Day 17: Monday 03/21/16, El Paso, TX to Ft. Hancock, TX

Day 17 distance: 57 miles

Total miles:  926 miles

Elevation gain: 307 feet

Map of today's ride:

Today's ride from El Paso to Fort Hancock,Texas, was 57 miles long with about a 7 mile headwind. It was a very manageable wind to deal with compared to yesterday's 20 mph headwind. Traffic was quite heavy this morning as we had to go right through downtown El Paso, which, if not challenging enough, was made worse by several street closures. Then, TX 76 South, right outside of El Paso, had about a 5 mile stretch that was under construction and was a very narrow two lane without any shoulder. Wherever we had an opportunity, we would pull off to let the backed up traffic pass.

I had one other concern today when after our first SAG stop, my Garmin 1000, which contains the daily maps and gives me turn by turn directions, started shutting down for no reason. I stopped and tried to get it to run, but it would not. Fortunately, another coaster was close by and I followed him the rest of the day to Fort Hancock. Since then, I was able to finally get the Garmin to do a factory reset and it now seems OK. I did lose all the data on the device as well as all the daily routes so still have to load them and make sure it will work when set up as I use it. Most of the coasters are doing the ride with a simpler bicycle computer that keeps track of distance, time, and speed, which they need in conjunction with the daily map and turn by turn cue sheet. Although I always carry the cue sheet with me, it is close to worthless without a working bicycle computer, as it is based upon distance traveled between turns. I have included copies of a daily map and cue sheet in the picture's section so you can see what is used if you do not have a $600 bicycle computer.

Today's pictures:

View this morning, a couple miles from our motel, overlooking the city of El Paso.

This was the heavy traffic we rode through in downtown El Paso. The lane to our right was closed ahead so all the traffic was funneled over to our lane. Fortunately, we did find that the motorists who we slowed were all very courteous.

We rode past a very large oil refinery complex as we were leaving downtown El Paso.

This house needed some work, but it looked to me like a small Southwestern Classic!

Bubba bought everyone a pastry at our first SAG stop today at Pro's Ranch Market.  I snapped a picture of coaster Mark Copher trying to decide which one to select.

Today's recommended lunch stop. Mexican of course. What else is there? I skipped lunch as we only had another 24 miles to ride and I wanted to work on my Garmin computer problem. In the doorway on the left is return coaster from 2015, Mike Barge. On the right is coaster Mark Copher.

There is a lot of agricultural activity south of El Paso. I saw alfalfa fields, numerous large pecan orchards (that is what is in the background of this picture), and harvested cotton fields. I have no idea what will be planted or has been planted in the tilled field in the foreground.

A reservoir along Texas Highway 20. I understand the mountains in the background are in Mexico.

Some abandoned buildings as we entered Fort Hancock, Texas.

Ahead of our rider's meeting this evening, Bubba was trying to find the owners of unclaimed laundry and SWAG items. SWAG items are clothing items that riders shed and leave in bins at SAG stops as temperatures warm up.

Tonight's diner menu. Delicious as always!

This map is on one side of the rider's handout every night. On the top is the route with mileage markers and on the bottom is the riding elevation profile. As you can see by the elevation profile, today's ride is as flat as a ride can be. It even had an overall slight down grade for most of the ride.

This is the cue sheet that most riders use to ride the correct route each day. The second column is the mileage from one alert point (either a turn or route information) to the next. The third column is the mileage to the alert point from the start of the ride. You can see how hard it would be to do the ride without at least a distance computer. Personally, I would rather enjoy the ride and have the computer beep and tell me when, the road name, and what direction to turn rather than watching the distance as I ride. My computer beeps a few hundred feet ahead of the turn and a large arrow and road name enlarges that shows the distance to the turn and counts down in feet. SLICK!

 LINK to Day 17 of my 2015 C2C blog.