Arrived in Houston late afternoon and Ubered to our Super 8 Motel near the Motorcycle shop where our bikes have been stored for 3 years. This motel/gas/station/diner is a truck stop ..hundreds of huge rigs fuelling up & parked in the truck park (see the photo) .Tuesday morning went to Tejas Motorsports - the shop where the bikes had been stored for 3 years courtesy of Bob Binns the owner (thanks Bob). The workshop had carried out all the work requested, service & new tyres and the bikes were ready to ride. We all have the latest Garmin Zumo XT GPSs, so we removed the gas tanks so we could wire these in and then carried out a few other minor adjustments and fitted our luggage. After 3 hours we were on the road- all highway/expressway today. Drizzly rain to start out with then patches of torrential rain which tested our gear (failed in most cases) We stopped for a coffee & to discuss why we hadnt stopped earlier & put our rain gear on when the rain first started. No one had a satisfactory answer - out of practice ?? However it was very warm so everything dried
Back on the expressway we stopped after 162 miles (around 250kms) for gas & noticed a Motel 6 nearby so as the time was getting on we decided to stay the night here. The town is called Nacogdoches ..dont know how this is pronounced...if you do, let us know! This area is bordering on the Southern Bible belt & accordingly both of the nearby restaurants had no alcohol - so a dry night. For some strange reason Keith & Bryan chose battered as their meal & decided this southern US standard fare wasnt really them.
Tomorrow another 300miles of highway to Fort Smith before we get onto the Trans America Trail the day after.
Leaving Nacogdoches at just after 8am we were back on highways and expressways for a couple of hours with the starting temperatures around late 20s degrees C rising during the day to high 30s and a 40 was seen for a while during the afternoon heat. Keith decided that the Catfish from last night had a half life of at least 12 hours and despite seeing it advertised elsewhere we bravely (wisely) ignored the
advertising and pressed on for a couple of hours before stopping for a Subway breakfast. Today was fine with a little overcast and as we headed North we climbed to around 350m altitude where it was still mid 30 degrees. Warm temperature especially when you stop. We travelled some secondary sealed back roads through lush green farmland which was out of keeping perception of Texas countryside. The farms here looked prosperous and all the farm houses and small towns we went through looked quaint & interesting. Travelling further north the buildings, towns etc started to seem quite rundown. Big industries all advertising for staff (just like NZ) & there seems to be no market for buildings where has closed down. There were plenty we saw abandoned & left to deteriorate and eventually self demolish. Arriving into our destination Fort Smith, after 530kms, we were pleased to cool off with showers & a cold beer. A walk through this interesting historic town finished our long hot day. (still 28 degrees at 9pm)
Tomorrow we head onto the TAT for some real back country riding, firstly on trails through the Ozarks. Remember if you want
to track our progress you can go to the link below and click on the time frame (top right for a map of our progress)
