From Nampa, Idaho. Who knew Idaho was going to be so pretty?

Wanna see what I saw? You can see all the photos here (14 of them):

https://photos.app.goo.gl/pS4k3p2vgf3JoLjO2

It was a cold start this morning at 33 degrees. Did you know that is only one degree over freezing? Oh. I figured you did. But that is cold on a motorcycle. I did fine with it because I bundled up like the Pillsbury Doughboy with all my clothes and my handy dandy electric jacket liner, and I was just fine. The sun finally came out though and started warming things up. By the time I got to Nampa, it was 59 degrees. And the weather forecast looks good and warmer for the foreseeable future. I'm glad. That 33 degree stuff and rain stuff is hard to take.

It was a pleasant ride today with very scenic views as you can tell from the photos. And a short one for me - only 200 miles. You will remember that I had stopped two days ago about half way through the day's mileage because of the rain and cold. Then I took a rest day. So today I finished up that day's ride. It was one of those situations were there was no convenient motel a bit further along. So I was satisfied to have a shorter day. I rode from 10 to 3. I waited until 10 hoping it would start warming up, but it was still 33 when I left.

One of the problems I have is making sure I find gas. Because I am taking the back roads, not the freeways, there can be very long stretches without gas. That's a problem for me because my gas tank only holds 1.8 gallons of gas. Then I have 3 MSR bottles with a little over a half gallon in the three of them. My mileage depends on how fast I am going, of course. When I am lazing along at 45-50, I get well over 70 mpg. One time I went 88 miles and put in one gallon. But when I am pushing it at blazing fast speeds like 55 or even 60, then my mileage goes down to about 60 mpg. So that would mean that in a worst case scenario, I should be able to go 140 miles on the gas I have on board. And if I am taking it easy, I could get almost 200 miles.

I am using Google maps and telling it to avoid "highways" = freeways. The problem is that Google could very easily take me on routes that may be close to gas stations but not exactly by gas stations. I was on one stretch of road two days ago with a sign that said, "Next services 104 miles." It turned out that I found gas in about 50 miles, but that will make you stop and start calculating the ounces! I prefer to get gas somewhere between 50 and 80 miles, and almost always it works out that way.

So now one of my bits of homework is to look on Google maps and find the gas stations along my route the next day, so that I make sure I don't run out. Of course, if it did, I would probably stop at a farmer's house and see if he would sell me some gas from his lawnmower's gas can. I'd probably be fine. Probably. But you know, "probably" can make you nervous. Sometimes there's not a farmer.

Two more days of riding, and I should be at the coast, as in the Pacific coast, as in "TW200 Coast to Coast!" That was may goal, and it's close. The bike is running fine, and I am feeling fine. So all signs look promising that I will achieve this goal.

(And let's not even talk about the fact that I will still have a 2,600 mile ride back home! That's just a commute.)

Thanks for riding along with me.