Raven's Roads
Living an interesting life: the travels and musings
of motorcycling author Linda R. Moore

Apr 18, 2005

A hop, a skip and a jump

Filed in Landmark-Hunting, Motorcycle Road Trips, Raven's Roads 2005

12th April

We climbed Morro Rock. It’s a fantastic, 200′ tall mesa with good paths and a huge variety of flora and fauna. Ravens circled below us, we saw peregrines, purple cacti, orange lichen, alligator juniper (the bark looks like alligator skin…)

Every corner we turned brought new oohs and ahhhs as the landscape exploded around us. It was incredibly beautiful - the valley below stretched out for miles, dotted with trees, and I could see the road where I had ridden and where I would be riding later that day. The sun was quite strong but I managed to keep covered enough to not get burnt, unlike Oakwoman who did not fare so well and copped quite a burn.

We got to the top and explored the ancient ruins there while avoiding the little muddy puddles that were in amongst the limestone. You could see original ancient pottery shards and the outline of rooms done in differently coloured rock. What a place.

The mesa top was white sandstone and the path reminded me of Stephen King’s Pet Sematary, except this place was not creepy, just beautiful.

We made our way over and then down a steep path. There were still bits of snow in the shadows of the cliff, and caves to look at. At the bottom is the reason this place is famous: the cliff is inscribed with hundreds of signatures and versions of “Kilroy was here”. They date back to the time of the conquistadors in the 17th century and there are some famous names, like O&ntilde and Vargas. There are also many beautiful ancient pictographs.

We went back to the campground later and hung out with the owner and her friend, both ladies who had brought their Harleys for me to see. Awesome! We got Navajo tacos which were delicious - it’s sort of like nan bread with beans and ground beef and veges - and I tried my first New Mexican green chilli. It wasn’t too strong and it tasted grand.

After that I had to finish my ride…the road, where it had been straight, started to wind steeply upwards and then we crossed the continental divide, my first time on the other half of the continent by my own propulsion. A little whoop for that one!

Then the road wound equally steeply downwards and I had to concentrate hard for a while. ;-)

We got onto the freeway which promptly stopped. It came to a complete standstill for thirty minutes and Oakwoman got out to give me water! In the end it was ok, we lost an hour, and then got off on old route 66 and took that way through Albuquerque. The view coming down the hill to the city was awesome, with the mountains just lurking there in the background.

We took a break for fuel/food and then I was led up the canyon. That was tiring and my first real mountain road, rising 800′ in the space of about ten twisty miles.

We arrived at the wonderful place in the mountains at 8pm.

I have ridden 1,231 miles and reached the eastern terminus of Raven’s Roads.