Story: 21 Days in June
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Via US 491, CO 141, CO 90, UT 46, US 191, US 6
| Terrain: Curves, mountain, high elevation changes, scenic Date: June 2014 Roads: Paved highway, National Park roads Technical: Easy, to intermediate Elevation: 3,980 ft. to 7,720 ft  |
Here is the final Google Maps Link
We are heading to Arches where, originally, we had scheduled a couple of days to stay. It was either Arches or Dinosaur NP with a quick loop through the west side of Wyoming or Yellowstone on the way home. As it turns out, there are emergencies brewing at home. So to prevent issues back home, we decide shorten our trip a bit and start heading homeward. There is time for a quick side Moto trip along the way (there is always time for that!), so we take a run thru western Colorado and skip through Arches NP before bedding down for the night in Price, UT where we’ll make final decisions for the days ahead.
Selfie to prove that we were actually there! What an amazing time we just had all over Utah, New Mexico, Arizona and Colorado!
We point the ‘ol Road King north from Cortez, CO and detour from the direct route on CO 141 and CO 90 for two reasons. One, we avoid the monotony of US 491 and US 191 to Arches on the Utah side. And two, we get to stay in Colorado for just a bit longer. J We love Colorado’s cool air and wonderful elevation changes. The scenery has been beautiful… mainly with farmland, lots of green hills, and wonderful people. It’s MotoForever for goodness sake and anytime you can choose to make the ride better… well…
We head north on CO 141 and just before the cut off on CO 141, we stop at Dove Creek to top off the gas tank. What a fantastic small town store we find there! This is the real deal; the store acts as a true community station. Their stock is huge and includes all of the typical and many of the not so typical food items, dry goods, hardware, restroom facilities, written message boards, fuel…. Basically everything a community would need. They also act as personal messengers to keep the local communications flowing and repeating verbal notes as needed. We really wanted to buy some of the locally grown beans, but can’t afford the storage space on the Harley. We’ll try mail order and ship when we get home.
Just north of Dove Creek, we head to the right on CO 141 for about 65 miles to Naturita. This stretch is a nice ride with lots of curves, elevation changes and OK to very good roads, although I give it a B- because of terrible tar snakes and periodic road construction for new pavement (… not tar and gravel), the roads are really not that bad and the ride is very enjoyable. Periodic road construction is getting to be routine when travelling during the summer months.
I still don’t quite figure why people would live out here so remote, but it is nice to see the occasional houses and it makes you feel that help is not too far away if needed.
These two Colorado highways are fun to ride and provide nice scenery. We see bikes whizzing by, as we get closer to the Utah side. Because of the recent windy conditions, we are able to see the distant mountains we rode just a couple of days ago with our Albuquerque friend. I believe we can see the Colorado Matterhorn off in the distance.
Naturity is a larger town for the area and seems to be thriving. We stop only to reset our GPS and head west on CO 90 (which turns into UT 46) for 56 miles. This highway connects us to US 191 and then directly into Moab, UT. Moab is the home of Arches NP and is pretty big and highly developed. If you stay here, there are lots of restaurants and hotels to choose from. In town, we see off road vehicles, ATVs, Bicycles, Hiking gear on everyone, and of course many touring bikes too. I am reminded that we are indeed back in Utah; with the heat, the huge amazing landscapes, and the many international travellers and their interesting languages.
MOAB Food stop: Moab Brewery… brewery hopping has been good to us and we are not disappointed. Today’s special is a tender steak sandwich. Oh my! Enough said.
Arches, NP is nice, but seems very typical to us now. I like seeing the huge boulders and the scenery that is right out of the roadrunner cartoons. My impression of the park would have been better, but the road that goes to many of the beautiful arches was closed for… you guessed it, road construction. Only campers with reservations were allowed into any of those areas. If we come through here again, there are a few areas outside of the park that I’ve mapped as must see. Since we are in a slight bit of a hurry, we are happy to see/ride/hike to the couple of arches and views that were available that day. With the construction, the heat, and our more ambitious schedule, we decided to move on. Everybody seems to stop at the visitors’ center on the way out of the park instead of on the way in. Odd. But we did exactly the same! We stopped on the way out. Good thing too, because there isn’t much at the center anyway.
