Sunday morning the power was out between 7 and 9 AM so I woke up at 6 and showered just as the power went out (I assume that folks who waited had cold water). I packed and checked out at 8 AM. I buzzed down to Scotty's Castle, covering the 54 miles in 38 minutes. (it didn't open till 9 AM so the roads were nearly completely empty). I quickly looked around this mansion and then headed down to Ubehebe Crater. This is a fairly impressive volcanic crater near the north end of the park. I then headed out of the park. At Stovepipe Wells I topped off, getting the most expensive gas of the trip. It wasn't that expensive except that only 87 octane was available. My bike requires 90 so I had to pay $6 for some octane booster. I headed out CA 190 through Panamint Springs, south on US 395, and then west on CA 178. At Lake Isabella I took CA 155. Unfortunately a few miles later in Wofford Heights I missed where 155 turned left. I realized this mistake in Kernville, perhaps 10 miles down the road. Recalling the advice of a teacher at a summer camp many years ago (stay in trouble, you'll learn more. Of course he recanted several years later but the damage had already been done.) I decided to try the mountain route shown on the map. Unfortunately my map didn't have any route numbers for these roads. They ended up being CA Mountain 99 and CA Mountain 50. Had I known this then the sign that said Mountain 50 was closed would have meant something to me. I got 20 more miles up this road before I came to the Mountain 50 turnoff. The sign said road closed but due to the warm weather the road looked clear. The tops of the mountains only had patches of snow so I figured there was a good chance I could make it the ~20 miles to where CA 190 started again. I was wrong. I hit a few patches of snow but the vehicles that had gone over the road had done a good job of melting down to the pavement most of the way. 1 mile past the road closed sign I hit a large patch of snow. I coasted through about half of it without any problem. Then I stopped. I got perhaps 5 feet further with about 15 feet to go. The bike wasn't going to make it. Between bike and gear it was about 800 lbs. so I couldn't pull it. Now I was in the middle of a large snow patch on a closed road facing the reality of trying to turn around a heavy bike on a very rutted snow patch. I took a picture to prove that I'd achieved idiot status and then worked on getting the bike turned around. While I was turning the bike around it started to snow, as if to underscore my idiot status. 20 minutes later I was facing downhill. The ride down was just as scenic as the ride up but by the time I got to the 155 turnoff I figured I'd wasted 60 miles and nearly 2 hours. Ouch. 155 was interesting. There was a sign uncovered for the winter that said that chains were required. That wasn't entirely correct. While it did snow on me a little as I crossed the 6100' pass chains were not required. The only snow I saw on the road was bits dropped from various vehicles (many of the parking lots on the side of the road did have snow on them.) Of greater concern to me was the heavy amount of sand laid down on the road. Sand is no fun on a twisty mountain road and my ~30 MPH speed reflected that. Fortunately I was fairly quickly past the sanded area and into some really nice lush green winding roads. By the time I reached CA 99 at Delano 7 hours and ~400 miles had passed since I left Furnace Creek. It was starting to rain a bit. I decided to take slab in the rain instead of twisty roads in the rain. Neither would be a lot of fun but at least the slab would get me a lot closer to my goal. I rode CA 99 up to Stockton where I crossed over to I-5. After a few hours of slab I began to wonder if I would be able to do a Iron-Butt Association SaddleSore 1000 (1000 miles in less than 24 hours.) It wouldn't be official for a number of reasons, but I would know that I had done it. However as I neared Redding and passed Lake and Mount Shasta I began to wonder if I would make it. I was close but it was bitterly cold riding in the rain at night. When I fueled up in Weed I left my bike running as long as possible so that my electric jacket liner could warm me up a bit and my heated grips could get warm again. When I reached Yreka I decided to pull off and check into a motel. 908 miles in just over 15 hours. Close but not close enough. When I checked in I talked to the clerk about probably road conditions in the morning. He said that I should take my time leaving since there may be ice patches in the passes in the morning.