Easy Rider 2019

When we woke up in daylight this morning we saw this in the hotel car park, an old locomotive once run by the Death Valley Railway Company: Also in the car park our holiday transport: We headed off bright and early leaving Furnace Creek behind riding toward the lowest point of the USA, Badwater Basin situated in Death Valley that is nearly 300 feet below sea level. The sign here is way up the rock face and, identifies sea level: Here is a sign that is easier to read: Here is a plaque detailing the typical temperatures experienced in Death Valley. What it must have been like for the early settlers before the advent of air conditioning one can only imagine: Today we experienced temperatures up to 94F. After Badwater Basin we continued south to Shoshone in brilliant sunshine on empty twisty roads as good as any experienced in Europe (not all roads in the USA are dead straight!). We then crossed the Mohave Desert stopping for a picnic lunch in the welcome shade ...

Yesterday afternoon we met up with our fellow travellers - 5 Germans, 2 Swiss (German speaking), 2 Danes, 1 Dutchman, 1 Kiwi and 6 Brits (including us) and our Group Leader, Alan, and Support Vehicle Driver, Steve. The evening was spent at Gene Simmons (Kiss) restaurant in Los Angeles getting to know each other, albeit the main topic of conversation was sleep (or lack of it!). Something to do with the age profile of the group, I think...... Tracey and I by the official transport: Thursday morning saw us all pile down to the Eagle Rider premises in LA to collect our rental Harleys - Tracey and I have a Electra Glide Ultra (armchair on two wheels). We don't have these replicas of Billy and Wyatt's bikes: And so off in to the horrendous Los Angeles traffic passing the end of the runway where Billy and Wyatt did their drug deal with the pusher (played by Phil Spector) and then north towards the spectacular Panamint Valley and ultimately on to Death Valley via Ballarat,...

Well, we arrived on the west coast of the USA but not without a farily nerve jangling experience and a delay en route. Our direct flight from Heathrow was due in to LAX at 12.25 (20.25 UK time, we're now 8 hours behind) but as we flew over Canada a rather odd, acrid, smell filled the cabin of our British Airways Jumbo Jet 747-400. Much activity amongst the cabin crew and anxious faces amongst passengers before the captain came over the tannoy to announce seatbelts on, screens off, we're diverting to Chicago, 300 miles/45 minutes away. 45 nerve jangling minutes later we touched down in Chicago to be greeted by the Chicago Fire Service with sniffer devices and heat seeking machines! Flight duly aborted, BA chartered an American Airlines plane to fly us across America to Los Angeles (2,300 miles/4 hours further on) and we eventually arrived in LA at 19.30 (3.30 UK time) arriving at our hotel Crowne Plaza, Los Angeles Airport an hour later, tired and hungry, having been travelli...