Free falling!

Nope, not  a skydiving post....

I woke up far later than Mike, he was all packed up and ready to go. He kindly made me coffee as he'd promised the night before and we agreed to meet up later that day in Hankville. Then I was alone once again. Packing up with the beautiful view made me smile.  I got everything hooked to my bike. Ready to go. Oh yeah, but I'm not strong enough to get her off the centre stand. Damn. I had to unpack, get her down to the kickstand and repack. The on my way! That delayed me at least a half hour. The ride down from my campsite and through through Hite to Hanksville was good, baeutifylbuy somewhat stressful. I like travelling alone so I dont feel the need to cater to anyone else; like ime holding them up.

About 10k before Hanskville, I came upon a rollover. A completely straight road, but the driver of  truck pulling A camper made N error in judgement thinking the cattle truck in front we slowing for her when he was free Ally making a left turn. The older couple was alright, and the  were plenty to of people there to help out. I continued on with the intent to send help but passed an ambulance on my way. I guess someone finally got cell service.

I had lunch at Blondies with Mike,as planned. He hadn't been waiting long as he'd had a flat tire. That changed his plans somewhat. Instead of  coming to Capitol reef with me he headed off to get a  new tire. He was the  first to suggest I get a new rear tire.  I'd been too cheap to do it in  yyc before I left. Oops.

I headed off to capitol reef national park. As I hit the road I instantly be a e grumpy. I was riding through the hottest time of day, it was super windy, I was uncomfortable and frustrated. I was itching to get to the Visitor centre in capitol reef. It had water and air conditioning. Id parked my bike among some other motorbikes, even  asking if I was in their way. I came back outside to see one of them placing my helmet on my seat. My first thought as that had fun but as  get closer, one guy, Mark, noted he'd bumped it as he drove by. My first thought: f*** not again! My clutch handle was severely bent by left blinker now matched my right one (from the drop in Lethbridge) there was some plastic on the ground, but my bags appeared to have somewhat protected the back.

The group of 4, the Tamale Motorcycle Club, offered to ride with me for the day, they were headed to Bryce, my destination for the following day. I agreed, at least for the time being. We rode highway 12, one of the designated "all American" roads. The ride was amazing! Up onto a Ridge above one of the phenomenal canyons which fell down on either side of the road.

That morning Mike had recommended a BLM (aka free) camping spot on hole in the wall Road. We paused near there briefly to let Adam catch up. I considered going off that way, but they'd offered to put me up for the night, and a shower and hot meal sounded great at that point as I think all I had in my bag was beef jerky. I'd have planned better and my bike not fallen over.

We booked it through the remaining distance to Bryce to make it for the sunset. The sunset over the Hoodoos in Bryce was epic! Then headed to the guys hotel, the Ruby right outside the park, for dinner and bed. Dinner was great, I ordered first. We all had steak! Along with some much needed beer. The guys Mark, Adam, Eduardo, and Gonzalo were from Denver or Mexico respectively. And all from the art industry. This made for some different conversation from what I had with the group of mostly engineers I've been travelling with! The Tamale Motorcycle Club left early to make a daybreak ride through Zion.  I took my time then headed off to look for somewhere to hike /kill time till the guys arrived from The Grand Canyon.