Around the World in 80 Days (well, the US in 44-sort of)

[SacramentoMike]

It's pretty far after the ride ended, but maybe some of you can read it while you wait for the snow to melt. I left Sac on 8/31 and got home 10/13. After that it was time to relax, so my family and I took a week-long camping vacation in Yosemite. I can’t do a daily report from the road; I don’t know how anybody can.

On this trip I camped when I could, and the rest was a mix of motels and enjoying the hospitality of family and forum friends, which I’ll get to later on. But for future long trips, I think I’ll just bag the camping. I do love settling into a campsite for the evening, relaxing with a fire, and the whole ambience of a nice quiet campground, but having to unpack and repack and stop in time to set up in daylight, and still having time to relax in that ideal evening camping time is too hectic if you need to make miles too. On the nights I camped, I didn’t have that kind of leisure.

When I motel, I like covered parking.

I left here heading north, and cut over to the coast on the wonderful highway 36 (famous sign: wiggly arrow with the words “NEXT 140 MILES.” They should put a big smiley face on it too.) First night visiting my daughter in Eureka on the north coast where I visited the “Black Lightning Motorcycle Café” per FWFE’s recommendation, and headed up the coast. I always love that ride, though some complain it’s too slow and traffic-rich. I just like the views. FJRay had offered me a stop in LaPine (central) OR, but I was just getting going for the day when I’d have been near him. Mucho thanko for the offer, though, Ray (like Beemerdons, I like to spice up my posts with a little espanol).

Black Lightning Motorcycle Cafe. Strange mix of food, classic bikes, and gear. Cool, interesting place.

Port Orford OR. Great spot to eat a sandwich

Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area

Coastal Forest Service campground in Oregon

I stuck to the coast (with a stop in that great NFS seaside campground above) until I was almost to Portland, then tried to find a way around the city. What a FAIL. Traffic, then construction, then detours. Slow ones. After all that, I headed down the Columbia River Gorge toward The Dalles (one of my favorite place names). Crossed into WA and then ID, where everything is named after either Lewis, or Clark, or both, and then north. I planned to cut east at the beautiful Sand Point and duplicate (in reverse) a 2007 ride I’d done, Rte. 200 toward Missoula, but decided to continue north to Bonner’s Ferry for Rte. 2, toward Kalispell and Glacier National Park to ride the Going to the Sun again. Pretty, but always slow and choked with cars and campers, but at least it was now after the Labor Day weekend. The spectacular waterfalls were depressingly dry, though, but at least the weather was clear. It was chilly—had been for the whole ride so far, but chilly is perfect, IMO. It was slow and muddy from construction coming down the east side and the bike got a long-lasting coat of mud.

There should be a whole lot of waterfalls in this pic. Tough year for water all over the west.

Realllly long construction delay after Logan Pass. Which got muddy.

Approaching Glacier. I just liked this shot.

Going to the Sun was dry--but still spectacular.

Guess I'll post this much and see how much more I can do tonight. I'd hate to have the computer crash or something and have to start again.

 

[SacramentoMike]

After I came down from Logan Pass, the summit of the Going to the Sun Road, I opted to pick up my pace eastward, foregoing the short run north from St. Mary to the back entrance to the park that dead-ends at the best part of GNP, Many Glacier. Last time there we saw multiple moose (feeding in a lake), mountain goats, bighorn sheep, and a grizzly bear, plus the very best scenery anywhere. I didn’t do it, but I highly recommend it. Even with a trip of this length, there are just sooo many things you want to do and have to skip, but at least this early in the ride, many of them I’d seen already. The things I skipped later on, I regret bitterly.

It was down into WY next, through Yellowstone (but just the corner--BTDT enough) and on to the wonderful Beartooth Highway. What a magnificent and FUN road—but skipped the lesser (to me) Chief Joseph, (again, BTDT anyway) for the sake of getting on with it.

Beartooth Summit--10,947 feet. Not a lot of vegetation that high.

