The Adventure Begins

I awoke to an eight degree morning after a fitful night's sleep.  It had snowed about six inches the night before and I had worked hard to clear it completely from our 170 foot steep driveway.  Would Dave be able to maneuver his trailer down the driveway or would I have to find a way to get my BMW F800GSA up the driveway for loading?  That would be the last step before departure on our long anticipated and extensively planned trip to the Baja Penninsula.  We would ride 2000 miles round trip from the border at Mexicali to Cabo San Lucas and back over three weeks.

Joyce had already helped manage my angst and fretting making sure I was prepared and packed.  This morning she harvested Swiss Chard from our greenhouse and sautéed it to include it with delicious scrambled eggs and toast as we awaited Dave's arrival.  He skillfully maneuvered the trailer down to my waiting bike and it was easily loaded.  My gear was loaded into the jeep and Joyce gave us a fond farewell as we set off into the crisp but now sunny morning.

Over the next nine hours we traveled mostly clear roads through South Park, Salida, Pagosa Springs, Durango, Cortez and finally to Gallup, NM where we are spending the night.  The recent snows blanketed much of the route until entering New Mexico with temperatures as cold as -9 degrees in parts of South Park.  Because of the more extreme cold our bikes exposed on the trailer took on a thick brown icy patina from the splash of the rear tires of the jeep.