| Posted: 01 May 2006 at 8:58am | IP Logged
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3:00 A.M. and the alarm begins its obnoxious sounding and I am awakened to the day of days. This is the morning I have chosen to finally complete my Iron Butt run. Everything has been prepped, the Bike has fresh oil, I have spare money in the bank for gas, I have the time off work scheduled, and I have checked the weather and I have a perfectly clear window. Now all I have to do is get motivated to get out of bed this early in the morning. I drag out of bed and stretch to reach the alarm, my hand slaps the snooze button and back in bed I fall. Nine minutes later I repeat the same ritual and fall in for another nine minutes of sleep. At 3:20 I finally decide to get out of bed. I stumble through the shower, and throw on the clothes I had laying out. I grab my flip face helmet and ear plugs and head out to my bike. The morning is a little cool so I am wearing thermal underwear top and bottoms, jeans, a t-shirt, and of course my vest and colors. Due to the favorable weather conditions I have opted to travel light, no rain gear or spare clothes. My witness form had been filled out the evening before, and I was ready to hit the road. I smoke a quick cigarette and then head out to the pre-scouted gas station two miles away on the I-10 access road. When I get to the station I do a last minute gear check, make sure my ear plugs are comfortable, helmet is secured comfortably, and fill out my starting mileage on my log sheet. Then I slide my credit card in and top off the tank. As the receipt prints out I am not so thrilled to see that the time is almost 15 minutes slow so instead of the 4 AM starting time I had planned the receipt showed 3:45. I figure I should just roll with the punches and that it wouldn’t matter since I planned to finish at the same station. And on the road I go.
I am not a morning person and the thought of getting up at 3 something on a vacation day really was not that appealing to me, but the early morning start was necessary to avoid the morning traffic in Houston. The early start worked beautifully and as I cruised though Houston with not so much as a tap on the brakes I began to settle in for a long ride. As Houston made its way to my rear view mirrors and the urban sprawl dwindled down to empty fields I noticed an unplanned hurtle…. Fog. The Fog began to set in almost as soon as I had passed through Katy and had soon become a thick, wet soup in which I was surrounded. The visibility was somewhere between not so good and flat out bad as I began to second guess my obsession with completing an Iron butt ride. My jeans were quickly becoming soaked and by my first gas stop the only thing keeping me from being completely soaked was my thermals. As I filled up I tried to justify my decision to keep going in my head, and finally decided that the fog would eventually burn off. I was cold, wet, and not loving this ride so far.
When I finally got to San Antonio and my second gas stop the fog had finally began to lift and I was more or less feeling good about the ride. My timing through San Antonio could have been worse and I only hit minor morning traffic. As I put San Antonio behind me and the weather was finally cooperating with me, I realized an interesting tid bit about this ride. Usually my bike is a cheap for of therapy and I spend the time on trips mulling over the parts of my life that need some attention. This trip was different, I was just in the ride, in the zone, my mind was completely free of any distractions and I was almost in a Zen like state and the miles rolled past. This ride was completely and totally just about the ride. As I watched the terrain change I began to marvel at how I had started out on the coast just east of Houston and was now in the Hill country. This thought would come up several more times as the terrain changed to mountain and then to desert on this day.
The trip had become a steady cycle of 100 miles and a quick gas stop. My stops had become routine, with a quick fill up, Rest room break, and finally a cigarette before hitting the road again. In Ozona as I pulled in to the gas station I noticed a silver van that resembled the ones my company uses for out technicians. I work for the company that runs the lottery in Texas (and quite a few other states) as a supervisor for field services. We split the state in two halves and the northern supervisor is in charge of that part of the state. Since we back each other up when one is out on vacation testing their motorcycle endurance and such both of us supervisors are familiar with the technicians throughout the state. As I walked inside the store to make my rest room and hydration stop I noticed I was getting a funny look from the person behind the counter at the lottery machine. It took a moment to register, but the funny look was coming for one of our employees. A quick conversation ensued as I tried to explain why I would be 400 some odd miles away from home on a work day just to go for a ride. I would find out later that this technician blew up the phone lines as soon as I walked off to warn all the other technicians that I was out doing follow-ups.
As the miles kept adding up as I headed to El Paso My thoughts drifted to the scavenger hunt my club is currently having, one of the high point objectives is to get a picture on your bike outside the United States. I had planned this ride to qualify as a Texas SaddleSore and BunBurner with all the miles traveled remaining inside the Great state of Texas. I planned the gas stop and turn around point in El Paso to be a couple miles before downtown so that I could go off the route a bit and cross the border for a picture. As I passed the gas station I planned on filling-up at I knew it was only a couple mile past to the border. What I had not figured on was the traffic waiting to get in to Mexico. As I neared the border I realized the bulk of the traffic was avoiding the left hand lane so I worked my way over to it. The left lane turned out to be a U Turn lane that basically avoided the trip across the Mexican customs checkpoint. Score! I lucked out and made the U turn to discover there was no breakdown lane on the bridge. As I neared the plaque that marked the boundary line between the U.S. and Mexico I made a quick decision to go for the picture anyway. I pulled to the left of the lane and stopped with my bike half in the U.S. and half in Mexico. I waited for traffic to clear a bit and readied my camera, as I ran across two lanes of traffic to get the angle for the picture I decided I was insane. A quick picture and it was a sprint back to the bike before traffic caught up to me. The U.S. Border checkpoint was cursory and I passed through quickly.
