The first day of the rally basically started with us getting set up with a route to ride in the morning.  Jim and I had one planned, but Jim had obviously been busy.  He'd managed to find a couple local riders and we formed up a group of about 10 riders.  As with the EOM a few years back, this ended up being the group we rode with the entire rally.  It was a good set of guys (and girls).  We gassed up and quickly split into two "packs".  The faster guys (including Jim and I) up front, with the others a little bit behind.  We were never more than 5 minutes apart.

We took highway 72 plus a few other roads North and we ended up for lunch in Estes Park.  The roads and the weather were both awesome!  Couldn't have asked for better.  The wife did very well and managed to lean with me and generally just be a good, predictable passenger. :)  The comm system I installed last week helped a lot.  I was able to explain things and point out stuff as we were riding and she was able to ask questions and point out stuff that I missed.  It was worth it's weight in gold. 

We stopped at the Stanley Hotel for lunch.  The Stanley was where a fair bit of "The Shining" was shot.  It's a neat place and the food was excellent.  We learned a fair bit more about the crew we were riding with.  I'll post up names when I can get all my pictures and other scribbled notes taken care of. ;)  On of the guys (Dave I think) was a bit sneaky and paid for lunch before anyone knew about it.  That was very nice of him...  I'm sure it was well over 200 bucks!

As we were packing up to continue on, it started pouring.  SERIOUS rain!  We didn't have a whole lot of options, so we just rode on.  The wife didn't complain a bit (we were both in mesh - we got WET). 

Jim and I decided we wanted to see the Rocky Mountain National Park, so we split off from the rest of the group and headed up.  The bottom portions were nice, but it was just more of what we'd already been riding through.  Then, we got UP into some altitude!  The temperature dropped drastically and instantly.  We were riding above snow fields.  My guess is that they're there year round most of the time.

We saw lots of other FJRs coming the opposite way... more rally attendees.  We stopped at the top and the wife and I waited while Jim did the hike to the peak.  We saw about 6 other FJRs pull in and out of the parking area and talked very briefly to one couple on completely matching 07s and wearing matching gear.  We'd bump into them later. 

We headed back down and put some hustle on to make it back to the hotel in order to catch Jim's wife when she landed.  We hung out for a bit and checked out the other bikes until the dinner.  Jim's wife arrived as we were finishing up, but the staff was nice enough to keep a plate for her. 

After dinner, we pretty much called it a night.