Day 30 (El Paso, TX back to San Antonio)

I woke up this morning (June 15, 2009) in El Paso, Texas with a sense of relief about being home around 4:30 – 5:00pm. I was so looking forward to being home but it also gave me some time to think about my journey around the country. I was going to be going 545 miles to make it to my front door and I thought after riding 828 miles one day that this is nothing. Well that is not allows the case because it always seems to take longer when you get closer to your final destination and the drive from Ft. Stockton to San Antonio still seems like it takes forever.

Luckily, there was nothing real eventful but I knew I was back in Texas when I had to go through the Border Patrol inspection station where they ask you where you are going and are you a U.S. citizen. How come they never ask you that along the roads up north where you are real close to the Canadian border? But then I never saw Border Patrol checkpoints either. Interesting!

I have to say though this eventually turned out to be a really hot ride during the afternoon hours. I had to pull off more times than normal just so I could cool my body temperature down and of course Texas is loaded with Dairy Queens so that always helps with heat reduction.

As I had said earlier, I had some time to think about what I had done and I felt somewhat depressed that I was not able to raise very much money, let alone anything near the $50,000.00 that I had hoped to raise for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. I had to face some real hard realities in my journey and yes, I finished going around the country (minus four states, due to schedule changes) but I just didn’t feel like I accomplished what I really set out to accomplish which was raise more money. Despite what some people may think, this trip really wasn’t about me at all. It was more of an honor to ride for people that have been stricken with cancer (remission or died) and for their friends and family who supported them through these tough times.

I did finally arrive back home sometime between 4:30 and 5:00pm. I couldn’t believe it at all. And today I spent a number of hours cleaning my bike because it was driving me nuts.

I hope that if you have not been able to yet, that you will consider donating to The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society on behalf of “Cruisin’ For A Cure. This is not over yet despite my arrival back home.

http://www.active.com/donate/cruisinforacure

Note of Interest:

I am behind in some of my previous postings and will work on telling you about the travels I have had prior to my arrival back home. Stay tuned shortly as I need some time to go through my notes and pictures. I start back up at work tomorrow as well. I have some really neat stuff to share with you so I'm not posting previous blogs

The photo albums are located in my Photobucket.com website at:
http://s443.photobucket.com/albums/qq158/pwestjr

I still have photos from a while back that I need to upload so please be patient with me.

Pete West
pwestjr@gmail.com
(210) 563-0509 (cell)
http://www.active.com/donate.com/cruisinforacure (donation website)