It would be a good days ride but not out of hand.  It is somewhere around 400 miles from Phoenix, Arizona to the tiny town of Tecopa, California.  Tecopa is in the Mojave Desert and just a bit south of Death Valley.  There is a hostel in Tecopa where I planned to spend the first night of my trip.  I had wanted to leave early in the day and get into the hostel around dinnertime.  Unfortunately, I didn't leave as early as I had hoped, but that's another story.  It was eleven in the morning before I pulled out of my driveway.  Now, to get to the hostel before dark was going to
require some serious motoring.

I've had my PC for six years and put almost 50,000 miles on it.  I have a pretty good idea what kind of range I can expect from a tank of gas.  Even though I've squeezed well over 200 miles from a tankful on occasion, generally I seem to get closer to 180 miles.  It doesn't seem to matter whether I'm doing city or highway driving.  The urban stop and go driving cuts into potential for more miles per tank as does the 75 mile per hour speed limit on many of Arizona's highways.

But this time, I'm not doing the speed limit.  I'm finding the bike settles into a nice groove around 90.  I'm making great time flying across the wide-open Arizona desert toward California on I-10.  But I'm also noticing I'm consuming petrol at a heretofore-unknown rate.  Early projections are looking somewhere in the area of 120 to 140 miles per tank!  I've never seen cruising range figures this low but then I've never run this fast for this long.  Before the end of my first tank, I had already gotten nervous about running out and had added the contents of the liter bottle of gas that was in my trunk.  When I got to the next gas station, it became apparent that my precautionary move was not necessary but I was glad to have a little reserve and so I refilled it along with my tank and vowed not to run so close to the edge on fuel.

I ate a late lunch within sight of the London Bridge at Lake Havasu City.  I was making great progress but the mileage was so low that I worried that I hadn't balanced the carbs before leaving on this trip.  I was estimating the
trip at 3000 miles.  I was well within the recommended service interval on the carbs and I still would be at the end of the trip.  Consequently, I had changed the oil and let it go at that.  Now I was wondering if it was just a matter of speed or if my failure to balance the carbs was a major factor.  I took on my second fill-up of the day and pushed on.  It was looking good for getting to the hostel at Tecopa before total darkness set in.

I continued north up the pleasant two lane highway that hugged the banks of the Colorado River.  I was still generally travelling at a high rate of speed when I got to I-40 and turned west again.  For several miles I fell in
behind a group of 3 sport bikers that seemed similarly motivated.  After I crossed into California near Needles (famous as the home of Snoopy's brother Spike) I stopped at a rest area.  Not only was I burning lots of fuel, but
in the desert heat I was also consuming lots of water.  I refilled my Camelback and checked the map.  I noted that the exit where I was to leave I-40 looked like a promising crossroad where there was sure to be fuel for my next fill-up.  Continuing on, I passed the turn-off for Route 66.  I noted that The Mother Road dipped south but roughly paralleled the Interstate.  That exit sign mentioned the town of Amboy.  In the next several miles there were a couple of more exits for roads which crossed the ten or so miles of desert void that separated the Interstate and Route 66.

Again, the signs mentioned Amboy.  "Amboy next three exits" I said to myself.  I still was maintaining a very good clip as I throttled through the desert on the slab.  My mind took up the interesting problem of optimization.  If I factored in the time that it takes me to get off the highway and fill up for gas which I was now doing almost twice as often as I normally would, was I really saving that much time?  I decided that the answer was yes.  Since I was on a once-in-a-lifetime vacation, I was willing to overlook the speed-induced diseconomy that was compounded by a dramatic rise in price per gallon.  Before leaving home, I had filled up at my neighborhood station that always has the lowest price around.  I had paid $1.399 per gallon there.  The price of my previous fill-ups was pushing
$1.90.

I was snapped back to a much less theoretical problem when I got to the turn-off that would take me north toward Tecopa.  There was no fuel at this exit.  There was nothing!  As I turned north a sign read, "No services next 58 miles."  Looking at my fuel gauge and even factoring in my spare liter of fuel I was pretty sure I could only make about 30 miles.  Looking north I saw a vast emptiness.  Consulting the map again I noted that the road that I had planned to take north also continued south toward Amboy.  OK, I'll detour south to Amboy and fill up there.  It's out of my way but it beats running out of gas in the middle of nowhere.  I'm making such good time that I can accept the detour and resume my course and still make it to Tecopa around dusk.  I turn south for about 10 miles and hooked up with Route 66.

Amboy is about 5 more miles to the west on Route 66.  At this even more desolate intersection there is a California Highway Department sign that says that tells me there is gas in Amboy from 8 AM to 6 PM.  Great!  It's only about 5:30 now, plenty of time.  The sun is low on the horizon as I traverse the remaining 5 miles to Amboy.  I begin to think that if aliens are looking for a place to put down a huge spaceship where nobody would notice, this has got to be a good candidate.  The desert begins to feel like some cosmic joke.  I normally appreciate that in an arid sort of way, the desert is beautiful and it is a delicate and fascinating ecosystem teeming with a surprising amount of life.  But after sweating my ass off riding through it all afternoon and, with the oasis of my suburban Phoenix stomping
grounds fresh in my mind, it now seems to be a huge and totally useless wasteland.

