Tulsa OK – Pie Town NM
Thu June 22, 2023
(~1474 miles)

Feeling much better after just four hours sleep in the comfortable bed at checkpoint 1, though I can feel that I’m building up a nasty rest deficit. Oh well, better than nothing – there’s a rally to run here! Got myself showered and down to the meeting on time, where I grabbed some coffee. The hotel had run out of breakfast sandwiches however, so looks like I’ll be dining on tank bag food for my morning meal. 🙁

The meeting started promptly at 04:00. Jeff and Lisa started things off with heated admonitions about about some isolated behavior observed during the first leg. We were reminded that taking another riders’ rally flag if found at a bonus is a big no-no. Now this is something many of us picked early on while participating in rallies, but maybe it hasn’t happened in a while so it just became an assumption that everyone knows this. Well, now the community has a fresh reminder to tell stories about, based on the events in Bar Harbor. Take heed rally newbies! 😬 Secondly, someone had apparently leaked information about the group photo bonus in Kansas to outside parties who posted about it on social media, something explicitly verboten in two different ways!

Last and most sternly addressed, was showing proper respect for the  properties we visit for bonus locations (thus reflecting on the event and organizers).  Someone had decided to try shortening their search through Cornhenge by riding their bike up and down through the grassy rows rather than walking to find that missing kernel. There were raised voices that came close to the legendary fire-and-brimstone scolding about social media posting I witnessed from Team Strange rallymasters  during Butt Lite IX – almost but not quite!

Jeff then gave an quick update on the top ten riders. I was relieved and a bit surprised to have squeaked into the top ten at slot #9. In chatting with a few other Bar Harbor riders, I’d confirmed that they had indeed found time to snag more bonuses in southern New Jersey, Virginia, Kentucky, and/or Tennessee, in addition to the same string of bonuses that I’d busted my ass for to get back on time. Shit, Jim Owen and Mike Brooke had gotten all the way down to Georgia before heading west! The top two leaders Ben Ernst and Jon Anderson had solved Leg 1 impressively, with a counter-clockwise run of the northeast, first picking up several of those mid-Atlantic locations before committing to the run up through New England.

Of course, I didn’t have all these details right now, but I’d already known that I’d been left behind after my slow roll through New York on Day 1. Being 4000+ points down after the first leg did sting a bit, especially considering the small number of bonuses on this leg in the first place. As expected, we definitely have a strong field of riders this year! As usual, I was humbled and amazed by the routing prowess and grit of the competitors I was facing in this rally.

View the Leg 1 Results

Leg 2 rally books were then divided alphabetically amongst several rally staffers, who spread themselves out in the room to avoid stampedes. We were released to claim our books at around 04:20… the clock was now ticking again! I made it to an elevator and got up to my room without much delay. The emails with bonus info were a bit delayed in arriving – I sent a few nervous texts back and forth with fellow riders until it finally hit the Inbox a few minutes later. Time to route!

The rally book was about HALF the size of the one from Leg 1, with only 26  location bonuses available for the leg! I could acutely feel the pressure from the way Jeff had architected this rally. With so few bonuses in the first two legs, it seemed he was corralling the scores to keep things fairly tight at the top. By presenting less options, there is less opportunity for riders to choose a radically different route and separate themselves from the pack. There were no additional combos or special puzzles to deal with, so I had the waypoints sorted, organized, and colored pretty quickly. Here’s the scatter for Leg 2.

This leg had two obvious “big rock” bonus locations (purple): in Santa Monica, California; and Manitowoc, Wisconsin (north of Milwaukee). I gravitated towards the higher concentration of larger value bonuses in the southwest and built out my Plan A route. One of my rally self-improvement goals is to improve on getting out of checkpoint hotels faster, although I’ll never match some of these guys who plan most of their leg on the fly. After a quick scan of the northern route to compare points, I decided not to even bother vetting it, which left me free to fine-tune my gut choice. I sprinkled in some Bingo bonuses along the way, again focusing on those chains that are endemic to the areas I’d be traveling through. I loosely planned out where I’d be getting some rest. Before I knew it, I was sending data to the GPS units and packing up to go.

