FJRBandit
Well-known member
El Durango Cinco - May 2016
The motley crew you see above assembled in Durango, CO back at the end of May 2016 for a few days to terrorize the good citizens of New Mexico and Colorado. While this story recaps some of the fun and frivolity of the adventure, the names have been changed to protect the guilty. Pictured from left to right; FJRBandit, Cornbread, FJRBritbob, Hondapotamus and LA2wheeler. These, mis amigos, are the banditos that comprised El Durango Cinco.
The idea for this ride was borne in the Ozarks one year earlier while Britbob, Cornbread and I (fjrbandit) were in the midst of Dixie Shunpikin’ 2015. Cornbread lives in central Arkansas and Britbob, since I’m sure you wouldn’t have guessed, is from the U.K. He and his wife make it a point to visit the U.S. every other year, whilst Britbob makes the trip solo on the opposite years and takes a 10 day or so motorcycle tour somewhere that he “fancies” visiting. Dixie Shunpikin’ happened to be his solo trip in 2015 and for 2016 he and his lovely bride planned to return to the U.S. to celebrate their 30th Anniversary. Being the consummate planner, the old chap had already laid his itinerary down for the 2016 visit. While sipping some sour mash one evening, on the banks of the Jacks Fork of the Current River in Eminence, Missouri the plan for El Durango Cinco was hatched.
Britbob and his wife would be coming to the U.S. in mid-May and planned to spend a few in the Keys. They would then fly to El Paso, TX, rent a car and head to a dude ranch in the Gila National Forrest, deep in the back country of southwest New Mexico and spend a week there. Well, Britbob has managed to convince Mrs. Britbob that she would prefer to ride horses for a few days without him when they make these trips, which allows him to go ride steel horses for a few days. So on this trip he planned to slip away from the dude ranch for four days, rent a bike in Albuquerque and ride in Colorado and New Mexico before returning to Gila N.F. to retrieve his bride and head back across the pond.
Cornbread and I, being the opportunist we are, saw an opportunity to let the sails out a bit and do what we referred to as a “rocket ride” across the Plains and join Britbob on his four day jaunt through NM and CO. Britbob thought it to be a magnificent idea and thus the planning was on!
Since we had a year before the ride was to take place we had plenty of time to discuss options and make the necessary arrangements. One thing led to another and Cornbread and I decided that, hell, if we are riding 2,000 plus miles round trip out and back we might as well stay longer than four days. So we decided to make a 10 day ride out of it ourselves and we would join up with Britbob for the four days he planned to ride. His only requests were that we include the Million Dollar Highway and CO 141 through the Escalante Staircase through Uravan and Gateway. CO 141 was HIGH on my priority list as well because I had to skip it due to time constraints last year on my Western Adventure when I followed Rush from KC to Denver to Calgary. But that’s another story you can read at this link. Other than those two places, Britbob wanted to ride through Taos and Red River, NM, which was perfect because that would be our gateway in and out of the Rockies. He left the remainder of the planning up to me. I scratched out an outline, presented it to both he and Cornbread and with a little tweaking we had our plan.
In the meantime I had been talking with a good friend that lives in Huntsville, AL about riding with us. He’s an avid motocross guy, still rides competitively at age 51 and has a Goldwing as his chick cruiser, aka Hondapotamus. I had also mentioned this ride to my good friend from the frjforum, LA2wheeler, who lives in southern Arkansas. If one or both of these guys could join us we’d have a blast and still have a manageable size group. By mid-February we had commitments from both, Hondapotamus and LA2wheeler. So now there would be four of us doing the rocket ride across the Plains and then meeting up with Britbob mid-stream in New Mexico.
Our plan was for Hondapotamus to ride down from Huntsville on Thursday evening, May 19th, meet me in Birmingham and then we were to depart on Friday, May 20th. We would meet LA2wheeler somewhere near Shreveport mid-day and then ride into the Dallas area for the evening. Then we would head to Amarillo on Saturday, meet Cornbread, and the four of us take it all the way to Durango on Sunday, the 22nd. As I laid out our plan I decided to make Durango our base camp for four of the six days we would be in the Rockies. This put us right in the heart of the action and only a half days ride down to meet Britbob on Wednesday before returning to Durango that evening. It also allowed us to ride unencumbered by our gear for three full days. It’s very rare that I don’t have to pack every morning when on a long road trip and drag my gear into a different hotel each night. This I found to be a luxury and everyone else agreed that plan made a lot of sense. So Durango it was, from Sunday night through Thursday morning. On Thursday we would strike out of Durango and end up in Gunnison, after a 450 mile trek through western and central CO. Friday morning we would strike it down the spine of the Rockies on CO 149 through Lake City, into Creede. Then cross Wolf Creek Pass enroute to Pagossa Springs, before turning south and making our way to Taos and ultimately Eagles Nest, NM for our last night with Britbob, before striking back across the Plains homeward bound. Hondapotamus and I would travel the furthest and return home after 10 days and right at 5,000 miles on the clock. It was an aggressive plan, but hey, that’s just how we roll.
Tomorrow, or whenever I finally get around to posting the second installment, we’ll finally go KSU and get El Durango Cinco underway! The two goons above are begging you to stick around as the fun has only just begun.
