West Texas Hunger

Day 37

Sanderson to Langtry TX

"Danny" was the name of the manager at the Budget Motel in Sanderson TX.  He was managing a sinking ship, the place looked like it had been staged for one of those suspense movies where stranded tourists are forced to spend the night, usually with fatal consequences. The pool was filled in with dirt, the old filtration equipment laying helter-skelter inside the still erect fencing around the pool.  Every paint can, mop, broom, or bucket that had ever been used at the facility was still there, waiting for the call to duty just one more time.  I was intrigued with the massive ironing machine that was slowly rusting just outside the back door of the motel, it looked like a giant lathe, vintage about 1940, that must have been a steam device to iron bed sheets.

Danny spent his day talking with cyclists, encouraging them to rent a room (he has a little speech he gives every arriving cyclist, the core message is that he has a "sliding scale" fee for rooms he rents to cyclists, just name your price.  I made a joke about Priceline but I doubt he knows who William Shatner is. Failing that, he offers soft drinks, cold water, and hot showers for sale. He is quite a salesman; his daily take cannot be more than $100.

Staying at the "motel" in Sanderson was rough.  The camping was on gravel, it was windy, and the cafes did not seem interested in opening for breakfast, I vaulted out of there with the idea that I would ride the full 65 miles to the next town and then have a massive dinner.

The weather had warmed, so the riding was pleasant but I did start to feel the hint of work. The wind, which had been for the most part blowing from some westerly direction, was starting to veer to the east.  All day it strengthened from the SE, making for a bit more work than usual to cover 65 miles- since I was cycling right into it.

Arriving at Langtry, I camped at a small community center for free, no bathrooms but some nice grass.  Just a block from my campsite was located the Judge Roy Bean Museum, where I found squeaky clean bathrooms, ice cold water at the fountain, and WIFI.  I walked through the museum; it was a tiny affair- it actually seemed totally out of place, so far out in the desert with nothing else for miles- with silly little mementos of the life of Roy Bean.  I vaguely remember the movie starring Paul Newman...I will have to watch it now that I have visited the actual site.

The real problem with Langtry is that the two restaurants shown on my map had ceased operations, so there was no food to be had, unless you count the one small gas station- it had standard convenience store fare, but no real food.

I would have to make up for the shortage of food tomorrow.

64 miles

Day 38

Langtry to Del Rio TX

I was hungry, the wind was supposed to be strong from the east (headwind), so I hit the road early, just as the sun peeked over the horizon.  During the night the weather had made a significant change, up until Langtry the humidity had hovered around 10-20 percent, now it was close to 90%.  I think the desert was giving way to the Gulf of Mexico.

I crossed the Pecos after only a few miles, not only did it have real water flowing within its banks, the water was CLEAR. Things looked to be getting wetter.

 Strong SE winds slowed my pace, but I made it into the next town (Comstock) in time for an early lunch, only there was no lunch to be had.  Like a lot of the towns of Western Texas, this one was suffering a serious setback.  Most everything was closed, including the two restaurants shown on my map.  The only "convenience" store (in Texas, apparently, a convenience store   is only allowed to sell beer in 40 oz cans, cigarettes and chew, plus a full selection of chips.  And soft drinks.) had little to offer.  There was a refrigerator with a sign announcing that sandwiches are $3.50 each.  I rooted around within its bowels for a bit seeing nothing that resembled an edible sandwich.  The proprietress watched me the entire time, calmly smoking what must have been her third pack of the morning- judged by the pall of smoke in the store- and when I inquired about a sandwich, she said, "we ain't got no sammiches".  I wanted to change the sign to read "if we had sandwiches, they would only be $3.50 each. Have a nice day".

All I could scrounge for food was a can of V8 and two payday bars. They went into the hopper but made little difference.  My only option was to keep pushing on the pedals until I made it to Del Rio, where surely there would be food aplenty.

After 8 full hours of pedaling into a stiff headwind, I made it to Del Rio.  I passed up several taverns that seemed more interested in alcohol than food, and settled for the first Subway that hove into view.  I devoured a foot long sandwich in record time, and then hustled into town headed to the Motel 6.  I was lucky to get a room, it seems that Del Rio is in the midst of a boom and many of the rooms were already filled with construction workers.  Later, I was to learn that most of the towns in Texas, if they are booming, are busy drilling for oil and natural gas.  Evidently, there is a lot of fracking going on in Texas.  Money.

As soon as I was settled at Motel 6, I located the nearest grocery store and STOCKED UP.  When I left the next morning, my trailer was festooned with many bags of groceries and sandwiches, all ready for immediate consumption.  There would be no more food shortages if I had anything to do about it.

61 very slow miles

Day 39

Del Rio to Uvalde TX

I decided to leave the route, missing some of the legendary Texas Hill Country, and go visit my friends Barb and John in San Antonio.  I decided to head straight east on Hwy 90, since it was a direct route. 

The first 20 miles out of Del Rio, the shoulder of the road was wide, very wide- maybe 6 ft.  The next 20 or so miles, it shrunk to about 3 ft.  Still workable, but no margin left for any error, plus traffic volume was increasing.

