To Ride or to Sail, that's the...

Day 3 in our journey from Fargo to Las Vegas started at 8am in Rock Springs, Wyoming, heading towards Utah.

To be perfectly honest, it was almost sad to leave WY as the land scape make for perfect motorcycling backdrops. Even that's only considering what we've seen from mostly highways and a few backroad passes and some more canyons. I don't even want to begin to imagine what it would be like when you take your bike off the beaten path and start exploring the back country with all its roads leading you from mountains to canyons to seemingly endless rolling hills depict as farm land. Could it be that WY is just a tad bit underrated? I leave that discussion for another day, though.

Welcome to Utah!
Park City - Whatta view, even from the highway! An incredible spectacle of mountain ranges, still topped of with snow, to homes cut right into the mountain. If you haven't seen it yet, you absolutely must put it on your list of places to visit.
Was there once a day when we complained about wind in North Dakota? Not anymore. The wind through Utah was incredible. Made me want to adopt to the idea to just put a sail on the bike and safe on gas. Headwinds quickly killed that idea, though...
(i posted a few twitter images - will post more later) Gusts up to 50 mph switched from straight head wind, to brutal cross winds that just smacked the bikes around, pulled my head in every which way it pleased. In short, it was cruel.
However, even with the winds being "abnormally strong - I've never ridden in this high of winds" so a Harley Davidson rider at a gas station, there were a ton of bikers out on the roads, and we pressed on wanting to make it to Mesquite to meet with Van and MaryAnn.
We met some more motorcyclists along the way, including a couple from LA who were headed for Grand Junction, CO. A husband and wife team, each on their own Harley. Super nice folks, easy to talk to and just one of us. "Us" being that large motorcycle community where you talk to one another, inquire about your origin and your destination and have a little chat about the things that happened in between.
Continuing to battle the high winds, seeking momentary shelter at 80 mph where the highway was cut through rocks, we finally made it to Mesquite, NV. Quite an accomplishment to just go through an entire state that welcomes you with incredible winds for several hundred miles.
Finally, arrival in Mesquite, some welcomed downtime until we all met up and then headed the final leg of 65 miles to Las Vegas, NV - to dinner.
Meeting some more of my old friends, we headed to dinner, caught up on 4 years worth of not being able to insult each other in a matter of about 3 hrs - it felt like coming home to family and was certainly
a welcome finish for 2 1/2 days and 1600+miles worth of riding.

We'll be jetting around Las Vegas and the immediate surrounding areas for the coming days, before we embark on our journey back home to Fargo. This time across Bryce Canyon, into the Rockies, leaving Denver in the south...
Check the "Trip Map" to view our plan and feel free to follow along on the "Live Tracker".

Ya'll (Wyoming speak) have a splendid weekend and we'll see you on the road,

MJ