My heart sinks as I pull into Amboy.  There are several clearly abandoned buildings and there is a cafe with two aging pumps outside.  The sign on the window states the hours of operation but then a larger contradictory sign
below loudly states, "Closed".  Behind the large plate glass windows of the cafe, it looks frozen in time.  It looks like it could have been operating yesterday but maybe it hasn't been open yet this year.  I just can't tell.  The signs by the pump boldly advertise that gas in this part of the world is going for $2.50 per gallon when it goes at all.  This is making the buck-eighty-eight I paid in Havasu look like a downright bargain.  Forget a buck-forty at home!  Next door to the cafe is a motel that looks like, if there were more people around, it would have a chain link fence around it.   It is clearly dysfunctional.  In this God forsaken place, this motel stands there laughing at me, daring me to vandalize it.  It says, "What would you gain?  Who would care?"  The sign inside the motel office proudly
announces that Amboy was established in 1964 and it boasts 20 inhabitants.  Looking around I believe that this population figure is a historical claim with no relevance to today.  Across the street is a tiny but solidly built
structure that is the Amboy post office.  This entire building looks like it would fit in my cubicle at work but I chalk this up as an optical illusion.  The emptiness that surrounds this glorious edifice only appears to diminish
it.   Nevertheless, I imagine the wall of post office boxes inside.  There would be a whopping twenty of them, one for every man woman and child that ever lived in this stinking town.

This is a nightmare I begin to think.  OK, it's not life or death, but it's a nightmare.  I have food and water.  I have my tent and sleeping bag.  I could find a place to spend a reasonably comfortable night here in hopes that the cafe will open in the morning.  But this is the first day of my vacation.  The first day on what promised to be a fabulous ride on the Pacific Coast Highway.  I have not seen another car for a half an hour now.   Back home, this would be rush hour.  I can only imagine the solitude that will come when rush hour in Amboy is over.  The only thing moving is a stray dog that draws my attention to another abandoned building a few hundred yards further down the road.  I now notice that there is a fairly contemporary motor home parked there.  Optimistically, I leave my bike by the pump outside the cafe and walk to the motor home.  There are promising signs of life and so I knock on the door.  A somewhat elderly man answers the door.  I ask about the cafe and he casually says, "Oh, they're open sometimes."  I inquire about tomorrow morning and he helpfully answers, "Maybe."  I ask where the next nearest gas is and he points west and says "Twenty six miles in Ludlow".  From looking at the map earlier I recognize that he is referring to the dot where Route 66 rejoins the Interstate.  When I left the Interstate I probably could have made Ludlow buy from here I suspect that I could only make half that distance.  I consider adding my spare liter and riding my tank dry.  Then if take my empty fuel bottle and managed to thumb a ride the rest of the way and back to the bike, that amount could still leave me a few miles short. My mind echos, "This is a nightmare."  The thought of keeping my reservation at the hostel in Tecopa is rapidly fading and the idea of making Sacramento by the following night is going with it.  I'm thinking that I'll lose the better part of a day of my vacation in this debacle.  I ask this guy if he has a gallon of gas he would be willing to sell me.  He shakes his head.  "Anybody around here
that might?" I ask.  He informs me that there are only three families in Amboy and he gestures vaugely out into the desert and says, "And I KNOW that HE doesn't have any."  I'm pretty sure that I don't even want to meet HIM.

The man continues, "The other folks live over there and they might.  She drives the school bus into Needles.  Someone might be home by now."  My heart momentarily goes out to the poor children that have to ride that
tremendous distance to school everyday but I console myself that there can't be many of them.  I walk back to the bike and decide to squander a little of my remaining fuel and ride the bike past the motel and up the little dirt road to the tiny home to which I had been directed.  Sitting out under the carport is a couple drinking beers.  "How are you doing?" he says as I dismount and approach.  "Not too good." I answer, "In need some gas."  The man laughs.  He asks about where I'm headed and how much gas I have and how big my tank is and some other pointless conversation.  At this point I realize that amid the clutter in the carport right there at my feet is a red plastic five-gallon gas can that appears to be full.  I think I began to salivate.  He gestures and says, "Well, I got five gallons right there."  I wipe the drool off my chin and ask if he will sell me a fill-up.  He says, "Oh I couldn't do that, I might spill some on your bike and you'd be mad at me."  As I offer to pour my own gas I realize that this guy is just playing with me.  He's got me by the short hairs and he knows it.  I'm thinking about what is in my wallet and what it will take to spring this petrol loose.  He says, "How much money have you got."  I must have been thinking
about how much this gas would be worth to me as a desert version of the movie Deliverance spins through my head.  "Alot." I blurt out.  Instantly I know I've said the wrong thing and I do some quick math.  I factor in the price at the pump a couple hundred yards away and a reasonable premium for extortion and the problem of trying to make change and I quickly follow up my blunder with, "I'll give you twenty dollars if I can fill my tank from your can."  "Sold," He says smiling.

As I pour slightly less than four gallons from the jug into my tank I begin to suspect that this is probably the guy that runs the freaking cafe.  I can't imagine that I'm the first person to ever buy gas here.  I mean the jug was just sitting there.  From the barren landscaping around the house it is pretty clear that they don't need it for their lawn mower.  I return the jug with more than a gallon still in it and fork over a twenty.  As I leave I imagine the guy walking down the lane to the cafe, unlocking the door, turning on the pumps, filling the jug and grabbing another beer.  I'm
sure the five gallon jug was intended to be sufficient to get all but the largest land yacht 26 miles west for a proper fill-up but I turned back north and headed on toward Tecopa.  I know I paid over five bucks a gallon but I was
ecstatic to be sitting on a full tank of gas and watching downtown Amboy disappear in my rearview mirror.

It was plenty dark by the time I nursed that expensive fuel 120 miles to the hostel but it was still before 9:00.  As I checked in for the night, I gave the gracious hostel manager a Readers Digest version of my day.  By the look of pity on her face as I told her about the enterprising homeowner selling me the most expensive fill-up of my bike's life, I imagined her saying, "You schmuck, he usually only gets fifteen!"

(Note:  On the way home from San Clemente I maintained a modest speed and got 208 miles out of a tank and still had half a gallon when I filled up.  The carbs were fine, I was just going too fast that first day.)

Neill
 

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