Suited up and helmet on, I lugged my tank bag and duffel downstairs and out to the garage to pack the bike, then came back in to fill up my hydration jug. I could probably have gained some efficiency this morning by taking care of some things while waiting to score last night, but I’d just been so damn tired! The garage was active with riders getting ready to leave and quite a few motorcycles had already hit the road, leaving my bike parked oddly in the middle of the aisle that we had all crowded into yesterday. After getting everything stowed and refilled, I departed from the hotel just after 06:20.

Though my route’s big anchor bonus was in southern California to the west, my initial focus lay east of here, to snag a juicy bonus in central Arkansas by Little Rock. Hopping back on I-44 for one exit north, I turned on OK 51, the Muskogee Turnpike, for the 70 mile stretch southeast through the city of Muskogee and down to I-40. Speed limits were high and traffic was light along this whole stretch all the way into Arkansas, allowing me to keep the cruise control set to a quick pace just a couple miles above what traffic there was doing. I passed several other rally bikes along the way, accelerating often to create some space between us, and avoid any grouping up like what bit me on Day 1.

Glancing at the group Spotwalla page from time to time, I knew there were several riders already a good way out in front of me and those little markers kept me motivated. The leaders were quite out of reach, however, so I knew that some of them must have left the hotel super early with hardly time to formulate a full route plan. While I was making really good time and was stuck on I-40 for a while, I started running scenarios on my GPS to see what Improvements I could make myself.

My original plan was to grab Little Rock, and then hightail it straight back west on I-40 to I-44 and then down through the Texas panhandle. However, there were two bonuses to the south, one near Dallas and a very interesting one in southern Oklahoma. With so few bonuses on the leg, I decided that I needed to be more aggressive with my plan to try minimizing that points deficit after the first leg. My current schedule had me arriving in the wee hours at a high-point daylight-only bonus in New Mexico, so I would have to wait a couple hours for sunrise anyway (hopefully napping). Adding the Dallas bonus wouldn’t actually add that much time to the route so I added it to my route. I’d decide about the Oklahoma bonus depending on how the rest of my morning and afternoon went. It involved eating pie, so I was highly motivated to add it, almost regardless of time and effort. 🥧🥟😋

After a fuel stop in Van Buren, Arkansas (9.5 gallons – played that one close!), I was rolling through northern part of the state and happened to spot a blue Food services exit sign (a la rally poster!) with both a Bojangles and a Sonic. Sweet, a twofer! Shortly thereafter, I exited in Clarksville and rolled into a Love’s truck stop with a Bojangles attached. Having missed a hot breakfast at the rally hotel, I should’ve actually treated myself to a nice breakfast sandwich or two for the road, but I was in full rally mode and made the same minimal beverage purchase that I’d been doing this whole time and escaped outside with just the receipt, documenting Bingo bonus G1.

Just down the road a quarter mile, I pulled in to the Sonic Drive-In and parked my bike in one of the covered spaces next to another rally bike and rider whom I recognized as Ricardo Machado. I said hello, doffed my helmet, and walked over to the door to the kitchen rather than wait for service. I don’t think they’re used to people coming in that door, but nobody asked me to leave. I asked them to ring me up quickly for a small drink, and caught them before they went to make the drink. “No, please, I just need the receipt, could you please just ring it up?” So then the now-familiar confusion and complication because this obviously isn’t “normal” and then a supervisor key was needed to ring me up on the register near this door.

I finally secured my receipt and recorded my mileage and the bonus code I1. I noticed Ricardo was heading out and gave him a thumbs up. I took a few extra minutes to stretch my legs, grab a snack, check the group spot, and ensure the TX and OK bonuses were properly inserted on the GPS routes while I refitted my earplug and helmet. Then back at it!

Wait a second, notice something missing here? Well neither did I until an hour or so down the road when it suddenly dawned on me that I’d plumb forgotten to take the damn photo at Sonic! Between seeing the other rider and messing about with other things, I’d apparently been distracted. Looking through my rally camera on the fly, I carefully reviewed the last shots…nope, not there! WTAF, I’m 0 for 2 now with the damn Sonics, probably a total of 30 minutes rally time wasted between the two of them! Shaking my head, I didn’t dwell on it too long, since there are Sonics pretty much everywhere.

