Heading back toward Socorro, I was about to do a fine job of missing the bonus sights sprinkled along the way, had it not been for Bonus Site Captain Hopper-Brooks pulling over to record them usually with me sailing by not realizing where they were. We had already lost Jim L. when we pulled over at the Owl Bar and Café in San Antonio to do just that. We caught him at the fuel stop in Socorro (weren’t we just here?) on our way to the western part of the state, and the next leg of the rally. Doing good. Sun gods. Adidas.

While I was happy that the ride was proceeding on schedule and we were beginning to reel in other riders who left long before we did, I was beginning to get the feeling that all was not right. Fuel and bonus site stops were beginning to lengthen each time. Kristi was starting to look a bit gray around the gills. When I finally got the nerve up to ask at the Very Large Array Radio Telescope Observatory stop how she was, she looked at her shoes and snapped that she was fine. Hokay. She had been fighting off an inner ear infection all week, but informed us at breakfast that she was 100% ready to go. It was now 3:30. The 100% was dwindling. I tried not to worry, and was failing. I did not push the issue, and Kristi rewarded (bribed) me with a banana before we lit out towards Datil Wells campground and the next bonus site. On the road back to highway 60, I saw a rider pulled over in the distance with gear spread all around the bike. Not wanting (much) to leave a competitor stranded in the middle of the desert with a broken bike, I pulled over to see what the problem was. I could now see he obviously was not one of ours. A seriously Baja-kitted XR600R Honda was parked in the road, it’s owner milling around. While this in itself is not strange, the fact that he had a large guitar strapped to his back took a minute to soak in. Dressed in shorts, Tevas, a tee-shirt and a genuine Gilligan replica hat, he looked at me for a moment while I tried to put this little scene right in my head. "Uh, need help?" I ventured. "Naw, duuude!", came the Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure reply. "I’m just lubing my chain!!" He punctuated the reply with a peace sign and a surfers grin. As I was riding off, I could not help but wonder what he was doing out there. He was not at the visitor’s center at VLA when we were there. There was only one road in and out, and we were on it. I spent the next few miles tortured with the image of this guy out in the middle of nowhere singing a nocturne to a rabbit or a bush. C’mon, Porter, keep it together. Ra, the Sun God. Atlantis.

The length of the fuel and bonus stops continued to increase, along with my concern over my riding companion. Through Datil, Pie Town, Quemado, and Reserve, I could see that Kristi was sick, and getting sicker. She was determined to keep going and finish, reinforcing the point by setting a torrid pace on highway 32, a wonderfully scenic and twisty road from Quemado to Apache Creek. We stopped for the bonus stamp at the service station in Apache Creek and decided to check tire pressures and oil levels. My concern was deteriorating to stress, and that was starting to consume patience. I inadvertently barked at Kristi for not bringing extra oil to top off her Suzuki, which was showing a bit low. Kim Haven, who had ridden a marathon of a rally so far (she did not get out of the shop until noon and had already caught us by putting in one hell of a ride), witnessed it. She commented to Kristi that I needed to have a part of my (male) anatomy adjusted. She was right. She volunteered. I tread lightly around Kim for the rest of the rally. She could do it. Jim L wisely stayed out of it. Working our way down highway 12 to highway 180 on our way to Silver City I was trying to tamp down the awful feeling that Kristi might not make it. The feeling was not helped by the fact that the sun was gone, and it was getting cold. Ahead was the mandatory stop in Las Cruces, then across the Sacramento Mountains to the high plains of eastern New Mexico. It was dark. Very dark. And it was going to be very dark for a long time. As we pulled in to Silver City, I knew that I had a tough decision to make.

She came out of the ladies room and sat in front of me in the booth. "You’re sick." I hated saying it. "You have been sick all day." She put her head down and nodded. I felt horrible confronting her like this. Maybe later I could find a puppy to kick and make myself feel better. The look on Kristi’s face certainly wasn’t doing it. We decided to at least make the Las Cruces (it was shorter than backtracking to Albuquerque) mandatory checkpoint, and see how she felt then. I downed a quick slice of ham and pepperoni while Kristi sipped water. Food was as out of the question than stopping was for her. Donning cold weather gear for the ride down to Deming, fatigue started making it’s presence known among worry and stress. We can still do it though. Roe is a sun god. Alanis Morrisette wears sneakers. Huh?