Continuing to get on with it, it was on to the Bighorn National Forest. Beautiful roads (Rte 14A, one of those National Scenic Byways. NEVER pass one by if you have a choice), beautiful views, damn cold at over 10,000 feet. Detoured into Bighorn Canyon National Recreation Area, because the views weren’t already spectacular enough. Sure enough, they got better.

Next stop was Devil’s Tower, WY. Now it just looks like a big tree stump, but I thought it was really fascinating. My lifetime park pass saved me another fee as I rode up to the base. Let me tell you, “Close Encounters” was pure bullshit! Richard Dreyfuss could NEVER have climbed that thing, let alone that blonde he was with. It was very impressive—one of the most enduring images of the whole adventure.

Good luck, Richard Dreyfuss

There's a prairie dog town at the foot of the Tower. Cute little buggers. Hundreds of them.

Big John SD had offered his hospitality, and the next day I got to Spearfish early enough in the day that John led me on a tour of local sights as soon as I had the bike lightened up by about the weight of a hefty pillion. It was a wonderful route of a couple hundred miles, I suppose, through places in the Black Hills that you HAVE to ride if you do the South Dakota run next June, like Spearfish Canyon and Vanocker Canyon. DO NOT MISS THAT ONE. We rode through Deadwood and Sturgis (stopped for the mandatory picture) and out to Mt. Rushmore and the Crazy Horse monument. Rushmore—I wish we’d gone in now. My natural tightness was offended when John told me it’s free to go in, but they charge $10 to park in the lot. And worse than that, it’s $10 whether you drive a 9-passenger van or an FJR! So we saw it from the road at a convenient overlook. It was pretty far away though, and now I wish I’d spent the ten. The dirty rats found a way around the lifetime pass we old guys enjoy. Wonder if other Nat’l Parks will follow?

George, Thomas, Teddy, Abe . . . and John

One of those "I Was There" pics. By no means one of the top sights in SD.

John and Jean gave me warm fuzzy hospitality that night, but the next day was threatening severe weather, so the best idea was to fly early. John had also offered Ralph—bikerskier—a bed for the next night, and he called John’s the evening before to discuss plans, but with the weather on the way, and after talking about it, he decided just to meet us for breakfast and then join me for a fast easterly run away from the front. So we all met in the morning and the joint ride with Ralph, on his epic 50-60-70 run, began. To be continued, again.

 

[beemerdons]

Very nice Miguelito, muchas gracias! JSNS, ese!

 

[RossKean]

Looking good! Could you post up a map of your route? I'm planning a big trip for next summer and would like to see where you went - easier to visualize with a map (at least for me).

 

[steveoreno]

Thanks for the report, looking forward to the rest of it.

 

[BikerGeek99]

Been waiting for this one!

 

[MCRIDER007]

Looking good! Could you post up a map of your route? I'm planning a big trip for next summer and would like to see where you went - easier to visualize with a map (at least for me).

Same here....and I was wondering if you found any motels that you would recommend.

 

[dgiles]

Quick question. How well does your SPOT work hanging from your belt. I've always tried to ensure that mine is orange side up. Thanks.

 

[gregory]

Subscribed!

 

[RossKean]

Looking good! Could you post up a map of your route? I'm planning a big trip for next summer and would like to see where you went - easier to visualize with a map (at least for me).

Same here....and I was wondering if you found any motels that you would recommend.

Just went back to the original post and found his Spotwalla link.

https://spotwalla.com/embed.php?id=b1c154021d4ea4275&width=1800&height=900&scale=on&zoom=default&refresh=no

That takes care of the route map!

 

[SeattleTy]

Excellent trip and ride report Mike, very happy to see you doing what you love

Hope to see you soon

 

[escapefjrtist]

Looking forward to the next installment Mike, keep it coming!

--G

 

[rogdeb]

Looking forward to the next installment Mike, keep it coming!
--G

Ditto

We're in

 

[Bungie]

In for the duration.

 

[SacramentoMike]

Quick question. How well does your SPOT work hanging from your belt. I've always tried to ensure that mine is orange side up. Thanks.

I had the latest one, the Spot 3. It comes with a carabiner that goes through a belt loop and a strip of velcro tape so it hangs flat --at least when you're standing still. Not always in the wind on the road. There, it definitely moves around some and sometimes turns facing down, but still seemed to send a good signal consistently.