Here is a good time to share the sad cycling fact that not all shoulder surfaces are created equal.  The wider the shoulder, the better, naturally, but sometimes the width really only serves to frustrate the rider.  For example, it was very common in AZ to encounter nice wide shoulders that were infested with "expansion cracks" every 4-6 ft apart, running perpendicular to the road.  Riding on these shoulders was a trial. The cracks were likely formed by years of heating and cooling of the surface, often leaving fissures several inches wide and several inches tall.  Riding across these fissures was like hitting something the size of a baseball bat every 4-6 ft. To ride these shoulders safely required a very slow pace and  checking on packs and tie-downs frequently to prevent items from dropping unnoticed.  It is especially painful to ride mile after mile on these rotten shoulders when there is a wonderful, smooth driving lane just on the other side of the white line.  I tried several times to cheat the situation and ride the roadway until I heard traffic approach from the rear, when I would then slow and ride onto the shoulder. Because the wind and/or oncoming traffic noise made it difficult to detect every overtaking vehicle, I received many long duration “damn it" horn blasts from many overtaking trucks- the message seemed clear, get back on the shoulder.  I stopped doing that.

Texas has many highways that have been resurfaced with "chipseal", Hwy 90 being one of them.  Instead of repaving the highway with high quality asphalt, the road is covered with paving oil, then gravel is spread over the oil, creating a new but rather rough driving surface.  In Texas they do everything BIG, and they use 3/4" angular rock for the chip seal.  This makes for a very rough and uneven shoulder, plus the road noise from tires passing you at 75 mph is incredibly loud. Again, nice wide shoulders, which appear to the motorist as very generous, to the cyclist, a challenge.

The narrowing shoulder and the chip seal made HWY 90 less than ideal, but a new element was beginning to emerge that would prove to be very helpful.  Up until this point in the trip, there was usually only one road available on which to cycle. No options unless one was willing to divert for hundreds of miles.  From Uvalde eastward, Google Maps was starting to show some serious options.  Texas has hundreds of "Farm to Market" roads, and I started taking them.  Now I could leave the noise and danger of the high speed highways and travel slowly and quietly through the little towns of Texas.  This was a big step towards happiness.

Another Motel 6 in Uvalde

74 miles for the day.  2,018 miles TOTAL!

Day 40

Uvalde to Castroville TX

The most noticeable change is the steady greening up of everything.  There is green grass springing up alongside the roadways.  Spring wildflowers are everywhere. Trees have green leaves, gardens are planted and sprouting.  Ranches have planted crops instead of scrubland.  The land of milk and honey. Unless you are a deer.

You can't miss it, especially in the smaller towns, where one passes hardware and lumber yards in every town.  The deer do not stand a chance here in Texas.  If the cars don't get them, the hunters will. I have never seen so many lifeless deer along the side of the road as I have seen here in Texas, sometimes the carcasses seem to touch they are so numerous. Judging by the roadkill numbers, life as a fawn is especially perilous in this state. And that is only during the off season, apparently things are worse, animal-wise, during hunting season.  Two items seem to be for sale everywhere: deer corn and elevated deer stands.  The deer corn is sold in 50 pound bags; the favorite seems to be the "apple" flavored.  Every convenience store has it prominently displayed...and it is March.  I presume that one uses it to lure the unsuspecting animals to within gun range of your deer stand.

The elevated deer stands come in a variety of sizes, but imagine a Sylvester Stallone movie- Rambo- where he has to rescue hostages from a sordid POW camp, the compound is always guarded with men in towers with machine guns.  The props crew probably purchased the "guard towers" here in Texas at any of the hundreds of lumber and hardware stores that have them proudly displayed.  They are all painted in camo and might even come with options like refrigerated beer tappers and machine gun mounts.

Not much sport to deer hunting here in the great state of Texas.

67 beautiful and serene miles along the backroads.

Day 41

Castroville to San Antonio

This was an easy day.  I stopped at a Starbucks to remember what big city living was like, and then cycled on to my friend’s house in NW San Antonio.  I was looking forward to some good food and sleeping in a regular bed.

37 miles

Day 42 (March 17, 2012)

San Antonio TX

No riding today.  I put two new tires on my bike, visited the real Alamo, had ice cream, watched the San Antonio River turn green in honor of St Patrick, grilled Jerked chicken on a strange grill, and relaxed.

0 miles

Day 43 (March 18)

San Antonio to Wimberley TX:

I hated to leave the comforts of San Antonio, but the winds dictated immediate action.  For the past eight days of riding, the winds have persisted from the SE, since I have been riding almost straight east, that meant headwinds.  Now my route is north for at least 45 miles and the winds are forecast to switch to the NW very soon due to a rapidly moving cold front from the north.  No time to dally, if I want to feel the joy of a tail wind, I need to leave today.

This day is a delightful ride into Texas Hill Country.  Never ending, rolling hills that give a fabulous view at every crest, then a sweet downhill run to the next climb.  Delightful riding.

I get my 45 miles of fast tail wind and then another 26 miles of headwind after I make my turn to the east, but all is good.  I camp at a free campsite, an EMS station in the wonderful town of Wimberley.   Plus there is another cyclist there from Portland OR; He is originally from Indonesia but now calls Portland home.  He is a chatterbox and shares many, many stories about his exploits cycling down the West Coast (he left for his trip in early summer 2011) and then starting the Southern Tier in the Fall.  I have met many people along the way who have told me about him (his name is Tai) and now I meet him.  Of all the riders I have met so far, he seems closest to me in his view of the Southern Tier: too few roads, too many cars, too few interesting towns.  He is planning to turn north when he gets in the vicinity of New Orleans, and ride along the Mississippi River.  He has heard about a trail that will take him along the river all the way north to Minnesota.  I hope I run into him again someday.  

71 miles