RUN FOR THE WALL Jean and Larry: Day 2 of the Run

HOLY COW what a day!!!
(FYI I finished updating Day 1)

As we got up, Larry told me it was 47. Brrr.. I started to layer the clothes.

Breakfast was provided by the mayor, John Moore and son. The lady here served in Vietnam for 2 years 9 months. She help prepare and set up breakfast. This is her 6th year doing it and loves it.

Morning staging

Chase vehicle

Here is platoon 3 (ours) Dave, Ken, Gomez, Skip. Dave and Skip are the tail gunners, Ken is platoon leader and Gomez is asst platoon leader.

Gunny and PattyO - Gunny founder of RFTW. Great guy and always thank you for coming

E-Z is the Central Route Coordinator.

Here is out Platoon leader, Ken and Asst. Gomez

Not looking too good and in fact had a little rain

Not to far out of town, we hit some pretty big bumps in the road. Gomez bounced around a bit and lost the ignition off his bike. Needless to say, the bike stopped running. He had to pull over. He looked for it but no luck. He was able to hot wire it and catch up with the group. Since we were right behind him, Larry and I moved into the spot. Now we are at the front of the platoon/

Right next to Ken.

As Larry and I are on trips, he always says nothing like the motorcycle to smell everything. This is not necessarily one to them. :-)

If you look close at the red wire, you will see they are apart. This is to shut off. Then he twists them together to get started. He made a great comment:

"Improvise, adapt and overcome".

This is so true of our troops not matter what war or what age. Thanks Gomez , this says it all.

Dave , our tail gunner, really tries to keep motivating. High fives and pats on the back for job well done

On to Holbrook, AZ. As we arrive, all the kids were out of school waving flag. what a site. Then I heard Papa Smurf say "There is hope for America". The look on the kids faces as the waved the America flag was really neat to watch.

The American Legion was waiting on us. What a spread !!! and the desert!! I think everyone in town help on the front. Some of the kids played and sang for us.

As we sat down there were signs around the whole room like this one.

Heading out of Holbrook

Heading into New Mexico was beautiful. I feel like I say this a lot, but this country is really beautiful. EVERY state. No way to capture it in pictures

As we cross the boarder, I felt like we were surrounded by motorcycle police officers. This is because we were. They will escort us across the whole state of NM. They will also close the expressways tomorrow as we travel. They said the only time that happens is when the President comes thru or RUN FOR THE WALL.

What a reception. As we get off the exit to go into town for lunch, we have 8 miles of people. That is what you read, 8 miles of people standing on the street waving flags and cheering. Again Amazing. I have lots of pics but too many to choose from. Here are some

Our Fuel team!!!!!!

The gentleman here is a WWII Navajo Code Talker. He turned 93 today. He was among the many that came out. If you are like me, I was not sure what this is. so google helped:

Code talkers are people in the 20th century who used obscure languages as a means of secret communication during wartime. The term is now usually associated with the United States soldiers during the world wars who used their knowledge of native American languages as a basis to transmit coded messages. In particular, there were approximately 400–500 Native Americans in the US Marine Corps whose primary job was the transmission of secret tactical messages. Code talkers transmitted these messages over military telephone or radio communications nets using formal or informally developed codes built upon their native languages.

They had 21 gun salute, played taps, and lots of singing (chanting)

The turn out here in Gallup was wild!!! Ceremonies from the American Indians. Many had been there since noon preparing the circle. we all danced thru it to keep us safe.