Continuing to pound the miles towards Little Rock, one of my GPSes was trying to shortcut me east on US 64 to Cabot, bypassing the capital. With the quick speeds I’d been managing on the interstate and the relatively short mileage, I ignored that turn and stuck to the slab. There were no backups through the city, so it turned out to be a good decision, I think, as I dipped south through downtown and then right back out heading northeast on US 167 to Cabot.

I took the exit for AR 89 (Main Street) and cruised through a stretch of strip malls and traffic lights to get to the center of town. Looky there, isn’t that just a Waffle House sitting pretty on the other side of the street? I made a mental note to pull in there on my way back out to the highway and redeem my failed WH attempt from Leg 1. The Waffle House just HAS to be valid in Arkansas, right? I mean, if not, what’s the point of it all?!

The Cabot Meat Market was just over the railroad tracks and there were already three or four rally bikes here in varying stages of the bonus collection process. I’m running about 20 minutes ahead of my own schedule and I can’t believe how many people left the hotel before me this morning! I banged a uey to pull into a lot on the opposite side of the road for a clear snap of bonus ARCA, first confirming that I was indeed on the correct side of the building and there wasn’t some OTHER giant mural with a cute cow.

On the northeast wall of the Cabot Meat Market, you will find a mural of a cow and honeybees. The cow seems to be asking for a better fate.

I’m running 20 minutes ahead of schedule and feeling pretty good with my first bonus of the leg documented. I pulled back out into traffic, crossed back over the railroad tracks and re-entered the commercial district. The Waffle House there in Cabot had apparently seen a few of my opponents already this morning. They seemed excited to see me when I walked in, and with a big smile, the man asked simply “Receipt?” I laughed, nodded, made some token bit of small talk, and got back outside in a flash. As another rider pulled in to park, I verified Arkansas qualified for Waffle House in the book, snagged my photo, and completed documentation of Bingo bonus N2.

Quickly back on 167, I booked it back south into Little Rock again and picked up I-30 southwest outta town. I had ridden this stretch down to Texarkana a couple times to attend the Heart of Texas rally last year, so knew it was pretty clear sailing. Once past the city, traffic levels became very light, so I made great time down into Texas.

The group Spotwalla page became more interesting after Little Rock, because that early morning train of eastbound riders began to fracture a bit, with some heading north, some reversing direction to head back west on I-40, and even fewer it seemed dropping down south with me. There were a few riders preceding me in this direction. The first one was waaaay out ahead, and I couldn’t even imagine what time they had left the hotel this morning!

My thoughts drifted to Gerry, as they would every remaining day of the rally now, especially on the long highway stretches. I figured he’d probably be bored in his hospital bed and might want a chat. After fueling up in Texarkana and crossing into the Lone Star State, I gave him a call and ended up speaking to his wife Nicky for a few minutes instead, since the patient was resting. He was doing OK, considering. They were focused on trying to get him flown home ASAP, working with the hospital to get them to understand how MedJet worked. Apparently, Lisa Landry had been a huge help with figuring out what to say to who, etc. It sounded like Gerry was getting lots of attention, and a plan for his next step was forming, albeit slowly, so I was glad he was in good hands.

When you’re routing on the clock at a checkpoint, you rarely have enough time to zoom in on every bonus that you stick into your route. So I was very pleased to see that this next one wasn’t actually IN the inner loops of DFW metro, but rather in the northern suburbs. So in Greenville, I was very happy to leave I-30 and interstate travel behind for a bit, in exchange for Texas state highways and some local roads. I picked up US 380 on the far side of Greenville and cruised west through a couple towns to Princeton.

I could see a big construction delay ahead on Google Maps entering McKinney. I remembered hearing Paul Tong say once upon a time to avoid this area at all costs, so I zoomed out a bit on my GPS and managed to pick out a zig zag route involving TX 546 and Highway 121 to skirt just south of that town. A few more miles and I pulled into the parking lot for Hutchins BBQ in Frisco TX for bonus TXFR “Texas Twinkie”. Oh boy, did it smell good as the cooking smoke wafted across the parking lot. Sometimes the Iron Butt Rally can be a cruel mistress.

The Texas Twinkie was invented here at Hutchins BBQ in Frisco. This gastronomic delight is a jalapeno pepper stuffed with cream cheese and brisket, then wrapped in bacon and deep fried. Today, hardened arteries are not a thing; that’s tomorrow’s problem.

