Rest Day (Mon, 25 Feb)

I spent the day in Alamogordo, NM today.  Resting up for 4 challenging stages upcoming and also spending time outside of Holloman, AFB (about 7 miles west of Alamogordo).  Below are pictures and video from the visit.  While I was once in the USAF and had done some work at Holloman, given that I’m now a nobody as far as the USAF is concerned (!), I couldn’t go onto the base but I was able to hang out just outside of the base fence near the end of the runway.  I was close enough to the planes landing, that I could smell the JP-8 jet fuel as the jets flew over – brings back fond memories…

What I saw: a) F-22 Raptors (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F-22 ), b) MQ-1 Predator drones (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MQ-1_Predator ) and c) German Tornados, which train here at Holoman (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panavia_Tornado ).

In the videos below, click to open and try to expand to a large size – the video should come through fairly well (although each of the files are compressed to upload to the site).

Also, to update yesterday - I noticed this morning I had a slow deflating flat tire from the ride on Sunday, so - Flat Tire #3 (again from a small metal wire - likely from a truck re-tread blowout - I'm beginning to dread those).

Sierra Blanca Peak in the Lincoln National Forest (I'll be riding up that way tomorrow).

Sign along US Hwy 70 as you enter the White Sands Missile Range.

Lincoln National Forest

F-22 Raptors landing.

German Air Force Tornados

Landscape outside of Holloman AFB, along US Hwy 70.

Two F-22's doing a flyover (note how quiet they are compared to the Tornado's below).

F-22 landing.

Two F-22s landing.

MQ-1 Predator landing (these are so quiet I didn't hear it until it was nearly on top of me).

Flyover of a Tornado, right over an MQ-1 landing - cool.

Videos of Tornados (I was right under them on their approach to the runway!).

Two Tornados doing a flyover of the runway and then landing.

Day 12 (Sun, 24 Feb)

Awesome riding and scenery day today!!  Lot’s of pictures below.  This time I’ve included comments spread throughout the pictures, since I’ve included more picts than in prior posts.

I rode from Las Cruces, NM to Alamogordo, NM today.  The ride was 77 miles with 3,000 feet of climbing.  The 3^rd solid mountain stage of the trip.  I had one long (about 15 miles) climb out of Las Cruces over the Organ and San Andres Mountains and then the remainder of the ride was pretty flat.  Once out of Las Cruces the ride was entirely on US Hwy 70 (my old friend in AZ and NM).   The wind was light in the morning and then picked up in the afternoon – by the time I reached the summit at in the Organ Mtns, the wind was easily 20 mph+ and I think at many points for the rest of the afternoon it was around 30 mph.  Many times I was riding with a cross wind and at those wind speeds I had plenty of opportunity to practice tilting my bike left and into the wind to stay upright going over and down the mountain pass and then across the plains into Alamogordo.   The day was primarily overcast and while it ended up being dry for me, there was significant rain and snow in the surrounding mountains during the day…  Temperatures throughout the day were cooler – primarily in the 40s.

Highlights of the day included seeing: a) the Organ and San Andres Mountains, b) the White Sands Missile Range, which is the largest military installation in the US (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Sands_Missile_Range) with a ton of our Aerospace History embedded in its work over the past 60+ yrs, c) the White Sands National Monument (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Sands_National_Monument), d) Holloman Air Force Base where I did some work when I was in the USAF – the F-117 stealth fighters were once stationed here before they were retired a few yrs ago and now the F-22 stealth fighter is stationed at Holloman! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holloman_Air_Force_Base and http://www.holloman.af.mil/library/factsheets/index.asp ). 

Finally, while I was at the White Sands Visitor Center, I had a very special conversation with a family from North Carolina.  They are doing a circuit throughout all 48 CONUS states in their RV, and are sponsoring numerous activities related to donating books to children in need.  A great family and a great cause – I truly enjoyed meeting them and hearing a bit about their journey.  Their website is here: http://gumptrip.com.  A cool thing you can do at this National Park is rent sleds and slide down the sand dunes, and they were on their way to do that!

Organ Mountains as I left Las Cruces.

NASA museum dedicated to NASA activities at White Sands (http://www.nasa.gov/centers/wstf/about/index.html):

Still climbing up the mountain pass in Organ Mountains (and looking for a reason to take a 1 minute break...)

 Still climbing...  This shot looking back towards Las Cruces.

Made it to the top.  Very windy, but I put my coat back on before the 2k ft descent.

Monument dedicated to US Army missile achievements at White Sands.

Basically this entire valley is the White Sands Missile Range, so nice that they let you know that you're going into an active test area!

That is the main facility for White Sands Missile Range, just on the East side of the Organ Mountains.

East side of the Organ Mountains - snow...

White Sands, sand, starting to encroach on US Hwy 70.

All of the following pictures are from within the White Sands National Monument (I did about a 10 mile loop through the park).  Lot's of white, blowing sand today.  The Park Ranger at the entrance asked me why I was out riding my bike on such a miserably windy day!

Updated Map of the trip!!

Short video I took in the national park (click on it to open/play it).

Day 11 (Sat, 23 Feb)

I noticed today that we’re approaching 1,000 views on the blog site – I’m glad there are so many people following the trip!!  Thank you.

I rode from Deming, NM to Las Cruces, NM today.  The ride was 60 miles and pretty flat.  The ride started out on old country roads out of Deming, then was 11 miles on I-10 and finished up with some interstate frontage roads and a very cool downhill descent (500 ft in <2 miles) into Las Cruces.   The wind was light in the morning and then picked up in the afternoon – about 10 mph and mainly at my back – good overall speed of 17.2 mph (but not as great as yesterday!).   This was my 10^th day of Perfect Sun out of 11 riding days so far – yes, I am definitely getting spoiled and “look forward” to the thunderstorms I’ll be able to ride in later on…  Temperatures throughout the day were moderate – primarily in the 50s.

I had a couple of dogs come out to greet and chase me but they stood little chance of catching me when I was able to easily get above 20 mph.  Still, a bit of an adrenaline rush when you see them coming…

No flat tires today!

As an aside, I spoke with a few hunters at the hotel this morning who were also having breakfast – seems that Elk and Bighorn Sheep are popular around here with the hunters.

In the pictures below: 1) Pictures 1-5 are of the very dry landscape (see more info below) in this part of the world along with small mountains north and south of I-10 and a train track I’ve been following for the past couple of days; Picture 5 the panorama of the road and train track is kind of cool, 2) Pictures 6-8 are various views of the Organ Mountains (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Organ_mountains ) which are just East of Las Cruces, peak at about 9,000 ft AND I’ll have the honor of riding over them tomorrow (!).

The last picture (#9) deserves a couple of sentences I think.  I was cruising into Las Cruces near the end of the ride and started up and over an overpass.  I happened to look right to see what I was passing over and saw yet another dry river bed (I think I saw about 40 in AZ – all the rivers are dry here!) and then I just happened to glance at the sign and saw what it said.  The Rio Grande, was dry here?!?  Wow.  I stopped, backed up and couldn’t believe it.  This river is supposed to start way North of here in Colorado.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rio_Grande.  Pretty amazing!  There were a father and his son down in the riverbed taking a hike.  DRY around here…

Keep checking in - couple of mountain stages coming up!!