Our plan of getting up early to beat the heat has worked pretty well, the days we are travelling we get it all done by 1pm.
We started this week with a few days riding through the Smoky Mountains and staying in small places along the way it has been a time of meeting nice people and travelling through pretty scenery, most of the time on very quiet roads. One of the highlights was highway 129 (known as the Dragons Tail). Very bendy, we were told it has 300 bends in 29 miles although we didn't count!
A view from the Dragons Tail, rather a misty shot as we actually had rain that day. It was lovely warm rain!
From the scrape marks on the road and the odd memorial on some of the bends it is clear that sometimes the Dragon gets the better of some of the less fortunate riders who try to tame it!
Hardly a motel really, just some rooms on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere! The owner told us to expect more bikers to turn up late at night but it was just us and some very vocal crickets (a bit spooky actually).
The joy of hand washing your underwear in shower gel!
From the Smokys we headed into Nashville (Yee-ha). We did all the tourist stuff and visited the Country Music Hall of Fame and RCA studio B (Elvis recorded half of his records here) and many country artists recorded here from the 1950's onwards. This was the studio and piano that Elvis used to record 'Are You Lonesome Tonight'. Supposedly this piano was one of the few things that Elvis could not buy as the Studio refused all his offers to buy it. Even though it is no longer a working studio it had a real atmosphere and was great to visit.
The Ryman Auditorium is a live music venue and used to be the home of the Grand Ole Opry radio show. It was moved to a bigger venue out of town but this was flooded earlier this year so the show is back at the old venue. Although we stuck out a bit in our grubby shorts and sensible sandals we went along and sat with the glamorous tanned, cowboy hatted and booted audience!
The show was fun (if rather cheesy) but like most broadcasts in the US interrupted by 'adverts from the sponsor' every few minutes!
Next stop for the McCombs is McComb in Mississippi!
We were surprised just how much you could smell the Texas oilfields, there were mile after mile of wells nodding away. At one point there was a large windfarm on the opposite side of the road to the wells, good to see the Texans are looking at alternative energy! With the amount of sky and sun they have they could generate heaps of power with solar panels.
The grave of Buddy Holly in his home town of Lubbock, Texas, it was very modest. Note the spelling of Holley, the change in his stage name came about because of a spelling error in a recording contract he signed
There was also an interesting museum, he certainly wrote and recorded a huge amount of material considering he died at 22.
We were in Lubbock for 3 days (2 longer than we planned) as a couple of miles before we arrived John suspected we had a rear puncture but when we pulled over there was a large bulge in the tyre wall. As we have mentioned before the temperatures we had been travelling in were causing pretty bad cracking and the tyre had now delaminated. By sticking a knife in the tyre and getting it back to a normal shape we were able to limp into Lubbock at 30 miles an hour. We ordered a new tyre through the local Yamaha dealer and when it arrived we went along with shower gel from the hotel and the tools John had packed to change a tyre and expected to have to do the job outside the dealers premises.
As it turned out the team at Watts Yamaha could not have been more helpful, John was able to use their workshop facilites to do the job. So no struggling to get the old tyre off and the new one on outside in the heat! They were fantastic guys, we highly recommend them. A big thank you from us to Ken Matlock, Dennis, Tom, Bobby, Matt and Drew.
An example of how big everything in Texas is, this train had 4 engines and was 2 miles long!
Our first stop in New Mexico was an overnight stop in a very small place called Fort Sumner, we stayed at the Billy the Kid County Motel and visited the Billy the Kid museum and Billy the Kid's grave. No prizes for guessing what the place is famous for.
By chance we arrived in the beautiful town of Sante Fe on their busiest weekend of the year when a huge Indian market takes place. Way too many shopping opportunities, it was torture! We camped outside the town and spent a great evening chatting and drinking beer with Ralph and Lisa. John found a kindred spirit in Ralph, another man who needs to know how things work, has good taste in music and rides motorcycles.
Recuerdo de le Mision in Abiquiu, this tiny little village is famous as the final home of American artist Georgia O'Keefe. A lot of artists love this part of New Mexico for the quality of the natural light.
FOR SALE some modernisation required, quiet neighbourhood.
A view of the wild west but no cowboys or Indians, not a bad photo as it was taken from the bike at about 50 mph.
The Rio Grande Gorge Bridge, this picture does not do it justice it's another one of those places you have to go yourself!
We had a great chat with this guy, his name is Jim Morrison (yes really) he has clocked up over 125,000 miles on trips all round the US on his Heritage Soft Tail Harley. The location was the Old Timer's cafe in Red River a quaint little ski resort that was on a route known as the Enchanted Circle, 80 plus miles of beautiful mountain passes around Taos NM. The highest elevation we rode at was 9820 feet, it' was lovely to ride in the cooler mountain air after the oven that is Texas!