Alas, no time to sample said Twinkie, but adding it to my must-do list, I was back on the road. As much as I wanted to catch a glimpse of Denton, where I lived through the 1990’s, I had a feeling the traffic on 380 might continue to be problematic, so I pointedly ignored the GPS once again, heading due north on TX 289. Passing through the town of Celina, I spotted a Sonic along the roadside…whoa! OK, third time’s gotta be the charm!

Closing in on 16:00, it was pretty hot out by this time in the afternoon, so I was grateful for the bit of shade provided by pulling under the overhang. I went in, no line, and got a cold drink, which I actually accepted and drank this time to help cool cool down. I stashed the receipt while slugging down as much as I could, then tossed the cup and mounted back up.

I couldn’t forget my photo this time! There didn’t appear to be a Sonic logo or sign anywhere on the actual building, so I maneuvered the motorcycle along the oddly sloped driveway towards the restaurant sign by the roadway. And…dropped the bike! Goddamn you Sonic! Not sure exactly what happened there, but the adrenaline kicked in and I picked it right back up again lickity-split. No damage done, so I positioned the bike, and got my Bingo bonus photo I1 (again!).

Continuing north on 289 in the 90+ degree afternoon heat for several miles, I eventually turned west on US 82 to close the 25 mile gap back to the interstate system in Gainesville TX, just south of the state line. Despite living in north Texas for several years, I hadn’t ever come up this far on I-35, so I took in the otherwise ho-hum landscape with some interest as I rode north through Marietta, Ardmore, and Springer, after which the flat dusty terrain turned more undulating and rocky. Traffic was light as afternoon faded into evening, and I made good time up to my exit on US 77.

Thoughts of pie had been keeping me motivated for these past several hours, because pie is what bonus OKD is about: Arbuckle Mountain Fried Pies to be precise! It wasn’t huge points – in fact I had categorized it in my lowest-value “green” grouping in Basecamp…only 884 to be precise. On top of that it was a restricted time bonus, only open 7a – 7p daily. And on top of THAT, in order to document and collect those paltry points, you needed to present three different things at the scoring table: the photo, a receipt for a fried pie, and the actual paper sleeve that the pies are served in. Hell, it’s like the routemaster is practically daring me to eat some pie on the clock! Well, challenge accepted sir! As soon as I’d read the description in the rally book, I’d hoped that somehow it would squeeze into my route plan. I mean…it’s pie for points!

The famous Arbuckle Mountain Oklahoma Fried Pie started as a simple recipe by Maude Pletcher in Spring, OK. Her recipe was handed down and perfected with her nine children and other farmers and ranchers that would visit her home.

I must have arrived at a lull in business around 17:30, as there weren’t many cars in the lot. I tiredly peeled myself off the bike in front of a long one-story building that lies just a stone’s throw away from I-35. There’s a small storefront area that fronts the large bakery lined with stacked rolling pastry carts. The carts and some glass counter cases were filled with pies of all flavors, folded over into half-moon dumpling-style hand pies. All the sweet and savory varieties were listed on a blackboard hanging down from the ceiling above the counter. I must admit I was a bit overwhelmed and the saliva was already flowing. I’d eaten my lunch of jerky and Clif Bar quite a bit earlier so at least I’d have some protein intake and wouldn’t feel as badly indulging in one of these luscious fat-infused beauties.

Keeping my rally wits about me, I did ask the clerk whether all the pies were fried pies – I didn’t want to end up purchasing something that had been baked and thus not meet the bonus requirement! She just looked at me a moment, wondering if I was for real, before confirming that yes, they were all fried pies like the name says! At a bargain-basement price of just $3.25/ea for the fruit pies, there was no way I was going to get just one. I asked for one apple pie warmed up to eat now, and took one blackberry pie to go, figuring I’d need something to look forward to on my rest bonus. I shoulda bought a half dozen!

I forgot to get a photo inside, and by the time I was outside, a carload full of family had unloaded and were crowding up the place. So I grabbed a couple selfies to document the pure joy I was feeling at that moment. I did a poor job of actually capturing the pie itself in the photos, so I grabbed one from online to showcase that delectable apple filling!