Kristi awoke, and felt no better. I had a feeling she wouldn’t, but did not want to vocalize it. We suited up just after the checkpoint closed at midnight to take the bailout route up I-25 back to Albuquerque. Jeff informed us that 11 other riders failed to make the checkpoint, so all was not lost. Missing the stamps from the Las Cruces checkpoint meant a huge point loss, so even though we would miss the eastern leg we might still finish ahead of the missing riders. He expressed concern that some riders had not been heard from. Kristi and I told him of the DNF’s that we knew about, such as last seeing Tim Meeks calling a friend from Reserve to come pick up his R1100RS, the rear tyre showing cords after having shedded it’s exoskeleton.

Making our way up I-25, it dawned on me that this is the second time this year I have done this same leg on an endurance ride at about the same time of night at about the same temperature, both on moonless nights. Which is another way to say it sucks. Dark, cold, and just flat boring were no way to prematurely end this rally, yet here we were. It didn’t last long, though. 12 miles south of San Antonio, Kristi pulls over. Sick again. As she waits for the wave to pass, a pickup pulls in behind us. It’s Jeff and his sister Gail, on their way back to Albuquerque to oversee the finish in a few hours. We wait as Kristi gets to feeling better, then take off again—just to pull over again 1 mile later. Sick again? No. The bike is starting to cut out and die. Oh, perfect. I look over everything, see nothing obvious (at 2:30 am, nothing is obvious) wrong, and we try again. Same result three times. The Suzuki would make it about a mile then quit again. It had fuel(?) and spark. Air was obviously in abundance. Each time it would quit, there would be several minutes of roadside diagnosis trying to get the ailing Suzi to run. Finally, at mile marker 131 it would go no further, refusing to even light off. We pushed it well off the road, locked it up, put Kristi’s tankbag in one of my saddlebags, put her soft saddlebags in Jeff’s truck, Kristi climbed on the back of the Beemer, and off we were to Socorro (again) for a final fuel stop.

Getting back on the interstate, I was mildly proud of myself for staying awake so well. That lasted until about Lemitar (I think) when all the concerns, the stress of breakdowns and illnesses, the disappointments, everything hit me all at once. I was suddenly very exhausted. Keeping the bike in one lane took great effort and concentration, no simple feat considering I was being followed by the rallymaster. No pressure. I was beginning to lose it, and did not want to admit it. The lights from oncoming traffic was beginning to dance before my eyes, the lights turning into bears, dancing bears, with little top-hats and canes, dancing and singing bears, singing "Loving You", by Minnie Riperton. Egads, I hate that song! Being sung by well-appointed bears was not helping. Maintain lane, maintain speed, God Roe, where is the sun? Maybe it’s in Crete with Morrison and Madonna. C’mon, concentrate!! Drop Kristi off at her house, maybe get an hour sleep at home, then make a flying trip to Vaughn and back for another Saddlesore 1000 award, gosh it’s bright, are we riding into a great majestic palace? Yes, guarded by bears from the Queens guard! What? No, wait, that’s just Albuquerque. We made it. I knew we would. Now someone get these damn bears out of here.

Back to the Winrock, official finishing time 9:04 am, 864 miles added to the Beemers odometer. Goat and Tom were there, anxious to find out what happened to the two other people I was supposed to be riding with. Halfway through the Readers Digest version, Jim L. came riding in, having completed the thousand. I sat down by my bike in the parking lot, looking at the sun shining down on all the Adonis-like faces of the finishers.

. POSTMORTEM

Dave (remember him? Kristi’s husband, the one that accurately quipped we were nuts) and I spent that afternoon going back down I-25 to retrieve the Suzuki. The postmortem later revealed that some moron had switched the lines coming out of the fuel tank to the petcock—meaning that when the bike was on the "on" position, it was actually on the "reserve" position. Switching to "reserve" meant it was outta gas, buck. I told Kristi to fire her mechanic. She reminded me that I was the mechanic. Yeah, I know that. Fire him! Please!

The Banquet was held that evening at the Atomic Museum on Kirkland Air Force Base. Dinner was eaten, awards were handed out, new friendships were made. Bob Norton invited us to Colorado to run the Thin Air TT, and Kim invited us along to the Waltz Across Texas rally. Oh, yeah! I can feel the sun on my face now…