Had a leisurely after­noon yes­ter­day with mark and the dogs. Got a pair of tires ordered, and it looks like they are going to the right place in texas, and will beat me there. yay!

Got a fairly early start this morn­ing, leav­ing Sun­Fire at about 7:30. Headed up to Warner Springs, then over the hills into the Coachella Val­ley (Palm springs, etc.)

Sat through a few stop­lights in Palm Desert and stopped for gas in Indio, and it felt way hot­ter than I was expect­ing. Started cool­ing off as I gained alti­tude going east, but upon drop­ping into Blythe, it got warmer. Stopped for lunch in Blythe, my ther­mome­ter read 93. Stopped just north of town to take a gan­der at the Intaglios there. It was a short gan­der, as wan­der­ing around on that exposed butte at 2:30 in the after­noon was a blaz­ing experience.

Even my GPS was ready to go

After that, it was pretty much a hot grind north­ward to King­man. I saw a bank ther­mome­ter in Parker, AZ that said 97. My tankbag ther­mome­ter never read higher than 95.8. That was hot enough, thanky­ou­very­much! It was cool to watch the scenery change from com­plete flat low desert to craggy, high desert here in king­man. I feel bet­ter now that i’ve had din­ner and a shower, and i now know that i can sur­vive, pretty com­fort­ably, a day of rid­ing in near 100 degree temps, on this bike, in this gear. That is confidence-inspiring. I think in a few days, I’ll be ready to tackle Tejas!