It’s on to Price, UT from Arches. The ride is pretty uneventful. We head up the hill and out of the Moab area. There are lots of high-speed straights, a little road construction thrown in for good measure, and of course the huge cliff views and scenery that is Utah. The speed limits bounce around 75 and 80 MPH. Faster than most people actually choose to drive, but it’s nice to have the option. I misspoke, there ARE some nice hills and mountain curves that are really fun to ride on a bike. We latch onto another couple riding a Harley Ultra. They have a Yellow “O” on the back of their helmet and an Oregon license plate! (for those that don’t know… that spells Oregon DUCKS!). We are riding with Oregon Ducks in Utah! Pretty cool. At a stop they tell us they are from Portland, OR. That’s about 100 miles from us. I can tell he is a very good rider, and I like that. The Duck fan on the back seat seems to be having a great time. I love that too!
We’ve seen so many people touring around the country on this trip! I wasn’t aware that so many people are doing Moto-touring long distance like this. That’s so cool, I finally seem to be into something that many other people are doing too! And that’s a change for me! When I started this trip, I really wasn’t aware of the immense popularity of long distance moto touring. We see and meet people riding touring bikes with sleeping bags (or not), with lots of luggage, riders going single, two-up, with riding buddys, going in every direction, doing high mileage days, going slow with sightseeing, staying at motels, people from their 20s, all the way up to their 70s, bikes, trikes, side cars… What I love about long rides is that there isn’t a ‘right’ way to do moto-touring… and there isn’t a particular reason why people are doing it…or what they get out of it. It is truly a personal experience that resonates with a large portion of our society. The one common thread I see, is that when you get back… you cannot wait to do it again!
Freedom, excitement, self sufficiency, free will, sense of accomplishment, see the country, feel a sense of kinship and community, meet people from all around the country, see people doing amazing things, discover the vast wonderment of America, benefit from our pubic national highways, parks, cultures, see and experience history, bond with your partner/spouse/buddies, time to think and feel oneself without distraction…
It’s on to Price UT. IF we get to Price, we can make it back home easily with only one more stop. This will cut our trip by 3 days, but oh well. This entire trip has been a little bit ‘on the fly’ and a little bit ‘let’s decide tomorrows itinerary the night before”. I think it best to plan 2 days at a time, today and tomorrow. And of course, tomorrow plan is probably going to change by tomorrow. J
The remaining stretch of todays ride from Arches NP to Price UT is 111 miles and we do this with no issues. We decide to stay at the convention center in Price. It is also a hotel, a restaurant, and private suites. It looks like a convention center from the front, we go ahead and check in (it’s 80/night) and includes an all night indoor swimming pool. The beds are nice, we shower and prepare for tomorrow.
Dove Creek Superette has everything!
Leaving Dove Creek down Hwy 141
The roads were fun and twisty. You can see the new pavement here.
But the tar snakes were plentiful too.
The views were large and clean. Changing weather conditions made for very interesting clouds.
More Clouds
As we left Naturita, the clouds became crazy! The earlier wind and fluffy clouds made this
… and this… Here you can see the new and old pavement varieties. The new pavement also means periodic waiting for road construction crews
As we get closer to Utah, those familiar cliffs start coming back into view
… and the greenery in the farm and ranch land gets bigger and greener
As you get into Utah, the highway markers change to Hwy 46. So if you’re coming FROM Utah, you’ll start on Hwy 46.
We ended up hitting every brewery west of the Rockies! We love the food and the beer was pretty good too!
We are finding that Micro and Craft Breweries are getting popular all over the US now.
Into Arches NP there are too many photo ops…
Here is an actual Arch. Many of the great photo ops are of the large monument boulders and cliffs.
Tomorrows ride will be long. It comes to 509 miles on the map as we head from Price, Utah to Ontario, Oregon.