s ride to the finish, I thought if I cut my rest bonus short, I could make more points by collecting the two bonuses by Laramie. That would still give me time to grab four hours of shut-eye right now, which should be enough to make it to the barn. I made the change, updated my GPSes, set my alarm, and collapsed into bed at last.

BONUS STOPS: 2