The motley crew you see above assembled in Durango, CO back at the end of May 2016 for a few days to terrorize the good citizens of New Mexico and Colorado. While this story recaps some of the fun and frivolity of the adventure, the names have been changed to protect the guilty. Pictured from left to right; FJRBandit, Cornbread, FJRBritbob, Hondapotamus and LA2wheeler. These, mis amigos, are the banditos that comprised El Durango Cinco.
The idea for this ride was borne in the Ozarks one year earlier while Britbob, Cornbread and I (fjrbandit) were in the midst of Dixie Shunpikin’ 2015. Cornbread lives in central Arkansas and Britbob, since I’m sure you wouldn’t have guessed, is from the U.K. He and his wife make it a point to visit the U.S. every other year, whilst Britbob makes the trip solo on the opposite years and takes a 10 day or so motorcycle tour somewhere that he “fancies” visiting. Dixie Shunpikin’ happened to be his solo trip in 2015 and for 2016 he and his lovely bride planned to return to the U.S. to celebrate their 30th Anniversary. Being the consummate planner, the old chap had already laid his itinerary down for the 2016 visit. While sipping some sour mash one evening, on the banks of the Jacks Fork of the Current River in Eminence, Missouri the plan for El Durango Cinco was hatched.
Britbob and his wife would be coming to the U.S. in mid-May and planned to spend a few in the Keys. They would then fly to El Paso, TX, rent a car and head to a dude ranch in the Gila National Forrest, deep in the back country of southwest New Mexico and spend a week there. Well, Britbob has managed to convince Mrs. Britbob that she would prefer to ride horses for a few days without him when they make these trips, which allows him to go ride steel horses for a few days. So on this trip he planned to slip away from the dude ranch for four days, rent a bike in Albuquerque and ride in Colorado and New Mexico before returning to Gila N.F. to retrieve his bride and head back across the pond.
Cornbread and I, being the opportunist we are, saw an opportunity to let the sails out a bit and do what we referred to as a “rocket ride” across the Plains and join Britbob on his four day jaunt through NM and CO. Britbob thought it to be a magnificent idea and thus the planning was on!
Since we had a year before the ride was to take place we had plenty of time to discuss options and make the necessary arrangements. One thing led to another and Cornbread and I decided that, hell, if we are riding 2,000 plus miles round trip out and back we might as well stay longer than four days. So we decided to make a 10 day ride out of it ourselves and we would join up with Britbob for the four days he planned to ride. His only requests were that we include the Million Dollar Highway and CO 141 through the Escalante Staircase through Uravan and Gateway. CO 141 was HIGH on my priority list as well because I had to skip it due to time constraints last year on my Western Adventure when I followed Rush from KC to Denver to Calgary. But that’s another story you can read at this link. Other than those two places, Britbob wanted to ride through Taos and Red River, NM, which was perfect because that would be our gateway in and out of the Rockies. He left the remainder of the planning up to me. I scratched out an outline, presented it to both he and Cornbread and with a little tweaking we had our plan.
In the meantime I had been talking with a good friend that lives in Huntsville, AL about riding with us. He’s an avid motocross guy, still rides competitively at age 51 and has a Goldwing as his chick cruiser, aka Hondapotamus. I had also mentioned this ride to my good friend from the frjforum, LA2wheeler, who lives in southern Arkansas. If one or both of these guys could join us we’d have a blast and still have a manageable size group. By mid-February we had commitments from both, Hondapotamus and LA2wheeler. So now there would be four of us doing the rocket ride across the Plains and then meeting up with Britbob mid-stream in New Mexico.
Our plan was for Hondapotamus to ride down from Huntsville on Thursday evening, May 19th, meet me in Birmingham and then we were to depart on Friday, May 20th. We would meet LA2wheeler somewhere near Shreveport mid-day and then ride into the Dallas area for the evening. Then we would head to Amarillo on Saturday, meet Cornbread, and the four of us take it all the way to Durango on Sunday, the 22nd. As I laid out our plan I decided to make Durango our base camp for four of the six days we would be in the Rockies. This put us right in the heart of the action and only a half days ride down to meet Britbob on Wednesday before returning to Durango that evening. It also allowed us to ride unencumbered by our gear for three full days. It’s very rare that I don’t have to pack every morning when on a long road trip and drag my gear into a different hotel each night. This I found to be a luxury and everyone else agreed that plan made a lot of sense. So Durango it was, from Sunday night through Thursday morning. On Thursday we would strike out of Durango and end up in Gunnison, after a 450 mile trek through western and central CO. Friday morning we would strike it down the spine of the Rockies on CO 149 through Lake City, into Creede. Then cross Wolf Creek Pass enroute to Pagossa Springs, before turning south and making our way to Taos and ultimately Eagles Nest, NM for our last night with Britbob, before striking back across the Plains homeward bound. Hondapotamus and I would travel the furthest and return home after 10 days and right at 5,000 miles on the clock. It was an aggressive plan, but hey, that’s just how we roll.
Tomorrow, or whenever I finally get around to posting the second installment, we’ll finally go KSU and get El Durango Cinco underway! The two goons above are begging you to stick around as the fun has only just begun.
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