Day Eight - Williams, AZ to Durango, CO
After waking up at 8 AM in my flea bag Hotel room in Williams AZ., I got packed up and going at around 10 AM. I was moving pretty slow and was looking for a nice easy ride to Durango today. I got on Interstate 40 and traveled east toward Flagstaff. Just after Flagstaff I got on Route 89 North. I entered the Navajo Reservation and then took route 160 east.
The reservation is a huge parcel of desert that is over 200 miles wide and over 150 miles long. As you are riding through it you start to wonder what the people who live there do for a living. I stopped for a late lunch in Kayenta along route 160. I never thought I would be happy to see a burger king. After seeing some of the local restaurants on the reservation I was relieved. They had a historical display showing memorabilia and information on the wind talkers from World War 2. For those who do not know, the US Army used native Navajo talkers during WW2 as radio operators as this language served as a code that the Japanese could not break.
Riding through the desert can become a little boring as you might think. This being said I found myself going faster than normal. So as I was passing a Truck in a 65 mile a hour zone I passed the local reservation cop. This was unfortunate as he got me at 89 MPH. I really thought I was screwed. I could only imagine how much this was going to cost me. The cop turned out to be pretty cool. He let me go with a Warning and kept calling me "dude". "Dude, why are you riding so F...ing fast?"
Later that afternoon I made it to the four Corners. Utah, Arizona, Colorado and New Mexico all meet at the same spot. Lots of Indians selling jewelry and rugs. Kind of a tourist trap, and I took the bait.
A Sucker born every minute. I finished the day with a great twisty mountain road through the San Juan National Forest and Uncompahgre National Forest. I made it to Durango around 6 PM and had a nice dinner for once at a steak house and called it a night early.
Day One - Marlborough MA to Ashtabula OH
Day Two - Ashtabula to Dexter, MN
Day Three - Dexter MN to Mount Rushmore, SD
Day Four - Mount Rushmore, SD to West Yellowstone, MT
Day Five - West Yellowstone, Mt to Logan, UT
Day Six - Logan, UT to Cedar City UT
Day Seven - Cedar City UT to Williams. AZ
Day Eight - Williams, AZ to Durango, CO
Day Nine - Durango, CO to Amarillo, TX
Day Ten - Amarillo, TX to Little Rock, AR
Day Eleven - Little Rock AR to Cordova TN
Day Twelve through Fifteen - Memphis, TN