mikeyb
Active member
Well my daughter was off to Paris, France for 9 days and the wife gave me permission to jet off on the FJR for a trip to visit my friend in San Antonio so we decided that I would ride to his house and then we would ride back to Arkansas to ride the Ozarks. He is a UPS pilot and was returning from a trip around the world and then needed to leave again the following week so we were limited as to what days were available.
Sunday March 23rd I leave from my Home in New Albany, IN just across the river from Louisville. It is 34 degrees that morning and I have my bike preped with a powerlet for my heated vest, tank bag that I have added a powerlet and 2 adapters for a radar detector and Sirius radio along with a Mix It 2 to integrate it all, I have added a Givi V46 Top Case which I had the body shop color match the lid to the bikes Black Cherry, Skyway Sliders, Hot Grips heated grips with a variable controller, and a Throttlemeister.
Here is the Bike Loaded for the 9 day trip.
60 Miles South of Louisville the 34 degree weather is getting the best of me and I decide to make a stop since it has started snowing. The palm of my hands are nice the toasty but my fingers are a bit white from the cold.
This first part of the trip is to get me the hell out of the cold so I drive south on I65 to Nashville and then head west on I40 to Memphis. After about 400 miles I need a break and head to see the KING.
I end the day in Little Rock just west of the city total mileage for the day was 580.
Monday March 24th.
Next I head to my brothers house in Dallas - surprise no pictures as there was nothing of interest along the way!!
Tuesday March 25th.
I have some time to get to San Antonio and so I decide not to take the highway through the middle of Dallas and head west to 281 and then south to San Antonio. This is the nice little ride except for the god aweful wind that I fight the whole way.
Seems that I see alot of this along the way with very little change.
Total Milage 1200.
Wednesday march 26th a day of rest.
Thursday March 27th.
Dressed and ready to ride. We have decided to change course to Big Bend National Park as the Midwest is raining and flooded. This allows me to drop the top case for this part of the ride. My friend has a 2002 K1150RT. We head for the TX Hill country on our way to Big Bend.
We stop in Bandera at a popular motorcycle gathering point on the weekends pictured here.
Along the way we pass 1 or 2 FJR's along the side of the road outside of Bandera. I know one was an 07 like mine did not really see the 2nd to ID it as an FJR but if it was, most likely an 05 or 06 blue.
I have ridden my friends RT through the hills and it is a nice ride but it is not an FJR. This is a fun ride with a lot of river crossings. However, in the middle of the night someone stole 5 miles of 337!
My Vstrom is a much better bike for this stuff.
This is one of the river crossings. I notice that in TX they don't worry about building bridges over rivers they just build them on the river and put a depth gage somewhere near the crossing so you can judge if it is safe.
After the Hill country we take 227 south to 377 to Del Rio then west on 90. We get gas in Del Rio for the trip since there does not appear to be much along the way. As we are riding we come up to this bridge over the Pecos River and nearly stop in the middle as we take it in. We circle back and head up to the overlook to get some pictures and meet 3 guys from Houston on 2 Harleys and a Kawasaki. Very nice group as we find out. They had seen us crossing the river and were betting we would come back as they saw us. They were right.
So as we are talking to these guys my buddy notices that there is oil on the strap of his camera. He goes and looks in his top case where he stored a quart of oil and about 1/2 has leaked out in the case. These guys (The Harley Guys) immediately go to their bikes and produce paper towles, bags and cloth to clean up the mess. As we find out later not all harley guys are as nice.
Here is the view.
As I had stated, we got gas in Del Rio. As we are heading west on 90 we pass a guy on the side of the road riding a K1200GT. We stop at this hole in the wall to get a drink and the BMW guy pulls up. Does not seem to be real friendly but has the CHiP pants on and custom ear buds etc. He asks us if we knew where there was gas at which we responded that we were sure that Marathon had gas but there was none where we were he says he has maybe 40 miles left in the tank. He goes inside and I go to my GPS and see there is gas 18 miles away. My buddy goes to look at his bike and sees that he has the fancy BMW GPS that apparently cannot be used to look for gas. I think it must say stop and ask people along the rode.
BTW the sign lies there is no gas at this stop!
We head to Marathon, TX and decide to get gas after passing a service station and so we circle and head back. When we passed there was no one at the station but as we approach we see 4 Harley guys on the right side blocking the pumps from that side and a pick up on the left blocking those pumps. So we sit there on our bikes and wait. The pickup starts to pump gas but the Harley guys just sit there and talk to the guys in the pickup. They never pump any gas but just block us from the pumps. Finally after 10 mins they leave! What morons.
