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Carving Canyons in Utah
Torrey would be an unremarkable small town in Utah but for two things: the soaring crimson cliffs of the Capitol Reef National Monument that overlook it, and Highway 12, which ends there. Arguably the most exciting motorcycling road in the state, it's a 100-mile continuum of fast, open bends, head-spinning switchbacks and wriggling canyon curves. So, I'm not surprised to see the town's general store surrounded by motorcycles. More than usual as I learn because it just so happens I've stumbled upon a relatively new Torrey tradition, the biannual BMW Sport Touring event known as the "un-rally."
Friday: I arrive in pious Utah through a portal of improbable contrasts via the sin cities of the southwest desert. Collecting an FZ1 from Yamaha Motor Corporation in the L.A. suburb of Cypress, I push north against a searing desert wind on I-15. I swelter in interminable traffic through Vegas, awed by the surreal, super-sized ziggurats swamping the skyline. In the wake of visiting the Guggenheim Art of the Motorcycle show here in 2001, what I remember most are the sad, sleep-deprived Mexican children thrusting call-girl flyers at me as I walked the Strip. I have no desire to linger.
I cross into Northeast Arizona at a garish gambling-guns-and-gas complex – its flashing neon hustling liquor and slots – and ramble into the Virgin River Gorge, a desolate chasm crusted in muddy pink. At the Utah border near St. George, I pull into the information station to ask about accommodations; but it's closed, as these places always seem to be when you need them. There's a custodian, though, and as he hands me a pile of tourist brochures, I ask if this is a "dry" county....
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