September 8-11, 2021

We rode off the Alaskan ferry and headed south, back to Coupeville and boarded yet one last ferry across to Port Townsend. After a quick visit at a local coffee shop with my niece, we rode across the top of the Olympic Peninsula, through Forks (famous for a number of things, including the filming location of the Twilight series, and more recently the now infamous attack of a family on their bus in a case of mistaken identity), and on to the Hoh Rainforest. The Hoh is one of my all-time favorite places. It has an other-worldly feel to it, and is so green and so dense that noise is almost completely muted. As we rode the nine miles from the highway to the visitor center, I couldn’t help but hum the Star Wars theme, and I could envision Ewoks on Speeder Bikes racing us through the trees.

Unfortunately, but as we had known all along, the campground was full and there had been no cancellations for the day, so we turned around and rode the nine miles back to the highway, and continued south to Ocean City, Washington, where we stayed in a small cabin (hut?) a block from the beach.

In the morning, we continued a bit further south to Astoria, Oregon before turning east and following the Columbia River to The Dalles, eventually making camp at Maryhill State Park for the night.

In the morning, we awoke to rain on the tent. We packed up and rode in rain the entire day, arriving in Meridian, Idaho that afternoon. It was once again time to change tires on the bike, and we had arranged for tires to be shipped to a hotel next door to a motorcycle shop. The next day I pulled the wheels from the bike, but unlike last time, I let someone else mount the tires. By noon we were back on the road and headed the back way via the Peaks and Craters Scenic Byway to Idaho Falls. We passed through Craters of the Moon lava field before stopping at Atomic City, the home of Experimental Breeder Reactor 1 (“EBR-1”), the world’s first electricity-generating nuclear power plant.

We spent the night at a nice city park (Tourist Park) in Idaho Falls, for $15 a night. As we pulled in, we were approached by a gentleman who said “If all of the sites are taken, you’re welcome to pitch your tent in my site.” He was traveling in a pickup and had a similar sized tent. We circled the park, and found one remaining site. I later walked over and introduced myself, and found out that Michael was traveling similar to us, living out of his Ford truck. He had done quite a bit of world travel, and was interested in traveling by motorcycle. We shared travel experiences before I headed back to our camp.

Not long after dinner, two motorcycles rolled into the campground. Thinking of Michael’s generous offer, I flagged them down and offered space in our site for their tent. Ron and Kevin were from Phoenix and were headed back home after traveling through Montana.

It was good to meet several like-minded travelers and share experiences. We were glad to finally be through Idaho for the last time and headed further east to new places.

September 12-13, 2021

Okay, stick with me here. This song reference is a bit harder to actually tie in, but it stuck in my mind, so here we go.

We had a short day, riding from Idaho Falls to West Yellowstone, actually stopping just short of West Yellowstone at a KOA campground. This gave us a little time to relax, and the weather was a beautiful 66 degrees.

We awoke to 27 degrees. It was a bit chilly in the tent, but another nice day and it quickly warmed up into the 50s again. The west entrance to Yellowstone National Park is one of the busiest, and looked a bit like entering Disney World. There were four or five lanes of traffic extending back into town, and it took a while to get into the park. We had both been to “The ‘Stone” more than once in the past, and Yellowstone wasn’t actually on our “to see” list. We were simply cutting through the northwest corner of Yellowstone to head across the Beartooth Highway.

Outside of the north entrance to Yellowstone is Highway 212, also known in part as the Beartooth Highway. It is a fantastic, twisty climb up to Beartooth Pass, at an elevation of 10,947 feet.

We crossed Beartooth Pass and continued to Greybull, Wyoming for the night. We found a nice campsite in Greybull, and enjoyed the local A&W Root Beer stand across the street for dinner.

So here’s the song tie-in: Key to the Highway (Beartooth Highway, in this case) was recorded by Blues pianist Charlie Segar in 1940, and covered by many different bands since, including the Rolling Stones (as close as I could come to Yellowstone with the Highway). Thus, the Stones and the Highway.

Phew. That was too much work.

Next up: Another musical connection, this time from a movie.

