Eli: amarillo

I left Austin this morning and have been trying to outride the rain throughout the day. For the most part, the ride was really nice. I even got sunburned arms! I sunblocked my face but for some reason, I forgot my arms. I arranged to take a different route returning to Washington going through little parts of New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, Montana and Idaho.

When I lived in Texas before I went on a bike trip through the middle of Texas. There's a town called Brady that is the geographical center of Texas. I thought I'd pass through there as with Amarillo to see the Cadillac Ranch.

During one part of Texas, I kind of zoned out, taking in the scenery and forgot a gas stop. I saw some civilization and construction and just totally forgot to refill the tank. You can sure bet 30 miles later, I was wishing there was a gas station close by. I really thought I'd be pushing the bike... and dreading it - those hills would have been really tough to be pushing that metal chunk! The gauge was in the red and I had no idea where I was or how close the next town would be. Luckily, remembering my almost running out of gas ordeal last time on my trip to Texas, I slowed down from 80 to 60mph and just kept going, going, going, going. 15 miles later, there was a town named Post - out of nowhere, it just popped up. Then I realized I was further along the route than I thought with a record of 126 miles for the tank. Way cool!

In between the sun, the rain was present with dark clouds and lightning in the distance. It would rain but the sun would be out. Crazy! By the time, I would give in, pull over and put on my rain gear the rain would stop. After the 2nd time, I told myself I would just ride through the rain since I was about an hour to my destination. And that 3rd time, was the most rain I went through all day. After about 3 miles I grudgingly decided to pulled over. It got alittle cold so I applied my rain gear and after a mile it cleared up and was hot and sunny. With the suit on, it was like a sauna! But I rode on with only 30 miles to go. Whew!

I made it to Amarillo and took my rain suit off! Ahhhh. Even though it was hot out, it felt like air conditioning! So I'm spending the night in Amarillo, leaving in the morning for Denver.