After seeing how much Peter enjoyed his last moto-trip to Seattle, it was time to see if I might enjoy extended rides, too. Peter planned a short trip to Death Valley national park. Four days, about 1,225 miles. We packed for riding weather ranging from mid 50's (through mountain passes) to the low 100's (a "nice" Death Valley day).

We left Sunday morning early to avoid the late afternoon winds. Hwy. 152, Pacheco Pass, and Hwy. 5 south towards Bakersfield were calm and clear. I concentrated on riding in tandem with Peter, and stopped worrying about wind.

We had dinner and a sleepover in Bakersfield, a city I generally avoided when I lived in southern California. Bakersfield was just another hot boring place we would pass through in the family car with the windows rolled up and the AC on full. Now, riding on the city streets, I wondered about the name of the city.

Bakersfield was settled in 1858 by a handful of families who had trekked northward through the El Tejon Pass seeking home sites rather than gold. The town was named by an early settler, Colonel Thomas Baker, who invited the weary travelers through the valley to rest overnight. These travelers would plan in advance to meet and rest in "Colonel Baker's field."

Peter planned an easy first day not knowing what kind of shape I'd be in after a couple hours on Hwy. 5. Turns out I could have put in another couple of riding hours, but had it been windy on the highway that day, I would have been exhausted.

Next morning, we headed east on Hwy. 58 towards Tehachapi. Just as we cleared the pass, I saw a coyote spring from the side of the highway, stretched out in a straight line from its nose to the tip of its tail, moving like an arrow across four lanes of high-speed traffic. The coyote's legs were a blur. It crossed in front of Peter, me and a car going in one direction, across a narrow dirt median, and continued in front of an oncoming semi-truck going in the other direction. I had no idea coyotes could move that fast.

After breakfast at a great "mom and pop" cafe in Tehachapi, we got back on 58 east headed into Mojave. I knew we had another pass to cross, but I wasn't expecting to see the windmills lining the tops of the surrounding hills. I studied the blades, they weren't moving very fast at all. Goody.

We turned north on Hwy. 14, passing Cantil, Red Rock Canyon State Park, and headed east on Hwy. 178 through Inyokern and Ridgecrest. During this leg of the trip I realized that the bike may be able to go 150 or so miles between pit stops, but my bladder has about a 100 mile limit, and, given how much water I was drinking, even 100 miles was pushing it.

We took the Wildrose turnoff from 178 to make the ascent on the Emigrant Pass trail. This trail was a bit of a challenge. The smooth high tarmac gave way to rough surface trail. The trail devolved to washout, the lacy remains of tarmac with the granite gravel base layer showing through. Peter's bike has a belly pan. Mine does not, the CS has exposed hoses on its undercarriage. I went very slowly, able to enjoy the wildflowers that were in their full glory.

We reached a fork in the road. The trail surface was mostly gravel by now. We could have hiked the trail faster than I was willing to ride it. The left fork headed towards Highway 190 which would take us on a paved twisty road to Stovepipe Wells, our lunch destination. The right fork would take us on a gravel path to the charcoal kilns site. I watched Peter consider the options. My thumb hovered over my horn button. His body was turned to the right, his bike was turned to the left. His bike led us out. My thumb returned to its wrapped position around the handgrip. We rode about twenty minutes of wonderful twisty turns on smooth tarmac surrounded by wildflowers and clear blue skies.

At 3000', the air temperature was moderate. As we descended into the valley the temperature rose steadily into the high 90s. We parked the bikes in the shade of a huge tree in back of the little store at Stovepipe Wells. Lunch consisted of pre-packaged lunch meat (salt), a pickle (salt), peanuts (more salt), some bottled juice and a lot of water. Two guests of the Stovepipe Wells hotel joined us on the benchs in front of the store. They were brothers-in-law and fellow riders, staying for the week. Martin was a good storyteller, his recounting of his visit to the local ghost town Rhyolite gave me the shivers even though it was broad daylight. After our electrolyte levels had returned to normal, we rode the remaining 26 miles to the Furnace Creek Ranch where we would spend the next day and half.

In general our strategy was to get up before sunrise and be on the road as the sun crested over the Amargosa Range. This gave us about six hours of exploration time before the heat would wipe us out. Peter wanted to visit Titus Canyon, a deep, narrow gorge that cuts into the steep face of the Grapevine Mountains. Peter has run through the canyon in a marathon. The trail to canyon was worse than washout. We tried it anyway and gave up (came to our senses). What we needed was dirt bikes with knobby tires. I managed to dig my rear-wheel into the dirt trying to turn the bike around. Peter had to come over and push me out. We headed towards Ubehebe Crater and Scotty's castle instead.

We passed the turnoff to the Racetrack. The surface of the turnoff was just like the "road" to Titus Canyon. We'll go back when we have a 4-wheeled vehicle.

