"The willing, Destiny guides them; the unwilling, Destiny drags them." ~Seneca
Greetings all, taking a day off in Del Norte, staging for the big
climb up to Indiana Pass (11910 ft) tomorrow. A cold front rolled
through bringing rain and snow to the high elevations last night and
into today..probably tonight as well. Should be smoother sailing
tomorrow.
Anyway, trip from Salida was okay, negotiating the WSW, three over 10K
plus pass swing into this area. Weather cooperated and there were no
surprises other than some coyotes yelping away too close to me at
night. Please have some respect guys, I really need my sleep.
BTW, I ran into fellow GDMBR riders Artie and Sherry from Georgia
back in Salida...they left out a few hours ahead of me. Great folks,
they are motoring ahead at a very admirable pace. Also. thanks again
to Sandy for hooking me up in Salida as well. He brought my mail, and
of course, in it was a jury duty summons...yeah, Nice. I was luckily
able to get that deferred by phone today. It was also a treat to see
Gunner (the dog.) Most of my dog experience over the past month or so
has been of the 'chasing Chris down the road' variety.
Scenery through this area has been predictably phenomenal...the dawn
of the fall foliage change is readily apparent and will intensify as I
progress into the high elevations of northern New Mexico in the coming
week. Overnight temps are getting cold and frost is more likely than
not in areas over 9000 ft. The cold weather gear I have been lugging
over the last 2000 miles is getting some good use!
Otherwise, all is well...physically, mentally, electrically,
synergistically, and mechanically. I have completed several
audiobooks along the way, among the best: "Lone Survivor" by Navy
SEAL Marcus Luttrell (God bless our troops!) and "The Long Walk" by
Slavomir Rawicz. Both written by or about cats a lot tougher than I'll
ever be. Another really good read was "Rant" by my fav author Chuck
Palahnuik. I still have about six more books to go.
Thanks to all for the continued support and greetings to the class of
school children back in hometown Texas who have taken my trip on as a
Social Studies/Writing project. Until I found out about Melissa's
class, I wasn't sure if I had communicated my trip goals and intents
effectively...but I have been pleasantly surprised otherwise, again.
Due to isolated areas ahead, probably a long time before next post,
until then... "So it goes." (~Kurt Vonnegut, "Cat's Cradle")
Mileage to date: 2057.31
