Day 1 - The Adventure Begins

SOUTHWEST ADVENTURE - Day 1
Starting Point: Trent house in Terrytown, LA
Destination: Kerrville, TX
Day 1 mileage: 620
Cumulative mileage (GPS): 1274.3
Cumulative mileage (Odometer): 1297

After almost a week in New Orleans celebrating the marriage of our daughter Jaimee and her new husband Travis, it was finally time to ride. If you want to check out a bit of update from the wedding, you can do so here. Four riders - Randall, Trent, Matt, and I - met at 5:30 AM. After a quick visit and prayer, we rode a short distance through New Orleans to meet Steve, and then set our sights on our Day 1 destination: Kerrville, Texas. The route pictured here is a 614-mile journey that is nearly all interstate, as we are simply trying to get west, where the real adventure begins.

I'm riding a 2013 Harley Davidson Road Glide Ultra, loaded down with all that we need for three weeks away from home. Clothes, cameras (video and still), laptop, tools, first aid supplies, cold-weather gear for the rides at elevation in Colorado, and rain gear.

The rain gear proved useful today. Texas has been experiencing record rainfall in recent weeks, with catastrophic flooding over the past few days. We've been watching road closures in anticipation of our departure, and we left New Orleans confident we could get through Houston safely and be able to ride the planned route in the Texas Hill Country. We expected to have to push through the weather system that was causing the extreme conditions to get to our intended destinations - so we were not surprised by what we saw on the weather radar as we approached Lafayette, LA. A Chik-Fil-A provided a stop for breakfast as well as an opportune time to prepare for the weather that was ahead.

Fortunately, everyone is skilled enough to ride through inclement weather, and we were able to make good time in spite of the rain. We drove out of the weather as we approached Houston and experienced great conditions the rest of the way to our destination in Kerrville, Texas. Here is a quick 30-second video of our rain experience:

Arriving in Kerrville, we met a sixth rider. Joe Thomas, a good friend from our days in West Monroe, LA, will ride the Hill Country with us tomorrow before returning home. We enjoyed dinner with Joe tonight, and look forward to riding with him tomorrow. Our only regret is that Joe can't stay around longer to enjoy the camaraderie that we experience on these motorcycle adventures. Maybe next year...

Tomorrow, we ride some of the best motorcycle roads Texas has to offer. We'll start the day at 7 AM and ride to Bandera, known as the Cowboy Capital of the World, before spending most of our day on The Twisted Sisters, three Texas Farm Roads known for cycling adventure. Part of the description in our ride summary reads as follows: If you are a new rider or lack much riding experience then Texas 16 South out of Kerrville is NOT be the ride for you. Once you get about 12 miles south of Kerrville, 16 crosses over the Medina Mountain and that is not a road for beginners to be on. There are some very tight turns going up and over the mountain. If you are an experienced rider, take this route for some exciting riding and breathtaking scenery but head the warnings about the turns and 15 mph speed limit. Any faster and you may not make the turn. If we have recently had any heavy rains be careful of loose gravel on the turns. You won't be disappointed on this ride.

Of course, rain has been abundant in recent days, so we must be vigilant as we ride. We ask readers to pray for safety as we ride!

Our goal for the day is to reach Fort Stockton, TX. If successful, we will ride just over 500 miles - a challenging day, for sure. We'll take to the interstate again after lunch to try to reach Fort Stockton before nightfall.

Day 2 Ride Overview

Twisted Sisters Ride Detail

There really wasn't very much that was remarkable about the day. We rode long stretches of interstate in order to be ready for the Hill Country today. But I took a few pictures that I'll share here...