Happy 2012!

Made it through the holiday season in one piece.  Hope everyone had a good time and got to spend some quality time with friends and/or family.

I received a text, this afternoon, from a friend in Austin.  He linked a blog site of a gentleman who is currently on a trip, headed south, on a 1999 BMW F650.  Under his "about" section he states this:

"My name is Taylor and I am going South. Into Mexico, past Costa Rica, through Colombia and hopefully much further beyond. Keep checking back often. I’ll be posting daily once my trip begins."

You can find his blog at http://www.headedsouth.net. I wish him the best of luck! and am extremely jealous that I can't be out there as well.  If you have some time, visit his site and post some encouragement his way.

As to my own travels, it's been lacking as of late.  Early December was a rather wet one here in Southern Arizona, and with the activities of the season I didn't get out as much as I wanted.  I did have an old college buddy come out for a visit, who had just taken the Motorcycle Safety Foundation class, and had gotten his license endorsed.  He asked if we'd be able to take a day trip somewhere and I wanted to give him a nice view, so I thought we'd try heading out to Kitt Peak.  I made this same trip back in March of last year for anyone wanting more information on the route.

I was able to talk my dad into loaning out his bike.  I believe his exact words were "Sure, I'm planning on getting a new bike anyway so who cares about the old one.  Now, if your friend had wanted to borrow my new bike guess again."  WooHoo! Bike in hand my buddy came over and we were ready to go.  Meet Matt, my friend, and most of the junk in my garage.

The ride there was pleasant.  We were lucky enough for warm weather on the way out.  We stopped for gas at a place called Three Points, southwest of Tucson.  My dad's bike has a max range of around 90 miles and the day's route was going to be about 120 miles total.  My wife snapped a quick photo at the stop.  You can just make out the mountains to the left side of the photo.  This was our destination for the day.  We still had about 20 miles to go before we reached the turnoff to start heading up.

Kitt Peak tops out at about ~6500 feet.  Halfway up the mountain I look up and notice what looks like snow...but no that can't be, can it?  It was.  As we kept going the temperature probably dropped into the 40's but we were keeping our speed low so it wasn't too unbearable.  Near the top there were two sections along the road that sat in the shade of the mountain all day, and you could tell there was still some frost there.  I was very concerned about losing traction, especially with the wife sitting on the back of the bike.  It did appear that sand had been put down, which probably helped, and we made it to the top without incident.

We quickly made our way into the visitors center to warm up and drink some coffee before venturing back outside.

I'm not going to post a lot of photos on the telescopes, as I covered that topic to death last year.   Needless to say we took our time and wandered around and checked out all the sites.

Ms. Bonnie

Mr. Bonnie

This view never gets old.

 Shot of the day.

 You've always got to be on the lookout for snow rattlers.  Just as you make out their long little sweaters, it's too late.

 I called for help, but was unable to get assistance from this odd looking couple.  I spent the next hour crawling my way out of the half inch snow drift.  It was life and death there for awhile.

 "Take my picture honey! I want to look like a bad motorcycle mama."

 Modern Art or Ancient Image?  We'll never find out.

That's pretty much it.  Sorry not a lot of cycle shots this time.  We headed back down thinking it would warm up.  But some clouds, and a cold front seemed to have moved through and it stayed pretty chilly all the way back home.  Matt seemed to have a good time, and I was glad the wife was able to make it.  I believe this was her longest road trip to date.

Until next time.