There was a local guy hanging around, watching me embarrass myself with my pie, so we chatted a bit. Of course he turned out to be a rider and had a Harley back home. I gave him the very short version of my story, and mostly exclaimed about how good this pie was!

As I finished up, I spotted a couple of those tourist prop boards where you stick your face through. I asked my new acquaintance if he’d mind terribly helping kick the embarrassment up a notch , saying “I know a few people who’re gonna get a big kick of this I think.” Meaning, of course the rally staff. He kindly followed me across the lot and after quite a bit of messing about with the phone’s camera app, finally managed to snap off a couple of shots.

With the pie achievement unlocked, I was happy, my stomach was happy, and all was feeling much better in my small focused universe. I sent off a couple texts back and forth to the rallymasters with the photos, thanking them for the opportunity to eat pie on the clock. The assured me that these photos wouldn’t be considered extraneous! After the additional time spent on this little photo shoot, however, my rally instincts began calling me back to the road. I thanked my new photographer friend as I geared back up and fired the engine. After a great stop of some 20 minutes total at Arbuckle Mountain (worth every minute), I scooted out across the road and got back onto I-35 headed back south.

Getting down to Ardmore, I turned west on US 70, with a pit stop to fuel up in Lone Grove. I’d been gaining a bit more confidence with the tank mileage I’d been getting during the rally, so this was another fill-up of around 9.5 gallons, rather than the 8.5 I’d been stopping for during most of leg one. It really sucks having a broken fuel gauge!

Then I beelined toward a gorgeous setting sun on that highway across southern Oklahoma, my tanks full of gas and my stomach full of pie, having one of those unexpected “moments” of riding where all things just feel right. It’s not a particularly scenic road, nice and rural with plenty of ranchlands and cows, but I was finally feeling happy again about being in this rally.

I had a good long call with Char to share the moment a bit, exchange info on Gerry, and to listen to her read me official rally blog updates and other rally-related commentary from the inter-webs.  The miles went by quickly as we gabbed, and I watched distant cloudbanks with rain showers falling on the Oklahoma plains.

After about an hour and a half, route 70 dives south at Davidson OK to cross the Red River back into Texas, having bypassed the entire Wichita Falls area. It was a pretty sight with the river and sunset sky at that moment, but I didn’t want to stop rolling.

 

I’d been watching a few storm cells at different points on the horizon and the MyRadar app showed a nasty little bugger right in my vicinity. Luckily, I was now moving WNW on good old US 287, a highway I’d traveled (on four wheels) several times during my Texas residency, and that carried me quickly out of reach of the storm.

Memories played across my mind, of younger days and faces from the past. Lots of long lonely stretches with the occasional crossroads town to pass through. I’d last visited the sleepy towns of Chilicothe and Quanah around 1998 and they looked pretty much exactly the same as I remember, with perhaps a newer gas station or two.

Gerry rang me up along this stretch, and it was great to hear his voice again, muddled though it was – he was feeling no pain yet at least. 😵 He updated me on their progress (or lack thereof) in getting transferred home, while I fed him tidbits about my ride so far and what I had planned for the rest of the leg. After a short chat, he wished me luck and we said we’d meet on the flip side. I wouldn’t speak to him again until after the rally was over, but he was in my thoughts every day I was out there.

Cruising into the wayside town of Childress, I pulled into an Allsups to use the loo and top off my water supply after the hot day I’d ridden through. At the crossroads community of Estelline, I veered to the southwest on TX 86 for 20 miles (with some actual nice curves!) into Turkey, Texas (pop. 421), where I arrived at my next bonus TXTU around 21:15, deep into twilight by now.

Turkey is considered the hometown of Bob Wills, one of the co-founders of Western Swing music.

Apparently another FRINO location (food related in name only) like Sandwich MA, I later looked the town up to see what else I could find out. Even Wikipedia delivered minimal 411 on this little burg: Besides having the oldest Phillips 66 station in Texas as a claim to fame, amusingly, PETA apparently tried to get them to change the name to Tofurkey in 2011. So there’s that.