We arrived at Ubehebe Crater just as a geologist was starting her presentation to two cargo vans full of college student geologists from Tennessee. We edged closer and learned that the crater was created around two thousand years ago (a relative youngster), when magma found a fault line and thus an escape route to the earth's surface. The magma worked its way through the fault-weakened rock where it met water-soaked bedrock and alluvial fan sediments. In an instant, water flashed to steam. A sudden, violent release of steam-powered energy blasted away the confining rock above. A dense, ground-hugging cloud of rocky debris surged out from the base at up to 100 miles/hour, decimating the landscape. The largest of these eruptions produced Ubehebe Crater, over a half a mile wide and 770 feet deep. There are "bombs", volcanic rock boulders, all around the area near the site of the explosion.

We would have liked to hike around the crater, but neither of us thought to bring our walking shoes, and hiking in motorcycle boots is not a good idea. We headed to Scotty's Castle which thank goodness, had public toilets. The walking tour didn't start until 9am so Peter and I walked slowly up the small hill to where Scotty is buried. Next to Scotty's grave is a smaller one marked "Windy". The second grave was for his dog, not his wife, as some people assume.

There are two tours, the house tour which is done as "living history" with a docent wearing period garb, and an engineering tour which is only available in the summer and fall. The house tour is interesting, but the one I want to go on is the engineering tour. "Death Valley Ranch", the name carved into the beam above the front door of what is commonly known as Scotty's Castle, was designed in the mid 1920's to be self-sustaining. It had solar heating for water, an air conditioning system of tunnels below the house, and ran lights and a freezer using direct current from a stream-powered Pelton wheel. Yes, that's "stream", not "steam". Cooking was done using "rock gas", precursor of propane. Did I mention that this site has flush toilets for the tourists? And the snack bar is air-conditioned?

Peter and I decided to take the roundabout route back to Furnace Creek towards Nevada on 267, southeast on 95 to Beatty for gas and something to drink, west on 374, then south on 190 to Furnace Creek. Passing trucks does not bother me any more. At 12:30 p.m. the ambient air temperature was in the high 90's. There are two sweepers (nice easy wide turns) coming into Furnace Creek. Both are marked 45 mph. I had been riding pretty well all morning but when I hit the first sweeper I was caught off guard and had to work hard to keep the bike under control. The second sweeper also seemed to come out of nowhere. Despite drinking plenty of water, I was dehydrated, overheated, and pretty much dogmeat stuffed into an airflow jacket and leather pants, sitting on top of a motorcycle. We collapsed in our air-conditioned room, able to strip off the riding gear but too tired to wash the crusty sweat off our bodies. I slept for three hours without moving.

Ten or so years ago, Peter and I visited Death Valley and stayed at Furnance Creek Ranch. The facility was owned by the Fred Harvey company and had the worst food I have ever eaten in a commercial establishment. This time we brought enough protien bars and dried fruit to live on for three days if necessary. Both Furnace Creek and Stovepipe Wells are now part of Xanterra Parks & Resorts, the largest park & resort management company in the county. I mention Xanterra because they are making a concerted effort to make the facilities self-sustaining and reduce the environment impact of tourism on Death Valley National Park. Dinner was more than acceptable, it was pretty good.

The next morning we got up before dawn. Heading towards the Panamint mountain range as the sun came up, I watched sunrise over the Amargosa range in my rearview mirror. The approach to the Panamints on 190 is a roller coaster. Peter is used to it from previous trips. I actually got motion sick from a couple of sudden dips in the already undulating road. We were riding at pretty good but safe pace, this is not an environment where you want to take chances.

I may have lucked out on the wind at the start of the trip, but it was one of those "pay now or pay later" deals, and it was pay up time. Coming towards the Argus Range on 178, the only way to ride a straight line was to keep the bike at a 10 degree lean angle, and ride into the wind. This may be easy for leatherneck riders, but this city bike rider was learning a new skill on the fly, and under duress. When we approached the Tehachapi pass, I saw windmill hill and my heart sank, just like in the movies. Those blades looked like they warming up to beat egg whites for meringue. I started experiencing fairing-envy. Peter's VFR has that nice big wind-cutting fairing. My CS is just about naked by comparison.

Coming out of the pass, I was downright happy when the signs for Bakersfield started appearing. We stopped somewhere in Bakersfield for a rest and something to drink. The last leg of the trip was technically easy, but this was my first attempt to ride about 500 miles in one day. We still had Hwy. 5 and the dreaded Pacheco Pass to go and my butt was getting sore.

We took Hwy. 5 into two sections. The first section, Peter cruised at 90mph. He could have had a leg up and been reading a newspaper. I stayed right next to him, but it wasn't as easy as he made it look. We stopped at the Harris Ranch exit, which has a Subway (made to order sandwich shop), and shared a spinach salad which was a lot better than I was expecting it to be. As we were leaving, a fellow came over and asked us which way we were riding. He warned us that a highway patrol helicopter was surveying the traffic and radioing down the easy pickin's to the CHPs. Peter was a good boy and kept us just below 80 mph until we hit Pacheco Pass. The pass was not as bad as I expected. Either I had acclimated to the wind, or it had died down. The remaining slog up 101 in rush hour traffic was actually a blessing. I was done with passing trucks for a while.

This experimental trip was a smashing success because Peter and I discovered that we ride very well together. I admit that I'm thinking more about a different bike for future trips, but until Silicon Valley's economy picks up, I'm in no hurry to replace the CS. Next likely long ride will be to Santa Fe, New Mexico in a couple months.