September 14, 2021

From Greybull, Wyoming, we were headed towards the Black Hills of South Dakota. But we stopped a bit short of Deadwood at the Devils Tower. This large rock butte is probably most famous from the 1977 Stephen Spielberg movie “Close Encounters of the Third Kind”. The campground below the base of the tower shows the movie every evening in an outdoor theater that faces the tower, so you can see it on film and you can see it IRL just above the screen at the same time.

I began to wonder, what is it with America’s obsession with the devil and rockpiles? We have the Devils Tower, and the Devils Postpile. Both are in beautiful areas often referred to as “God’s Country”. So what’s up with this?

The 1267 foot tall butte is known by many names, but most locals (Lakota) refer to it as Bear Lodge, and there are many local legends about its’ formation. Many have to do with a giant Grizzly bear chasing little girls. One explanation as to its’ satanic name is that during an expedition in the 1800s, an interpreter for Colonel Richard Irving Dodge misinterpreted the Lakota word for Bear as meaning “Bad God”. Thus Devils Tower.

Devils Tower is America’s first National Monument, having been established by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1906. Spielberg’s movie forever casts Devils Tower in a different role. Now the campground has a miniature golf course with aliens standing watch, and there are “UFO Parking Only” signs.

By the way, the music for Close Encounters was composed by the same person who wrote the music for Star Wars and Jaws, and with whom I share a last name: John Williams.

In the next two days, we will play “Speed Tourist” and visit multiple tourist attractions…something we fairly rarely do.

September 15, 2021

I flash back to that scene from National Lampoon’s Vacation where Clark Griswold is trying to get the family back in the car quickly at the Grand Canyon. His wife says “Don’t you want to look at the Grand Canyon?” and he turns, faces it, nods a couple of times and says “Okay, let’s go.”

Unlike my prior travels, we have sort of settled into a tourist’s checklist of things to see in this area. There are so many things in such a small area that it almost becomes “Speed Touring”. Because we have upcoming commitments, we have two days in which to see a half dozen or so national landmarks, parks, and monuments.

We have intentionally planned this route for a month later than originally thought. Had we not been allowed to enter Canada and gone on to Alaska at the beginning of August, we would have ended up here during that time, which is also the same time of the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, an event I have worked hard to avoid over the years. Now, as we ride through the Black Hills, there are Harley Davidsons here and there, but nowhere near the quantity, volume or obnoxiousness of that August time frame.

We ride through the Black Hills to Custer, SD, stopping at the Crazy Horse Memorial, before continuing to Custer State Park’s Wildlife Loop, and then on to Mt. Rushmore. These are all places we learned about in school, and are familiar with, but have never visited before now.

By the end of the day, we are surprised at the amount of scenery and history we have viewed, and we are only half way through this Speed Tour Loop. We find a place to wild camp a few miles down a dirt road near the National Grasslands, and have one of the best nights’ sleep of the trip.

September 16, 2021

After a good night’s sleep, we pack up without making breakfast or coffee, because we are headed to a place that has five cent coffee.

From Wall, we head south to the Badlands.

On the way out of Badlands National Park we see three things that catch our attention: The first is a place on the west side of the road that has a big billboard proclaiming “Feed the Prairie Dogs!” This is a bit of a shocker, since we’ve been hammered with signs for days saying “Don’t Feed the Wildlife”. And sure enough, out in an open field, there are people squatting down, hand-feeding wild prairie dogs, and petting them. Two thoughts come to me:

1. I wonder how many people get bit every day?
2. Why hasn’t every prairie dog within a hundred miles moved here?

The second thing we see on the side of the road is this:



I’m old enough to remember the AMF days of Harley Davidson, when they had real quality control issues. Back then it was fairly common to see both t-shirts and bumper stickers that said “If Harley Davidson built an airplane, would you fly in it?” Well, here’s the helicopter version. (Okay, it’s not really a H-D helicopter. It just has a big bar-and-shield on the side in hopes of getting the Sturgis crowd to pay for a ride.)

And the third is this:



These goats were standing in a large, almost perfect circle in a field. We have had many theories since seeing this as to how and why.

