Ernie and Doris - Richards, TX

Ernie and Doris's ranch is two miles outside of downtown Richards, Tx. It's an abandoned downtown that looks like the set of an old western. You cross the bridge over the creek and skip across the rusted railroad tracks around a bend where the road widens and a block of disheveled buildings sit to your right. The general store, the barber, the gas station whose owner has stayed to tell the visitors that the country is going to hell and "things just keep gettin' worse." Mostly older men trickle into the gas station there. They ask you where you're from and where you're headed, wish you luck. They buy a sandwich or a beer, and move along.

Mexican Hill Ranch opens up into a beautiful pasture where Ernie has planted hay for his cattle, thirty-something in all. Ernie grabs you with his words and stories right away while Doris chimes in with any details he might leave out. It's as though the two are speaking as one. He and Doris traveled back and forth between Germany and Texas to work on the ranch and build what they call Check Point Harley, a gem just of a place built on their property that provides camping, lodging, kitchen, showers, a pool, bar, and any other luxury a weary cyclist might be dreaming of at the end of a long day for a great price. Penny (my new friend that I've been biking with the past couple of days) and I stopped in for the night and couldn't stop saying sighing and saying, "this is so great."