Barstow KOA (3?)

It’s fine. Pull through site with hookups. That works.

We’re not actually sure how many times we’ve stayed here, because for some reason, I have not thought it worthwhile to dedicate a post to the Barstow KOA. But now I’m too set in my ways not to, so here you go.

Today was Long Slog Day, or LSD for short, but way more boring. Lots of miles of long, flat, and straight ahead road. We got a very early start on it, which helped prevent afternoon fatigue. All told, it was seven hours from start to stop, but it was a designated ‘make tracks’ day, so not unexpected.

Yep. It’s this times seven hours.

We spend a lot of time now looking in the rear view mirrors for signs of flaming wheels. We are also back in the habit of using our laser thermometer to check the wheels every time we stop. I keep calling it a “temperature gun” but I need to stop that. Sometimes we’ll be getting out of the car at a gas station and I’ll say to Richard, “Get the gun!” Not good.

Barstow is kind of a necessary evil seeing as it is so far to get to the next decent place to stay that has hookups. We were trying to work out how else we could do it on the way back and ended up thinking, “Meh, might as well just do Barstow.” So here we are and here we’ll be at the second to last night out. We head into much more scenic backdrops tomorrow. Well, after we get through Vegas, that is. Then pretty all the way.

Before we left, Richard did a thorough cleanup job on my pretty blue bike. I’m really bad at riding that bike and I have great guilt. I will really try to get my butt on it at least once this trip to make his hard work worthwhile. Meanwhile, his bike gets to ride inside. It’s a little tight on long trips when we add just a few extra things to the mix, like a spare set of beefier bike tires in case he wants to ride miles and miles on gravel. It has happened, so we carry them. I think Bruce2 would look really good with a roof box. Maybe that will be for our next big trip. Meanwhile, car storage Tetris.

Pretty blue bike, looking at me accusingly.

We pulled in around 3:30 and seeing as how there is not much to do (except buy shoes at outlets, apparently), we reorganized the car to make it easier to get the grill out. It is 93º here. Living the dream!

Total miles: 316.9, 17.6 mpg, 7 hours. Site… something, doesn’t matter. Electric hookups and pull through level site so we don’t have to unhitch.

San Luis Creek (4)

Finding Dory2!

Launch status: GO! We are on our way to find Dory2. We’ve got food for a week, 350 coffee pods, 75 shake packets, 130 after dinner mints, clothes until they get smelly, and a couple bags of housewarming items for Dory2.

We are anxious. I mean, that is normal for us, but we are especially so given several sad posts on Altoistes lately about crashes. And to top it off, our BFF Linda, who launched a couple days before we did, had a mishap where someone flagged her down to alert her that her trailer wheel was on fire. I mean. WHAT?? Literal flames were coming out of her wheel and she had to use the fire extinguisher. She was stranded for six hours before getting a tow and a diagnosis of a bad bearing maintenance job she’d gotten right before she left. We are super glad she and the dogs are ok, and relieved she was able to get back on the road the next day, but holy hell.

You just never know do you? Absolutely anything can happen out there and it will probably be the thing you never thought to worry about. So all we can do is just hit the road, packing an extra large supply of anxiety, and just keep swimming.

San Luis is becoming a dependable springboard stop for longer trips.

We should be in Durango, CO on day six and will pass through some gorgeous scenery on the way. Well, first we get to do the Barstow slog, but after that we will eventually get out of the flatlands. It’ll be a series of one night stands until we get there, but we get to relax and enjoy the road after that.

We’ve got a list of fix it jobs for the peeps in Durango for Lola Too that we hope not to add to en route. But if we do, oh well. Just keep swimming.

Onward!

Total miles: 105.1, 17.8 mpg, 3 hours 14 min with holiday weekend traffic. Site 15 hookups. Super windy. Won’t be dumping tomorrow cause don’t need to and hate this dump.