Although it requires a bit of backtracking, I’ve been wanting to visit the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site for a while. The visitor center is on the Interstate just north of Badlands. After viewing a very informative movie there, we ride another seventeen miles back towards Wall to view the Delta-09 missile silo. You can’t enter the silo, but they have replaced the top hatch with a glass dome that allows a view into the silo, which contains what I assume is a mockup of a Minuteman Missile. Or at least a deactivated one.




Even Cold War Missile Operators have a sense of humor.



The Delta-09 missile silo near Wall, South Dakota. There are still many active nuclear warheads in the area, and now that we have seen what the silo looks like from ground level, we actually recognize several more of them as we pass by on our way south through Nebraska.




Looking down into the silo at a Minuteman Missile.

After doubling back, we pass through Badlands National Park again and head south to Wounded Knee. The memorial here is not the official US government type, and if it were, would no doubt tell a different version of history. As a kid, I remember being told about the “Battle of Wounded Knee”. However, since that time it has been, um, clarified that it wasn’t a battle as much as a massacre of local people by the US government.

At the end of the day, we camp at Chadron State Park in Nebraska. We have had two full days of Speed Touring, and are now on our way towards Texas.

Over the years, we’ve seen some beautiful places during our travels. Some because of natural beauty, and others because of the local culture. The more miles we acquire, the more we come to appreciate not just the places, but the people we meet along the way.

I have a lot of special memories of people I met throughout my year on the road in 2015-16. From Judith, the “Swiss Girl” that rode her DRZ400 all the way from Alaska to Santiago, Chile (and is even leading all-women rides in Nepal), to the stranded local motorcyclist on the side of a dirt road in Colombia who allowed me to repair his flat tire, to Mama Margaret in Tanzania (and her daughter Patricia, who lives not far from us, and has since become our good friend), to the guy at a roadside cafe in Namibia who unwittingly gave me one of my best stories due to my own ignorance.

This trip has been a lot of the same kind of memories. I was convinced that people would be less inclined to approach a traveling couple than a solo traveler. In some instances, it seems that has held true. In fact, what I’ve found is that I can use Diana as a “carrot” to start conversations. This usually happens when she is left standing by the bike, in all her gear, while I go inside a store or other place. I think the attraction of a solo female traveler is strong, and whether it’s that people see her that way when I’m missing, or if they’re just hesitant because of my “Grumpy Duck” face, it seems to work. Often, I’m in the store paying for gas or filling our drink bottles, and over our helmet intercoms I hear her respond to someone who has approached. In other instances, people see us getting on the bike, and they can’t believe there is actually room for her amongst all the bags, so they stop to watch and often comment.

We’ve met a lot of great people in the past four months, even if it’s just a short conversation in a parking lot. From Jimmy in Lizella, Georgia, who recently bought a Versys 650 and wants to travel, to Andrew in East Texas; the Montana bicyclist in northern California on his way to San Francisco (and the Washington bicyclist in Astoria, Oregon on his way to San Diego); the “mailman” in Idaho (Tom and Erin will know who and what I am referring to here — a story left untold on these pages); our friend Dave’s wife AnneMarie in Alaska whom we met for the first time on this trip, and her son Joshua & daughter-in-law Kayla and their friends with whom we shared a dinner, and introduced us to new podcasts; Michael at the Tourist Park campground in Idaho Falls who saw us pull in and, believing that there were no spaces left, offered to share his (turns out there was one space left, so we took it, then shared stories with Michael), and later that same night, Kevin and Ron, who arrived even later on their bikes, and since there were no spaces left, we shared ours with them. And Tony Adams, the bicyclist pulling his house, who has traveled this way for 21 years and covered much of the US.

Then there are the homeowners we’ve met on our housesitting gigs. And too many more great people than we can mention here. Along the way, some people see the Texas license plate and are just curious about where we’ve been and where we are going. Others want to share their travel stories. Some want to learn more about how to travel like we do, so they invite us to dinner, or to their homes.

So while we will always make a list of places we want to see when we begin planning each leg of our journey, it’s really the people along the way that create the strongest impressions and memories. Because of them, we can’t wait to hit the road again.

