Pagosa Springs: Long Days, Late Posts, and Leg Cramps

I'm bad. Here we are on another riding adventure and I haven't started the story of this adventure yet. And we left Fort Collins yesterday morning.

This year, Donna, Lin, and I have traveled to Pagosa Springs, Colorado. So, here is the story of the last two days.

Pagosa Springs is only about 350 miles from Fort Collins -- totally do-able in a car in one day, but not so much on a motorcycle (for us at least). We decided to make the trip in two days and made motel reservations in Salida -- a mere 200 miles from the Fort. Good thing, too.

We packed up the bikes, backed out of the drive, and pushed the starter buttons. Of course, my bike decided not to start. I had to jump-start her on my first ride this year, but she had started the night before when we rode from the garage where we park the bikes to Lin's house across town, so I wasn't expecting issues first thing in the morning. Surprise!

After push-starting the bike, we made our first stop the Honda shop for a new battery. Lin and I pulled the seat off and replaced the battery. Before we put the seat back together, we made sure the bike started. Success!

As I packed all my stuff back on the bike, we watched the interstate and the southbound lanes had stopped. Hmmm. Time to rethink our route. One of the employees came over to tell us that a motorcycle accident had occurred in the southbound lanes, hence the traffic backup. Knowing our way around the area, we quickly chose a route that would keep us off the highway until we were well past the accident.

We had originally decided to stop at Johnson's Corner for breakfast, but scrapped the idea when we had to make the detour to fix my bike. We thought about Mickey-D's, but circled back around and decided that we needed a good start to the trip -- so off to Johnson's Corner we rode.

After a good breakfast and three full tanks of gas, we were off to Pagosa Springs -- at the crack of noon, of course.

We watched traffic on the highway as we ate and gassed the bikes, the southbound lanes crawled along, while the northbound lanes zipped by at normal speeds. Change of plans, instead of the taking the interstate to Denver and US Hwy 285, we headed for US 287 to Denver and US Hwy 285. Either way, we were looking at slow-and-go traffic. Finally, we reached US Hwy 285 and pointed the bikes south.

The ride down US 285 was uneventful until we tried to find the motel where we had made reservations. The address was in Poncha Springs, it was really in Salida. The room was small and by the time we had found a place for dinner, unloaded our luggage, and settled in, there was barely space to walk in the room, let alone break out the computer and try to make a blog entry. Not only that, I'm not sure they had WiFi.

Last night was a long night of leg cramps. Donna suffers from muscle cramps, as does Lin, and my legs are trying to take lessons. No amount of water, Gatorade, or leg cramp pills helped. All Donna could do was walk them out and hope they wouldn't come back. She's had worse nights, but last night was bad enough.

This morning, we packed up and had to pick a few things up at Wally-World before heading out. We asked a local about a breakfast place and got an excellent recommendation -- the Patio Pancake Place in Salida. According to Lin, the pancakes are very good. I liked that I could get a 1/2 order of Eggs Benedict (I can't eat a full order any more and I hate to waste food).

Once again, it was the crack of noon before we were fully on the road and headed to Pagosa Springs. Today we only had to ride about 145 miles, but that ride included the ever-dreaded Wolf Creek Pass. This pass has never been kind to us. We have ridden it three or four times in the past 10 years, and it's been cold and/or rainy every time. Today was the best ride we've had over Wolf Creek.

Our delays caused us to miss all of the rain that fell throughout the last two days (who says delays can't be beneficial?), and possibly an accident. When we left South Fork, we made sure we were dressed for cooler conditions -- jacket liners, sweatshirts, heavy gloves, face protection. Sure enough, it was pretty chilly by the time we reached the summit. Five miles later, we were melting -- but we missed the rain (by minutes apparently, the road was still very wet).

At the first opportunity when we reached Pagosa Springs, we pulled into a parking area to pull off the extra clothes before we passed out from heat stroke. As luck would have it, the Malt Shoppe serviced the same parking lot, so we slid in out of the heat and sat down for an ice cream and a pit stop. Our timing (as usual) was impeccable. About 10 minutes after we walked in, the Sunday afternoon ice cream rush was on. By the time we walked out, the line was out the door and half-way down the sidewalk.

Fifteen minutes later, we were standing in line waiting to check in at the resort. Twenty minutes after that, we were sitting on the patio outside our home for the week looking at the San Juan Mountains.

After much-needed showers and an awesome meal, it's past time for a good night's sleep. Tomorrow, a week of new adventures begins.

((Correction 6/29: Our view is not of the Collegiate Peaks, they are the San Juan Mountains, my apologies for the misinformation.))