We were due for a trip to Leakey, and so we took it. Regular readers will recall that normally it's me, Greg, and John. John, the lucky bastard that he is, was off riding in Europe for three weeks, so we went without him.

We're off! Greg following.

Truck with ladder leading... Crap!

He's still there...There were some pretty views coming up, so I took it easy.

The roads just drops away here.

You can see a long, long way.

We stopped to eat and to plan the rest of the route. Good motorcycle riders plan to eat, and eat to plan.

We were in Bandera, which is where we usually stop on this trip.

If you sit at the bar, you get to sit in a saddle. Yeee haw!

We sat at a normal table.

The place we ate had a thing for John Wayne. He filmed movies in this area.

This is our playground for the weekend. A funny thing happened on the way to Leakey... Hold your mouse over the image, and a green dotted line should appear near the middle of the image. It follows a road we decided to take. It looked interesting to us, and we'd never ridden it before.

They look like a nice, sweet old couple don't they? Don't be fooled, they are the scourge of the earth. We had to eat before them, because they look like the kind of people that get out in front of motorcycles and do.... GASP... the speed limit!

Greg was stalling, and I told him to hurry up and eat all the complimentary...

...butter.

We hit the road again. That's Greg way up in the distance. Remember that dotted line road that looked like fun to ride on?

It was! Here it is, a nice dirt road. These roads make me want a dual-sport bike so bad it isn't even funny.

We didn't ride the entire length of it, just about half. Then it was back onto terra firma. Greg up ahead, again.

I seem to be gaining on him somehow. Is it the zoom lens? Or is it...

Speed? Tee hee!

The roads out here are really curvy, and really fun.

Go ahead, make the sounds, VROOOOMM!

Soon we reached the cabins. This is the living room.

The kitchen. (do the walls look funny to you?)

My room.

And the bathroom vanity. Yes my friends, the walls are unfinished particle board. Weird. And the painted parts?

Painted particle board! This is a MAN'S cabin! Now, we didn't care one bit that the walls were not very fancy, because being inside this cabin is just stupid when this is what you see off your front porch...

A spring-fed creek that empties into the Frio River. Wuhoo! Gold star for Greg for finding this place!

Boy, I'll bet that water is cold, and it feels good!

All we have to do is move down the steps...

With our lawn chairs of course! Perfect!

Literally chillin'.

This is the nameless dog that hung out with us for a while. It turns out there were a lot of animals out there.

I'm hungry, and it's about time for dinner.

We went to Mama Cholo's, like we always do. I ate my food before I could take a photo of it, sorry!

Our meal worked out great, but some other folks' didn't have such a happy ending. Hold your mouse over the above text if you want to see what happened. Remember, I warned you.

And it was back to the cabin to enjoy the sunset and to listen to Greg say things like, "I don't know man, it's pretty weird to photograph tubs of butter. And people's barf."

A deer came down by the creek.

Later it got dark, as it usually does. There was a rustling in bushes near the porch, and I got excited. I was thinking that I would have a chance to see my second live armadillo, ever. I got the camera ready, and took a photo with the flash. Hold your mouse over the area above, and the image that I got should appear.

Just some kitty dropping the deuce. Dang.

Next thing we knew, it was morning. We sat out on the porch and drank our morning coffee. Greg said things like, "Great, you've now taken photos of butter, barf, and a cat taking a shit."

Greg doesn't understand art!

We hit the road and went to Lake Amistad. They built a dam and flooded a canyon out here. The dam and reservoir are on the border with Mexico. Apparently we share this with Mexico, which seems very un-American.

There are lots of pretty cliffs.

It's a pretty big piece of water, considering where we are.

From there we decided to haul ass out to some big bridge over the Pecos river.

Here it is. This is the funniest "No fishing from bridge" sign I've ever seen. The bridge is...

273 feet high! How the hell are you supposed to fish from a bridge that is 273 feet high? How much line comes on a spool? Do you use a 273 foot long pole with the net on the end of it to grab the fish? Or do you just reel it up the entire height? Hello?

A shot for the men...

and some shots for the ladies!

It was hot enough that jumping almost seemed like a good idea.

Wooo!

Downriver.

Ok, time to get back to that nice cool spring! Here is Greg passing me.

Zoooom! This was Rt 55, and we hauled ass on it.

A very curvy road. This is probably dangerous...

The moon was up, and you can see some of the fireflies that were buzzing around the creek. We also had a bat, but I didn't get a picture of it. I mentioned this to Greg, and he said something like, "Darn, maybe you could get a picture of the bat barfing and shitting at the same time?" I think he was making fun of me.

Back in the Particle Board Palace we got ready for bed, and the next day's ride home.

We checked out some other cabins on the Frio River. The river part was more scenic, but it seemed to have more people, and seemed like it would be too loud.

We decided we didn't want to stay here, that we liked the place we were at, by saying things like, "They charge more for these cabins. Probably because they have sheet rock or some froo-froo shit on the walls. Screw that!"

It sure was pretty.

I don't get this, but that's ok, I had my own interpretation. I imagined myself being behind this lumbering behemoth on the road, and thinking, "Would you pull over, or do the speed limit, for Christ's sake!"

I'd like to think that on the back of their car they have a sticker that says something like, "For the love of God!" or "For Pete's Sake!"

Ok, that's it. The last shot is a blurry one of the GPS with the trip summary. 833 miles in 2.5 days. almost 15 hours on the bikes. Maximum speed of...well, you can read.

Thanks!