After successfully get my shot of the turkey AND the Texas statues both visible together, I got the flock out of there, zipping west a few miles into the equally-sized village of Quitaque. I rode past a surprising mural on one of the buildings that made me do a double-take. Despite being tired, needing to make miles, and having many more of them to make tonight, I banged a uey and headed back for a look-see. Char just had to see this. I mean I am from New England, but I know the haters are widespread, so a big NE Patriots logo was about the last thing I expected to see in rural nowhere Texas, even if they did appropriate it for a high school team!

Another 50 miles or so across the darkness of the Texas panhandle, chatting with Char about whether Robert Kraft was getting his due for the pirate mural, before I pulled in to fuel up in Tulia. Only about 8 gallons this time, but it was getting late and my path was leading me across half of New Mexico on remote state highways in the middle of the night. I didn’t want to take a chance getting stranded if I couldn’t find a 24-hour station. I kept motoring along route 86 due west through the lonely countryside for another 60 miles or so to US 60 in Ravina, then crossing the New Mexico state line in Texico.

Though I was probably riding through beautiful wide-open scenery for the next few hours, for all I knew I was in a tunnel under the ocean. Thankfully, I saw no critters and was able to keep my aux lights at full blast for most of this high speed limit stretch, with very few travelers sharing the road with me at this hour.

The next bonus was daylight only, but my current ETA had me getting there a couple hours before sunrise. The early arrival suited me well when routing, as I could use the wait time to grab a nap at the Iron Butt Motel. However, I could feel the sleepies tugging at me already, realizing that I wouldn’t make it all the way without getting some shut-eye. Whether I sleep along the way or at the bonus didn’t seem to matter all that much. On the approach to Vaughn just past midnight, I suddenly noticed a bunch of dim lights scattered out across the property left of the road. When I passed a gated entrance, things clicked and I realized it was a large cemetery with a lot of those “ever-lasting” solar lamps that are placed at graves. Hmmm, this might be just the place.

I turned around and rolled up to the gateway, taking stock of the surrounding area. Right next to the highway like this, there appeared to be a minimum of residential dwellings within sighting distance and people were most likely asleep at this hour. I decided to chance it and idled into the cemetery, wheeled the bike around to point at the entrance, and quickly shut down the bike and all the lights. I set my timer for 30 minutes, lay down on the ground with helmet on and rolled fleece under my neck, and drifted off pretty quickly. After a good doze, I felt much better and able to continue. It sure beat laying on the asphalt in a convenience store parking lot. I roused myself with a protein shake and some water to hydrate, then got rolling again.

I have a voice note transcribed from some time during this night stretch that just says “Water bugs on the face shield.” I have absolutely no f’ing recollection about what that means! 😆  Maybe I rode by a rare section of road in this region bordering on a lake, possibly by Willard NM. Who knows?

The air cooled as I hit the mountains just south of Albuquerque, gaining elevation through Mountainair and Abo Pass. Coming down from the pass, you can see the lights of I-25 for the last several miles across a flat basin area. US 60 joins 25 south for some 30 miles, and soon I was rolling through the wide and empty streets of Socorro, past the bevy of commercial businesses, hotels, and fast food chains, mostly darkened and closed at this hour.

I pulled into a station to top off my fuel while I had the opportunity before my final push up onto the mostly isolated plateau. I’d been peeking occasionally at the group Spotwalla page and knew there were a couple of riders holed up in the hotels here in town. There was also at least one rider already roughing it up there in the mountains at Pie Town, which is, of course, where I’m headed.

Continuing down I-25BL through town, I passed by a cool retro-looking Blake’s Lotaburger restaurant, another unfamiliar Bingo chain that unfortunately looked very closed at this hour. US 60 turns west along here and climbs rather quickly out of town up to 6500 feet, through the neighboring Magdalena mountain ridge. The temperature dropped accordingly and started thinking about my heated gear again.

After the small village of Magdalena, there are miles of beautiful open plateau to ride across, which I remember well from riding through here back in 2016. For now, it was just more all-encompassing darkness, broken only by my LED lights and the one or two other late-night travelers I passed whooshing west across the basin. I passed by the Very Large Array at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, with it’s spread out network of huge dish antennas (seen in the movie Contact), catching a glimpse of a couple of them closer to the highway. I’d taken time to visit the observatory last time through, and it’s a very worthwhile stop.