I back tracked a couple miles to my official turn around point and filled up with gas and got the receipt. As I got back on the highway I realized that traffic in El Paso was much worse than I had anticipated. It felt like forever in the rush hour traffic, but after fighting it for 20 minutes or so I was past the 20 mph area and back out on the open road. Again the miles were adding up and my plan for a rest stop after completing the 1000 mile mark in Fort Stockton seemed like an excellent idea.
As dark caught me riding across the Texas desert I began to wonder what kind of lovely critters were lurking just out of the beam of my headlight conspiring to jump out in front of me. I entertained the thought of just continuing the ride on to Junction or further to make the follow-up days ride shorter, but as the night wore on Fort Stockton looked better and better. When I finally arrived in Fort Stockton I got a gas receipt and finished paperwork. I headed across the street to the super 8 or whatever it is and went to get a room. I talked the night desk clerk into filling out my witness form and as luck would have it the overnight clerk had just showed up also. I talked the overnight girl into filling out my witness sheet for in the morning, and then headed to the room. I was very hungry since I had only had a couple pieces of jerky on the ride thus far so I headed back out to find the local taco bell and found out it had closed 10 minutes before my arrival. Since I was cutting into my rest time I went back to the room, peeled off my boots and had a few more pieces of jerky before sleeping the sleep of the dead.
A mere six hours later the alarm began doing its thing and I contemplated rolling back over and being content with just a SaddleSore 1000 and a lot of sleep. 15 seconds later I was up and out of bed and a lot less sore than I had anticipated. I got dressed quickly and was back on the road in no time. As I dropped of the key with the overnight clerk she peeled herself off of her boyfriend long enough for me to thank her for filling out the witness sheet again and I was off to get gas across the street.
As I filled my tank and started doing the paperwork I noticed the mileage was the exact same as the final gas stop the night before. I knew I had ridden at least a mile in my quest for the Taco Bell the night before. My heart sank as I realized what had occurred. The Suzuki Volusia has a magnetic speed sensor attached to the front wheel, and the magnetic propeller is notorious for self destructing. Here I am 500 miles from home, no dealership in sight, time is ticking away, and I have no Speedometer or odometer. I figure I will have to just rely on gas receipts and the mileage verification, and hit the road.
At the next stop in Ozona the limited beef jerky I had eaten the day before was no longer cutting it. Luckily there was a little café next to the gas station and although everyone stopped and stared as I walked in like it was a bad movie the omelet was good and quick and I was back on road in no time. I was beginning to get the understanding why Iron Butt members refer to themselves as the world’s toughest riders. The soreness was beginning to set in and my bobber and lack of seat padding weren’t helping that much.
I quickly got back into the 100 mile and gas routine and even though I could push the bike another 60 miles or so per tank it had worked this far and I liked having the breaks. The miles kept rolling by and as I began getting closer and closer to Houston I realized I would be hitting right as afternoon traffic started getting bad. To be honest, looking back it may be a good thing the speedo was not functioning. I was riding my usual 5 or so mph over traffic flow, but at times that just seemed to be faster than I was used to. As I began to get into the Houston area the traffic started building, and soon I was dealing with full blow rush hour. As I watched the clock I still had over an hour to finish in less than 36 total hours, but I knew I still had a 35 minute trip left without traffic. Somehow I picked the correct lanes and found room to shift as necessary and I was soon past the worst of it and now just watching the miles and minutes tick away. After what seem like an eternity but in actuality only 40 minutes or so later I found myself back at my exit and arriving at the same store where this all began early the day before. I filled up and checked the receipt, 35 hours 40 minutes and from the map program I knew 1564 miles had passed since this all began.
It felt like a huge weight had been lifted from me, after 3 years of dreaming it; I had finally finished an Iron Butt ride. I headed back to my house two miles away and made it as far as the icehouse two blocks way. I walked in and the owner took a look at me and informed me I had a 1000 yard stare. I informed him it was more like a 1500 mile stare and told him a brief recap of my previous 36 hours. He ended up buying my beer, and after a cold one I went home.
I had figured I would have walked in the door and passed out, but for some reason I was wide awake when I got home. I got my ending witness form filled out, and I took a long hot shower and got on the computer for a couple hours sorting receipts and making copies of everything while I filled out my Iron Butt application. Finally after a couple hours it all caught up to me, and I slept.
A postscript report: I tore apart the speed sensor after my return and sure enough, the propeller was nothing but powder. I had also noticed some noise from my clutch area in any gear over 3rd, when I opened the clutch three of the four clutch spring bolts had loosened up and were about to fall out. All in all no major problems with the bike.
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Iron Butt.org General Discussion : Member Discussion area
Topic: A ride report a long time in the making
