Well, I guess blogging at night isn't working so well... I keep falling asleep! Yesterday's ride took me from Tucumcari, NM to Williams, AZ. It was a very pleasant day, cool and breezy, until after lunch.

First, these are photos of the old motel I stayed in Saturday night. The Caddy belongs to the owners. Even though the motel is "historic" (it's old), the rooms are very nice, very clean, and the owner, Cathy, is very nice and helpful.

I got a few shots of the landscape as I rode by at about 80 mph (so that's my excuse for lack of composition, fortunately the camera focuses pretty well even at that speed).

These two guys stayed at the same motel, they're from Orlando, FL and are riding a similar route to mine.

The scenery was beautiful. You can see forever out here!

Too bad the Mayflower truck couldn't go any faster to get out of my picture! I waited as long as I could. But it was a pretty rock formation anyway.

Pretty clouds over the hills, and they helped keep it cool in the morning.

This is Albuquerque - thought I was back in Atlanta and they painted Spaghetti Junction!

I had lunch in Gallup, NM, and there were some threatening clouds off in the distance. I decided to take a chance and skip the rain gear for a little while. About 25 miles down the road, the rain came. And boy, did it ever! I stopped and got my rain jacket on, but my jeans were already wet so I decided I didn't feel like putting on hot rain pants over them. That turned out to be a bit of a mistake. At first I thought I might get lucky and the worst of it would stay off to the south of the highway, since it looked like it was moving that direction. Not so much. I got caught in a torrential downpour for about 15-20 minutes, lightning, wind, the whole enchilada. There was nowhere to go, so I just had to put on my flashers and follow the flashers of the big truck in front of me. Visibility was pretty much nonexistent for a while. The wind was the scary part, I really had to work at keeping the bike on the road. Once I got out of the rain, the heat fired up with a vengeance, and by the time I got to Winslow 20 miles down the road, I was mostly dry, except for my hiney. But once off the bike, that dried pretty quickly as well.

So I pulled off in Winslow, Arizona (had to see "the corner" and get a photo!). I looked like a drowned rat, but what the heck.

I was having trouble seeing the image in the camera display due to the sun, so didn't realize I cut off the right side. Oh well...

I landed for the night in Williams, Arizona, a cute little historic town near the Grand Canyon. I got a room at the Comfort Inn away from the center of the action, so I called the "Tips for Trips" guy, and Taylor picked me up in a big golf cart and took me into the center of town. I forgot to get his picture :( .  I had a nice dinner on the patio of an Italian Bistro, and listened to Cal play some oldies. He was pretty good! The sky was pretty at dusk.

After wandering around and checking out the shops, I called Taylor back and got a lift back to the hotel, where I intended to update the blog. Well, we see how that went. I was falling asleep immediately with the computer on my lap, so I gave it up and slept like a baby.

120 miles this morning to Kingman, where I'll stay with Sherm and Pat, get rested and refreshed, wash some yucky riding clothes, and get ready for our trek across the desert in the morning :)