Girl Meets World on FZ-07 Motorcycle: Chapter 2, Part 24

We waited til midday to leave West Plains, Missouri, hoping things would warm up just a little bit before we had to get on the road again aboard the Yamaha FZ-07 and FZ1. While technically, I still had heated glove liners somewhere in my bags, digging them out felt like more trouble than the inevitable calisthenics that would follow. We hopped on the 160 and started making our way west. While the browned trees didn't lend to particularly beautiful scenery, the road was like a rollercoaster of twists and turns and elevation changes. It almost reminded me of racing at Sonoma Raceway with the way the road fell into blind sweepers and flowed through chicanes. Fantastic.

However, the brisk morning soon turned to very brisk rain, and while I could have kept going, when we pulled into Branson, the loud, obnoxious, Vegas-style main drag made me really want to stop and check it out. We explored the city a bit, taking a ride on a free trolley that drove around downtown. It was a cute, kitschy little city, complete with fake castles and rainforests, and made for a fun break from the norm (except for when I tried to park my bike on the sidewalk. I guess “I do this all the time in California” isn’t an acceptable answer in Missouri).

The next day, however determined I was to leave Missouri, something about that cheap hotel breakfast left us both a little sick to our stomachs, so we ended up with one last stop near the Kansas border outside Joplin. We took one last night of recovery, then determined that tomorrow, we were going to officially check off state 48 and 49!

We headed out bright and early, almost immediately crossing into Kansas. Despite my best efforts to find something I wanted to see there, save, of course, the world’s largest ball of string, I couldn’t find much that sounded interesting. We headed maybe 30 miles into the state, then opted to just head down to Oklahoma. As we crossed over the Kansas/Oklahoma border, I found myself feeling completely overwhelmed. That was it. 49 states. While I won’t say, I’ve seen all our states have to offer, I officially put my FZ-07’s wheels down in every one of them. We stopped for lunch in Miami (which was decidedly not quite as happening as Florida’s version), and I couldn’t even figure out how to put into words how I felt. We finally grabbed a camp spot outside Muskogee, and celebrated around the campfire.

I felt pretty lazy getting ready to keep moving the next day. While we officially had ticked off 49 states, we still had to get back to SoCal to call the journey a success! Not that I had anywhere to really go back to in SoCal, having gotten rid of my apartment and the expensive payment that went with it, but I still felt it had to be the final destination. We made our way south and stopped for a breakfast burrito to start the day. I didn’t expect much, but I couldn’t help but wonder how much BFE Oklahoma knew about proper burritos. As the waiter set down a plate with a tortilla covered with two slices of American cheese haphazardly plopped on top, every SoCal bone in my body couldn’t help but laugh. It was every bit of “what the hell” that I wanted it to be, haha.

We eventually made our way down toward Dallas, where Hollywood’s good friend Pam had prepared a bottle of champagne in congratulations. After popping the bottle (And subsequently getting hosed down with said bottle, MotoGP podium style…. My hair was so sticky), we took a couple days to relax among friends. We stopped by Stacy’s Cycles for some maintenance and tire mounting on Hollywood’s FZ1 (Complete with an obligatory “I just got a new tire” smoky burnout), then we went by Maxim Motorsports for some work on the FZ-07. The December/January issue of Motorcyclist Magazine sat in their breakroom, and the staff was excited to get to work on “that bike from the magazine,” haha. I’ll never get used to that kind of reception.

After a couple days of waiting out the cold in Dallas with Pam and then her daughter, Lacey, we finally got back on track heading west. Riding across Texas was every bit as boring as I remembered (But this time strikingly colder than I remembered), so with little to-do, we made our way to New Mexico. Our friend Adam, who we had spent some time with earlier in the trip in Minnesota was now living in Las Cruces (Clearly reverse stalking us), so we spent another couple days with him and his wife, Sue, where we had some packages delivered (including a new and much more waterproof tent that Hollywood insisted we didn’t really need- but dammit this is my house now, and waking up cold and wet sucks). We then parted ways and made our way into Arizona.

A night of camping in Coronado National Forest immediately reminded me of why I love the west so much. Free and beautiful dispersed camping is abundant, unlike the over build east side of the country, and there are towering mountains as far as the eye can see. We spent the night rain testing our new tent in the desert (since when does it rain so much in the desert?!), then headed toward Phoenix to stay with my friend Anitta, a local mini bike racer. After a quick detour up to Las Vegas to spend Christmas with my good friend and fellow CVMA racer, Sam, we crossed into Death Valley, where we set up camp in Texas Springs campground in Furnace Creek, the same place I had spent my very first night of this whole endeavor way back in March. I think this is what we call “coming full circle.”

A lot of things had changed since the first time I threw a stake down and slept beside my bike in a little tent. The sun beating off the valley walls made the camp the most pleasantly warm I’ve been in months, really sinking in that I was back in California. This time, instead of standing alone, terrified of what I was getting myself into, I was standing there confidently with a travel companion who had experienced at least 6 of the last 9 months with me, a new perspective on how amazing our country really is, and understanding, truly, a sense of self-worth that I had never given myself when all I did was struggle with lap times and my daily grind.

After one last stop in Lone Pine to visit my good friend Bill who was building a home under the view of Mount Whitney in honor of his late wife, Joanna (the last person I had seen before leaving, and now the first person I saw coming back), I reunited with my mother for my birthday, then headed down toward Joshua tree to camp with Stacy, another friend we had met along the way.

To finish this trip though, there was only one more place I had to go before returning to the city: Chuckwalla Valley Raceway. We pulled into Chuckwalla, and spent the New Year the only way that made sense- with my track family. Doing a few laps around the track on my fully loaded FZ was the greatest victory lap I can even imagine. About 40,000 miles and 9 months later, I can finally say I’ve done it. As for what’s next? Well, while I would love to get my FZ to Hawaii and call it 50 states, I think I’m going to have to use what’s left of my savings to try something a little more land (and finance) friendly. Next Stop- Mexico!