The Road Less Traveled: Day 2 - The Texas Hill Country

SOUTHWEST ADVENTURE - Day 2
Starting Point: Kerrville, TX
Intended Destination: Fort Stockton, TX
Actual Destination: Iraan, TX
Day 2 mileage: 462.7
Cumulative mileage (GPS): 1737
Cumulative mileage (Odometer): 1767.4

Day 2 was intended to be a long ride day. We were to ride the Twisted Sisters, then make our way back to the interstate, pushing west as hard as we could to position us to meet the girls in Phoenix on time. Here's the way the day went down:

We left Inn of the Hills in Kerrville right on time, at 7 AM. After a quick gas stop, we were on our way on Texas Highway 16 to get to the Twisted Sisters.
We went to Bandera first - the Cowboy Capital of the World. We walked around a little, then grabbed some quick refreshment at OST - the Old Spanish Trail Restaurant. We met a nice man here who gave us a map of the Hill Country. He is pictured with us below.
From Bandera, we set out to ride The Sisters - and this was GREAT fun!! These roads are like a motorcycle rollercoaster that goes on and on and on. I'll post video soon. Oh, my - this was so much fun!
Leaving the Hill Country, we stopped to say goodbye to Joe Thomas, who rode with us on Thursday, then set out to ride 200 miles west on the interstate to our intended destination of Fort Stockton.
A really intense thunderstorm system, coupled with a serious need for fuel, caused us to leave the interstate in search of gas, food, and a shelter from the storm. We thought we might wait for the storm to pass, then continue on to Fort Stockton, but finally decided to spend the night at our gas-stop town - Iraan, Texas. It was an interesting little place...

Riding the Hill Country proved to be a nice break after the long interstate ride, for sure. After riding across Texas west of the Dallas / Fort Worth area in 2012 and 2104, I was pleasantly surprised by the topography. I remarked on several occasions that, if I had been blindfolded and dropped off in the Hill Country then asked where I was, I never would have guessed Texas. The roads are characterized by continual elevation changes, and the greenery was much more lush than I would have expected.

The Sisters were fun and offered some challenges. Honestly, I had heard enough about the dangers of the Twisted Sisters - and noted the signs like the ones pictured here - that I expected the challenge to be greater. The roads really offered a very nice let's-have-fun experience, and proved to be a great warm-up for things to come later in the trip.

Some of our apprehension had to do with wondering if we would encounter standing water or debris on the roads due to the recent flooding in Texas. The roads were clear except in one notable instance.

Our first stop after leaving Kerrville was in Bandera. This was a great little town, and did not disappoint. Visiting Bandera was like stepping back in time... the town retained the flavor of years gone by. The locals were friendly. I hoped to see people on horseback, and we did not - perhaps because we arrived so early - but the visit was worthwhile, none-the-less. Of course, we had to stop in at OST - the Old Spanish Trail restaurant. Though we had breakfast at Inn of the Hills, some quick refreshment was a good thing.

From here, we set out to ride The Twisted Sisters and enjoyed several hours riding through the Hill Country. While these were not the most technical roads we've experienced, they were great fun, and should be ridden again if we ever venture this way to ride Big Bend National Park.

We stopped for lunch in Leakey, Texas. Conversation with locals while at lunch revealed tension over something called Jade Helm, a military operation that would have strong presence in Leakey. From the perspective of some locals, this operation has to do with putting down the influence of local militia. If seems another perspective might have something to do with containing Mexican drug cartels. I have no idea. While this calls for some research on the subject to satisfy my curiosity, on this day, I just felt impressed to get on the road before we encountered any difficulty.

I always like to build options into our route... things about which I say, "We probably won't have time to do this, but..." This day had a 60-mile option to ride along the Guadalupe River. In retrospect, I wish I had opted against this. We had ridden at the Sisters at an attention-getting, adrenaline-rush kind of pace, so we were ahead of schedule. The extra 60 miles proved to be just more of what we had already experienced, with only occasional views of the river. Had we headed straight to the interstate, we might have arrived in Fort Stockton on schedule, ahead of the storm that caused us to pull up short of our intended destination. And I would have avoided the "one notable moment" I referenced earlier.

The roads had been unexpectedly clear. I had let my guard down regarding road conditions after many hours of not seeing much water at all. We were in one of those places I always enjoy... a long sweeper that was punctuated by a curve to the left during a pretty good drop in elevation. I was leading, and came flying around that curve, into the drop, to see water standing all the way across the road. Yikes! I voiced my concern in animated fashion via our trusty Scala Rider communicators, and got on the brakes quickly. Of course, at the speed I was traveling, I didn't have time to slow down much - and I wasn't going to go through the standing water - unaware of the road condition beneath the water - while braking. So I got off the brakes, held on, and hit the water. The result was soaked legs and water up over my head that had me wiping my sunglasses dry as we continued on - but we all survived the notable moment and continued on our way.

Pointing toward the interstate, we pulled up just before getting onto I-10 West to say goodbye to Joe Thomas. He had business concerns that prevented his riding on with us - so we said our goodbyes, watered a few trees, and started west with our sights set on Fort Stockton.

The adventure of the afternoon continued as I made a bad call on when and where to refuel. Sometimes I plan fuel stops in advance. This was the case earlier in the day, when I heeded warning to not get caught on the Twisted Sisters without gas. Planning fuel stops is, for the most part, problematic, though, because the fuel consumption on our Harleys goes up pretty significantly when we ride much above 80 MPH. The speed limit in west Texas is 80. And we were riding a little north of that in order to try to reach our destination as early as possible. I realized too late that we weren't going to make it to our intended gas stop at the rate we were burning fuel - but I had this epiphany AFTER we passed the best gas stop. To complicate matters even more, I was monitoring a growing thunderstorm that was in our way. There were two things I really didn't want to experience: trying to find gas in a thunderstorm, and trying to find a hotel in the rain. So I made a decision to leave the interstate (no gas within miles on the interstate, according to the GPS) and head north to Iraan, Texas for fuel. I also thought we might grab dinner while waiting to see if the storm would blow to the north and let us get to Fort Stockton without getting wet.

Pulling into Iraan, we found gas quickly, but also found quickly that our food options were pretty limited. The gas station attendant first told me the only food available was the food there at the station (unacceptable to our little group), but another employee told us of a cafe just down the street. We made that our destination, and ate an okay meal while monitoring the weather. We finally decided to wait out the weather by spending the night in Iraan, and agreed to leave early the next morning so we could get back on schedule. So dinner at the Old House Cafe and a night spent at Mesa View Inn marked the end of our day.

Here are some photo highlights of the day: