Sorry about no post last night, I fell asleep with my computer in my lap and my hands on the keys :) Must have been the wine I drank with the lady next door... I stopped for the night in Tumcumcari, New Mexico, at the Historic Route 66 Motel, after 685 miles. It was a great riding day, starting out in the rolling hills of western Arkansas. Not too far down the road, there was a sign for an overlook, so I pulled off. Off in the distance was Lake Dardanelle. It was still early and a bit hazy, but the view was nice.

A little farther down the road, I took this one, which kind of illustrates just how long this road is. I think you can double click on the photos to make them larger.

The day started at about 78 degrees and humid in Conway, AR. I thought I was in for another really hot day, but between Oklahoma City and Amarillo there was a fairly strong crosswind, and a bit of cloud cover, so it was actually quite pleasant most of the day. It only got to 93 degrees, and that was just for the last 100 miles or so from Amarillo to Tucumcari. That crosswind reminded me of South Dakota in 2007, fortunately it wasn't as strong yesterday as it was then; but for anyone following behind me, my profile looked something like the backslash on a computer keyboard ( \ ) as I leaned into the wind to keep from being blown off the road :-)

The landscape changed from rolling hills to flat and mostly brown through the northern part of Texas, so I didn't take many pictures. I've always been fascinated by these wind farms and these huge windmills. I saw one of the blades being transported once, and it took a whole flatbed trailer for just one blade! I'm told the towers are about 300 feet tall. I took this while riding, so that's kind of a crap shoot when taking pictures... it's kinda tough to adjust zoom, etc. on the fly. Anyway, there are hundreds of these in different areas, and I saw one farm still under construction, with dozens of windmills still in stages of assembly. Very interesting, I'm going to have to do some reading about how these things produce electricity and get it where it needs to go.

And the last photo is this big cross that was off in the distance. Kind of neat out in this landscape. It was huge! I thought I got another shot closer up, but it wasn't on the memory card, so I guess I blew that. I'm wearing gloves, so sometimes my fingers touch something they shouldn't and the camera ends up trying to connect to wifi. By the time I get that fixed, I've missed the shot. Oh well.

The lady with the wine next door has been here since last Tuesday. Her car broke down on the highway, and AAA towed it to a shop in town. It had overheated, and messed up the head gaskets. She apparently was on her way from Deming, NM to Missouri where her family lives for a two-week vacation. She'd had the car checked out by her shop of 7 years, and they said all was good, no problems. Six hours into her trip, whammo. It turns out the radiator was leaking, and they had dumped some JB Weld into it rather than telling her she needed a new radiator. Guess they didn't feel like working on that. Needless to say, she won't be doing business with them anymore.

We drank wine on the patio of the little espresso bar here at the hotel until dusk, when hundreds of tiny frogs come out and are hopping all over the place. If you know me at all, you know that drove me indoors!

Well, that's all for now. Time to get my act together and get back on the road. Only 650 more miles to Kingman, so a couple of easy days ahead. I'll probably try to do 500 today, so I can arrive early on Monday and spend the day with Sherm and Pat before we hit the road across the desert on Tuesday morning. More later :-)