There was a discussion here about where to carry the gadget, and it convinced me that it was better to have it on my person than attached to the bike (it used to ride under the clear map window on my tank bag). There are really just two reasons to carry it: track your trip, and have the SOS button, just in case. If you need the button, you may not want to crawl around looking for the Spot. Or the bike. With two broken legs.

By the way, I did the whole 44-day trip on TWO sets of AAA lithium batteries! Improved battery life was a claimed benefit of the gen 3: confirmed. My old Spot (that stopped working completely) was good for less than a week per expensive battery change.

 

[garyahouse]

Looking good! Could you post up a map of your route? I'm planning a big trip for next summer and would like to see where you went - easier to visualize with a map (at least for me).

+1 on that map request. Thanks for posting. Enjoyed the pics.

Gary

darksider #44

 

[RossKean]

Looking good! Could you post up a map of your route? I'm planning a big trip for next summer and would like to see where you went - easier to visualize with a map (at least for me).

+1 on that map request. Thanks for posting. Enjoyed the pics.

Gary

darksider #44

See post #10, above. Link to his Spotwalla page.

 

[bikerskier]

Good pics, Mike. I'm 2 days from the barn, overnight in Altura, CA tonight and Redmond tomorrow and home Tues. About 75 days.

 

[SacramentoMike]

John, Ralph and I met for breakfast the next day--a gray and chilly morning. We left John behind to enjoy the snowstorm that was coming in. I understand they got three inches that day! Ralph and I stayed ahead of that, but couldn’t outrun the cold. It was gray and cold pretty much our whole three days together, but no worse—well, rain on the face shields a couple times, and just once had to put on rain gear, but that was largely to break the wind, which it worked great for.

The League of Elderly Gentlemen

So we rode into the Badlands, which are pretty bad indeed. Bleak and desolate and uninviting, easy to see how some depressed pioneer might have given them that name. They looked like a much larger version of the part of Death Valley around Zabriskie Point, and the gray, forbidding weather only added to the feeling.

Two more Old Goats

On the road, my requirements for a motel are a locking door, a bed, and a working bathroom. Ralph lives to a higher standard, but splitting a room with him let me come up to his. Splitting a room with me, though, probably lowered Ralph’s, because when he rooms by himself there’s no one snoring loudly six feet away. He was nice enough not to complain about it though. Much.

Now, Ralph said some nice things about me in his RR, and courtesy dictates that I do the same, but I’d have done it anyway. He was great to travel with. For one important thing, we were compatible in our riding styles (read: “speed”), but also in how often we wanted to stop for a break, when to get up or get started, how far to go in a day, etc. These are all things that are fine if they are fine, but can mess up any trip with more than one rider. But I enjoyed his company a lot. I’d met him a couple of times before, but three days of traveling gave me a chance to get to know him, and I feel like I made a good friend. Funny, interesting guy. There, is that enough? One more thing—his ride was much more epic than mine. Longer and farther, I think he actually hit all “four corners” and beyond, going way up into the Maritime Provinces (Greenland too, I think). And Key West. And Alaska. Way to go, buddy.

AND, he cannot tell a lie!

John had recommended a ferry boat across Lake Michigan to bypass Chicago, which sounded good, but since Ralph was going to cross into Canada by Sault Ste Marie, we stayed together and made it to Marquette on Lake Superior our last night together. I liked the look and feel of the town, and its beautiful location. Leaving in the morning, the sun was rising over Lake Superior to our north (yes, I know, but it’s a big lake). Anyway, it was pretty gorgeous. The leaves were already beginning to change in the Upper Peninsula, the first I’d seen, so we had to stop and take a couple pics. Of course, they just got better as time went on. I found the countryside in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan very pretty. Most enjoyable country to ride.

It's really a place. AND a brand of butter!

The Yoopers get the fall colors before the rest of us, apparently.

This is Marquette, which we liked.

We were south of Lake Superior. So the sun MUST be rising in the north!

Next: Bust and Mizz Bust. And MORE!