We spend the night in Alpine, TX.
Total Milage ~ 1700
Will post up more later!
Sunday March 23rd I leave from my Home in New Albany, IN just across the river from Louisville. It is 34 degrees that morning and I have my bike preped with a powerlet for my heated vest, tank bag that I have added a powerlet and 2 adapters for a radar detector and Sirius radio along with a Mix It 2 to integrate it all, I have added a Givi V46 Top Case which I had the body shop color match the lid to the bikes Black Cherry, Skyway Sliders, Hot Grips heated grips with a variable controller, and a Throttlemeister.
Here is the Bike Loaded for the 9 day trip.
60 Miles South of Louisville the 34 degree weather is getting the best of me and I decide to make a stop since it has started snowing. The palm of my hands are nice the toasty but my fingers are a bit white from the cold.
This first part of the trip is to get me the hell out of the cold so I drive south on I65 to Nashville and then head west on I40 to Memphis. After about 400 miles I need a break and head to see the KING.
I end the day in Little Rock just west of the city total mileage for the day was 580.
Monday March 24th.
Next I head to my brothers house in Dallas - surprise no pictures as there was nothing of interest along the way!!
Tuesday March 25th.
I have some time to get to San Antonio and so I decide not to take the highway through the middle of Dallas and head west to 281 and then south to San Antonio. This is the nice little ride except for the god aweful wind that I fight the whole way.
Seems that I see alot of this along the way with very little change.
Total Milage 1200.
Wednesday march 26th a day of rest.
Thursday March 27th.
Dressed and ready to ride. We have decided to change course to Big Bend National Park as the Midwest is raining and flooded. This allows me to drop the top case for this part of the ride. My friend has a 2002 K1150RT. We head for the TX Hill country on our way to Big Bend.
We stop in Bandera at a popular motorcycle gathering point on the weekends pictured here.
Along the way we pass 1 or 2 FJR's along the side of the road outside of Bandera. I know one was an 07 like mine did not really see the 2nd to ID it as an FJR but if it was, most likely an 05 or 06 blue.
I have ridden my friends RT through the hills and it is a nice ride but it is not an FJR. This is a fun ride with a lot of river crossings. However, in the middle of the night someone stole 5 miles of 337!
My Vstrom is a much better bike for this stuff.
This is one of the river crossings. I notice that in TX they don't worry about building bridges over rivers they just build them on the river and put a depth gage somewhere near the crossing so you can judge if it is safe.
After the Hill country we take 227 south to 377 to Del Rio then west on 90. We get gas in Del Rio for the trip since there does not appear to be much along the way. As we are riding we come up to this bridge over the Pecos River and nearly stop in the middle as we take it in. We circle back and head up to the overlook to get some pictures and meet 3 guys from Houston on 2 Harleys and a Kawasaki. Very nice group as we find out. They had seen us crossing the river and were betting we would come back as they saw us. They were right.
So as we are talking to these guys my buddy notices that there is oil on the strap of his camera. He goes and looks in his top case where he stored a quart of oil and about 1/2 has leaked out in the case. These guys (The Harley Guys) immediately go to their bikes and produce paper towles, bags and cloth to clean up the mess. As we find out later not all harley guys are as nice.
Here is the view.
As I had stated, we got gas in Del Rio. As we are heading west on 90 we pass a guy on the side of the road riding a K1200GT. We stop at this hole in the wall to get a drink and the BMW guy pulls up. Does not seem to be real friendly but has the CHiP pants on and custom ear buds etc. He asks us if we knew where there was gas at which we responded that we were sure that Marathon had gas but there was none where we were he says he has maybe 40 miles left in the tank. He goes inside and I go to my GPS and see there is gas 18 miles away. My buddy goes to look at his bike and sees that he has the fancy BMW GPS that apparently cannot be used to look for gas. I think it must say stop and ask people along the rode.
BTW the sign lies there is no gas at this stop!
We head to Marathon, TX and decide to get gas after passing a service station and so we circle and head back. When we passed there was no one at the station but as we approach we see 4 Harley guys on the right side blocking the pumps from that side and a pick up on the left blocking those pumps. So we sit there on our bikes and wait. The pickup starts to pump gas but the Harley guys just sit there and talk to the guys in the pickup. They never pump any gas but just block us from the pumps. Finally after 10 mins they leave! What morons.
We spend the night in Alpine, TX.
Total Milage ~ 1700
Will post up more later!