Despite being close to my destination, it was now in the 40s and I had to stop for a few moments to to layer up a bit, donning my heated liner and warmer gloves. I didn’t even bother pulling off the road, as there wasn’t really anywhere to do so. After the intersection for the tiny campground community of Datil, I began climbing again, up a shallow canyon into another range of mountains and the Cibola National Forest. There were several signs to watch for elk, and sure enough my lights picked out a huge buck at one spot standing right next to the road, with several deer illuminated further back near the treeline. I slowed down just a tad after that and shortly passed the welcome sign for the tiny community of Pie Town.

Very shortly, I pulled off the road into the large dark gravel lot of the Pie-o-neer Homestead café. I fondly remember stopping here in 2016 for two delectable pieces of pie and some coffee, while sharing a table and conversation with a couple other random travelers. Alas, there would be no pie for me during this visit as it was just past 04:00 local time and all was dark and quiet, once I pulled up next to the lone motorcycle parked there and killed my engine and lights. There are no streetlights up here, really no artificial lights of any kind in the vicinity. You can feel how remote this place is, day or night.

I could see there was a rider sleeping on the big wooden porch of the place, and resolved to move about as quietly as possible so as not to disturb him. Yeah, try that on a creaky wooden porch in the dead of night! There was about an hour to go before first light. I wanted to get more sleep, but I had a few tasks to take care of first. I fished my laptop out of my luggage and “tip-toed” (clunk, clunk, clunk…) up onto the porch to sit at the wooden table and bench, at the opposite end from the sleeping rider. I needed to take a closer look at my plans for the next part of the leg.

I was super tired, but exhilarated to have finally made it here to my intermediate goal pretty much on schedule, with a bit of time still left over to rest. It had been a tough ride pushing hard all day through Arkansas, heat and traffic in Texas, and then through the dark clear across New Mexico. Though I’d finally broken out of my funk, thanks in large part to that delicious fried pie, I was feeling the acquired exhaustion of four days with minimal sleep. Getting here had been my primary focus for the past 24 hours, but now I really had to take a closer look at the rest of my leg.

That big Santa Monica anchor bonus for this leg is time-limited, only available between the hours of 06:00 and 22:00. When I had put the route together, I had to make compromises (as we all do) between routing/research or getting on the road. I’d sort of eyeballed things on the west coast and figured I’d count on taking my rest bonus right in or around Santa Monica, no matter what. If I was late getting there this evening, I’d have a second opportunity to snag the bonus first thing the following morning after my rest. Seemed like a sound plan at the time.

An uneasy little lump formed in the pit of my stomach as I realized now that waiting until that following morning was not an option if I wanted to get to Checkpoint 2 before the penalty points began. The run from Santa Monica to Greenwood Village CO was a solid 1075 miles, including two bonus stops off I-70 in Colorado, which I did NOT want to drop from my plan. Waiting to grab the big bonus at 6AM would mandate a 14 hour Saddlesore to the checkpoint, after already riding on minimal sleep for five days.

I knew at this moment that I absolutely HAD to make the Santa Monica pier by 10 PM tonight (about 19 hours from now with the time change), come hell or highwater, or I could kiss any competitive rally finish goodbye, or worse get time-barred for a DNF if I ran into any problems on the way. Either way, hopes of taking a full eight hour rest bonus were completely dashed, which was a major downer considering how tired I was. I had put myself in a position to do either a really solid leg, or a disastrous one, but sleep wasn’t going to be a big part of it either way.

Finally, closing the laptop at 04:30 and cutting out that alien blue-white glow of the screen, I was left in pitch blackness and brought abruptly back to the reality of where I was – sitting on a creaky wooden porch before dawn, at a pie shop on top of the continental divide, in the middle of high desert wilderness in New Mexico. Wow, isn’t this just a trip!

I packed things back on the bike, removed my boots and changed my nasty socks, still moving as quietly as possible on those old boards. Luckily the other rider (who for some reason I was convinced – incorrectly – was Bob Lilley) seemed as tired as I felt. He barely stirred despite all my activity. I put my earplugs partially in, donned my helmet, and using my jacket for a blanket, stretched out on the floor of the porch myself, drifting off with the alarm set for 40 minutes of glorious sleep.