May 14th Redlands to Blythe

After our swim yesterday and a clean-up we took ourselves off into town. Redlands is another grid-pattern, widely spread out town so we called a taxi to get us the 2.5 miles into the centre. Just as we were about to leave, an elderly American lady accosted us and asked if we had come far “on those little bikes”! We modestly explained that they were in fact quite large bikes and yes we had come quite far. The conversation would no doubt have gone on much longer had the taxi meter not been ticking,

We followed the hotel receptionist’s recommendation and went to a “British pub” in downtown Redlands. Its main redeeming feature was that it was not particularly British. Apart from the obligatory pub bore who had presumably been imported specially, the clientelle was American, as was the food and most of the beer. We passed a pleasant couple of hours there. Redlands seemed like a nice town with some tree-lined avenues and views of hills in the distance.

This morning dawned…… (I think you know where I’m going with this one) and we set off down Interstate Highway 10 which would take us, via Palm Springs, all the way to Blythe which is just on the Californian side of the Arizona border. The countryside was a mixture of mountains and desert and at times was quite breathtaking. The frustrating thing about travelling on the Interstate is that it is not easy to stop and capture the views, although some good photos did get taken. Mark is also convinced he saw a body that had been wrapped in plastic and dumped in the central reservation but we didn’t get chance to go back and check!

We broke the journey at Chiriaco Summit, a gas station and diner set up by Mr and Mrs Chiriaco about 1925, just before the highway was built and which is still run by their family. There is also a General Patton Museum on the same site as this was apparently the training area for WWII US troops before they were sent to the Middle East. We got some nice pictures of tanks before departing.

When out of the mountains we were mainly riding through flat desert. The heat was intense and registered as 108F on the temperature gauge on Mark’s bike. It was so hot I did begin to have morbid thoughts about what the flash-point of petrol might be! Raising the visor on the helmet was like putting your head into a hot oven. As if that wasn’t enough, at one point near the end of the ride, an insect the size of a light aircraft hit my visor and I did the last 30 miles squinting out through squashed bug.

The desert wind was strong and we could see dust devils swirling either side of the road. Occasionally a cross wind full of dust and sand would hit us, which helped to break the monotony no end!

The most amazing thing was saw today however has to be a large party of cyclists making their way along our route. We were struggling with the gradients, the heat and the cross-winds even with 1250cc of Japanese technology to help us but these guys seemed to be taking it in their stride and waved cheerily to us as we passed them.

Despite the conditions we made good time and arrived in Blythe at 2pm. After a short prayer of thanks to the god of ice machines we then went on a shopping expedition to Kmart and Ace Hardware for essentials for the travelling motorcyclist such as gaffer tape and leather restorer. After that we cooled down in the pool.

Rather than try to discover if there is actually a downtown Blythe we ate at very pleasant diner just across from the hotel. I ordered zucchini (courgettes) as a starter and received a massive plate of breaded and deep-fried slices with blue cheese dip. I ate about half and commented on the size of the portions when refusing the offer to put the remainder in a take out box. The waitress proudly told me that “No-one leaves here hungry”.
By this stage the temperatures had dropped to a mere 100F. The waitress told us that her strategy for keeping cool was to take her kids and go and sit in the Colorado river. We are however putting our faith in the air conditioning in the room.

Tomorrow – which will doubtless dawn sunny and bright – we are planning to get to Ajo in Arizona.

We covered 164 miles today and our total so far is 1100 plus. Only another few thousand to go now!