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NM Tour Of Honor SaddleSore Extreme

Texas T

LD Rider
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Location
Sun Lakes & Show Low, Arizona
First Name
Brian
As posted to the Tour Of Honor forum...


Riding in honor of my father Msgt Charles W Thorn USAF, Korea / Vietnam who passed when I was 15 years old. He was a rider so I am assuming that I just inherited the genes.
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My wife Brenda and I left Phoenix about 5 am on Friday and rode to El Paso. After checking in to our hotel we rode to the Border Patrol Museum to take a tour. While we were there she purchased a Border Patrol hat and we were going to get a shot of her wearing it next to the sign outside but we forgot. It was intended to send to her brother, a former BP agent. Oh well, the best of plans...
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While at the museum I really got a kick out of the two long wheelbase illegal alien import devices they had on display.
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After visiting the museum we headed for an early dinner at The State Line BBQ. Being part of The County Line chain I was expecting some fine, tasty stuff but I should have gone to Rudy's down the street instead. While it wasn't bad, it just wasn't what I remembered when I lived in Texas. :(

A quick soak in the hotel jacuzzi and then off to bed for some shut-eye.

Up at 0345, dressed, packed, loaded, and over to the gas station we went. With a start time of 05:28 in Anthony TX (about 200 yards from the NM border) we began our SS1K attempt. Our first stop was in Ft Stanton and I should have paid more attention to my own routing instead of listening to Ms. Garmin. She routed me all over creation and back, even taking me back into TX for a spell. But soon enough we reached the Fort and got our requisite photos.
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Next stop... Truth Or Consequences
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Now it was straight up I-25 to Albuquerque and the Nuke Science Museum. I wish we had had the time to tour this as it looked pretty interesting. It's only about a six hour ride away, so maybe we'll head back over once it starts to cool down again.
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From ABQ it was just a short ride up to Santa Fe but Ms Garmin once again threw me for a loop. She kept telling me to look on one side of the road, but the museum was on the other side. I wasted a good ten minutes just riding past the place. Twice. I have an M1 Carbine inherited from my stepdad who had obtained it from the widow of a good friend of his. The friend was a Bataan March survivor, so it was a bit special to come to this location.
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Now it was time to get cold and climb into the mountains (9000'+) near Angel Fire. The road from Rancho Taos to the next site near Angel Fire is a great moto ride, but being unfamiliar with it, I kept my speed down to a reasonable level, even more so when the wife called out "Deer!" I don't know if this is done all the time, or because Memorial Day was coming up, or because the day we rode this was Armed Forces Day, but the road leading toward the Vietnam Memorial was lined with flags for several miles in both directions.
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The weather was looking a little dicey, but it stayed north of us and we made our way southeast to the little town of Springer. I remembered being there two years ago on the return side of a BBG that I had ridden up to Montana. We even got gas at the same station. This was a nice little memorial for being such a small town.
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Now comes the tough part. We had one more stop to make, but it was five hours away, and little did I know it but we would be riding through 6000'-8000' elevations almost the entire time. And did I forget to mention that it was windy? It was. From the start at the border throughout the entire ride it was windy. And did I mention that at 6000'-8000' in New Mexico when it's windy it's also very cold? It was. This was not a fun portion to ride, but we slogged on through the night reaching the final site in Farmington. Since it was almost 1:30 in the morning the site was closed but I took photos that showed we were there and then I went back in the morning to get another shot for further documentation.
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After leaving the site we hit a gas station and got our final receipt at 01:33, and then off to the hotel for some much needed rest.

After some sleep, a decent breakfast, and getting another rider to sign off on my witness form we loaded up the bike and headed for Navajo Lake State Park, and then from there up to Ignacio, CO to get our final site of the weekend.
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Here is our route for the six days. I haven't computed the mileage yet, but it will be somewhere between 2500-3000.
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I now had four states and 16 sites under my belt (I've already done the 7 in Arizona) and it was time to relax so the next few days were spent in CO and UT touring various National Parks - Mesa Verde, Canyonlands, Arches, and Colorado Natl Monument. We toured the CO Natl Mon on Wednesday morning, and then because I was tired of unpacking/packing/unpacking/packing I decided to head for the house and we got home at 11:30 last night. Lots of sleep later I started pulling the photos and ride report together, and that brings us to this point.

Once again, a big thanks to Steve Brooks and the various state sponsors who spend so much of their time putting this together for us to enjoy and honor those who have gone before us. I look forward to next year's Tour, and who knows, maybe I'll still have time to pull out a few more sites this year.
 
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