September 23, 2021

This leg of our travels ended up being a bit shorter than we had originally intended. We arrived home about three weeks early. Well, not quite home…we have a housesitter taking care of our home and cats, and our original agreement was through October 15th. Therefore, we are housesitting for others in the Austin area for a few more weeks. So close…

The Numbers

Number of days on the road: 138
Total miles covered: 22,448
Number of states and provinces visited: 26
Average: 163 mi/day
Number of nights camped: 44
Number of nights free: 57
Number of nights in hotels: 37

Analysis and Lessons Learned

Our housesitting gigs helped defray the cost of hotel rooms, which we usually only took when it was raining, near freezing, or necessary due to some other commitment. We typically set a rule for ourselves that one hotel room a week is our limit; we exceeded that this trip.

Likewise, we broke our other “rules” on this trip as well:
Rule #1: Don’t travel more than 250 miles a day.
While we averaged 160 miles per day, due to all of the days we didn’t move (or spent on a ferry), we exceeded 250 miles on 33 different days.
Rule #2: Don’t travel more than 4 days a week.
This rule forces us to slow down, spend more time in places, and see more. It doesn’t mean we have to ride for four days and then sit somewhere for three. They don’t have to be consecutive days. While we actually did average out to only four days a week over the entire trip, we actually spent several weeks with only one day a week off, but then countered it with nearly a week off here and there.

We did do fairly well with Rule #3: Don’t ride at night. We only got caught on the road after dark twice. That’s still two too many though.

I had the advantage of spending a year on the road six years ago. This was Diana’s first long trip, and the longest she has ever been away from home, her kids and grandkids, and our cats. It was a good learning experience for both of us, in terms of learning her limits on daily mileage in the saddle, temperature limitations (both hot and cold), and how long she can go without beginning to experience burnout. These are all lessons we will take with us on the next leg, and we will strive to stick to our above rules as well.

Due to COVID, we spent the past four and a half months mostly in the US, with the exception of six days in Canada. Since we were in the States. we were more familiar with many of the places we went, and we ended up turning this ride into more of a “vacation” type trip instead of the nomad “traveler” lifestyle we seek. Also, having other commitments in the US created an artificial “end-date” that made it feel more like a vacation, and a bit more rushed. This is something we’ve already discussed between us, but will continue to work on. In order to fully experience other cultures and locales, we need to be able to immerse ourselves in them. This will require some adjustments to our travel style, and probably a few new “rules”.

Now it’s time to do some heavy duty cleaning and prep on the bike and gear, and begin charting our route for the Spring. Fingers crossed, we’ll finally be able to ship the bike to Europe by then and get rolling.

We’ve been home for ten days now. We had originally intended to travel to the northeastern US before returning home, but due to a commitment in Austin in early October we decided to head south early. Our amazing housesitter who took care of our home and cats for five and a half months was due to depart October 15th, so we spent the last three weeks house sitting for others in the Austin area. This was a win-win: it gave our sitter the full time we had originally agreed on, since she had another sit scheduled at the end of ours, and it gave us a few more reviews on TrustedHousesitters.com, which we hope to use to find house sits in Europe and Australia during our upcoming travels.

Speaking of which, we have already begun planning the next leg. Assuming the world continues to improve and open up over the next few months, we’ll adjust our European itinerary that we had hoped to begin this year, and move it forward, adding a few new stops we’ve gathered from people we met during this year’s travels. Our house sitter will return again for part of our travels, but we’ll begin the search for another sitter in a couple of months. All of our travel vaccinations are complete. We’re hoping AirCanada’s Fly and Ride bike-shipping program resumes in the Spring; if not, we’ll change our departure/export point.

In between, our friend Heike from Germany (whose Kawasaki has been stored here at our place for the past two years while we all sit out the pandemic) will hopefully be able to fly here over Christmas. We’re planning to ride together to Mexico, which will give her the chance to become familiar with the border crossing and some of the country before she sets off on her own at a later date.

So for now, it’s good to be home. But that wanderlust itch is always there, begging to be scratched.