MajBach
Well-known member
Hi, all. So I’ve hardly been on the forum since last August. Too busy playing outside with all my toys I suppose. But I have been very much meaning to give a shout-out to BigJohnSD and a genuine thanks to him and a few others not on this forum for their generosity last season.
2017 was our Nation’s 150 birthday and I wanted to spend it at our Capital – Ottawa – 3000 miles away. I also wanted to view the eclipse a month-and-a-half later in Wyoming which was 2000 miles back. So, I decided to continue with my tradition of storing the bike and flying home. This of course can be a little bit challenging arranging storage in an unfamiliar area and sometimes expensive. So last year I made an enquiry about storage somewhere in Montana/Wyoming area. Much like “Silent Ray” did for me several years ago in San Jose, Big John answered the call in only a few minutes. I contacted his friend “TJ” some time after (not having made concrete plans for anything yet) and was shown incredible kindness and accommodation.
Sometime in late spring I headed East from Vancouver Island, experiencing snowstorms in Yellowstone to tornadoes in Idaho and everything in between. I enjoyed an awesome party shared with countless others on Parliament Hill, flew home for 6 weeks before returning and starting the trip ‘home’.
Experiencing the eclipse was an event of a lifetime and was well worth the hellish 6 hour drive north to Billings with the 8 billion others that had come up with a similar plan. I arrived fairly behind schedule an had learned earlier that TJ wasn’t even in town that week but had actually made arrangements for a tenant of his – Justin, to meet me at his house and park the bike in his finished basement. Wow.
Justin then drove me to my hotel, but not before buying me a beer and sharing some stories. A month or so later (I can’t really recall) I returned. Justin picked me up at my hotel and brought me to a fine restaurant where TJ and his wife were already halfway through a bottle of cab-sav, and the four of us had a terrific dinner together…which I was politely refused my offer to pay or even contribute to. Double Wow.
We then drove back to their house where we talked a little shop and I got to sit on TJ’s wife’s (apologies – I forgot her name) brand new Indian. The next day I resumed my adventure.
It was sometime during this wonderful display of hospitality that I decided not to return to Vancouver but just keep on driving – south as it happened. I met up with my brother in SLC who was the project manager at a ground breaking ski-lift project. ‘Left the bike there, flew home, worked my 2 weeks and returned, this time ending up in Phoenix. I found gated indoor storage for less than $2/day not 2 miles from the airport and have returned twice since November to go for a ‘winter’ ride.
Speaking of winter rides…another call out to ‘Anthony’ on the black ST 1300. Where were you? I showed up at the meeting place and waited.
Anthony was shadowing me during a sunset ride in a State park in Tuscon one evening and stopped to talk to me when I pulled over for a break. He told me that he and a couple of his friends (one with an FJR) meet at 0530 hrs every Sunday for a ride up Mt Lemmon. I told him that the weather was calling for sub-zero temps that day and also noted that the sun isn’t even up that early in November. He assured me that they would be going and I responded that I would join, I mean he was nice enough to invite me, right?
Well a couple of days later when I was setting my alarm for 4:30 am (ughhh), I couldn’t help wonder if this guy was yanking my chain and his buddies in the ST forums were all going to get a good laugh. Regardless, I hauled my *** out of bed and donned my fuzzy undies and rain gear. I drove out to the meeting point in the middle of nowhere under light rain and pitch black darkness arriving about 10 minutes late. With no one there, I raced up the mountain hoping to catch up. During the ride I of course was second guessing myself; maybe he meant 5:30 PM? ‘No, he said ‘sunrise’. At some point during this internal distraction and the faint light of the rising sun through overcast skies, I felt a little sponginess in the steering, not unlike what I felt a couple years earlier when I got a fast puncture to the rear tire.
I came of the throttle and finished the moderate left-turn around the climbing mountain road only to see the road almost entirely covered by snow (almost an inch) with a definite flat sheen on top.
*GULP*
It took 20 minutes to come to a safe stop, do a 28-point turn and coast back down the 500 feet or so of ice and snow I had just miraculously made it through without dumping the bike.
‘Stupid stupid stupid!’ I thought of myself the entire time. Completely oblivious to the outside air temperature and road conditions as I pondered the meet-up on the trip up. It would have been an obvious no-go had I connected the two simple dots of overnight precipitation and sub-zero temps (ahem – sub-freezing temperatures for you Yanks) that was displayed on my dash. It was also apparent that that little mushiness in the steering was probably the bike hitting a patch of black ice caught between the edges of dry pavement.
When I reached the bottom of the mountain (about 45 minutes to an hour after I passed through earlier), there was a County Mounty parked on the road with his cherries going and a “Road Closed” sign beside the cruiser. I stopped and asked the parka-clad Officer “What’s Up?”.
“ ’Road’s closed. A foot of snow up the mountain. Where the hell did you come from?”
“The mountain”, I replied.
“But…what the? How..” he stumbled,
“I’m from Canada”, as I pointed to my licence plate. “Have a good day, eh”
The look on his face made the trip worth it.
So I am halfway through my patrol at sea as I type this. I booked a round trip flight to Phoenix in a couple of weeks. Planning on spending at least a couple of days in San Diego but looking for ideas for along the way. Definitely doing USS Midway, but Sea World and the Zoo don’t interest me all that much (I see whales daily and I did a necropsy on a dolphin 3 days ago).
The inspiration for this thread was really this biking lifestyle I’ve adopted and how much I really enjoy it. In the past 5 years I have seen a good 2/3rds of the continental US of A by FJR and for four of those five winters, the bike has been someplace other than my garage. It may be something some of may want to consider trying. I’ve contemplating coming up with some type of a user-group where it’s members offer storage and/or lodging in exchange for the same but haven’t put a lot of time into it. Again, outside playing.
But sharing my travels and meeting up with people like you sure it a big part of what makes it so much fun.
Thanks again.
If anyone is up for a ride in March, let me know.
R
2017 was our Nation’s 150 birthday and I wanted to spend it at our Capital – Ottawa – 3000 miles away. I also wanted to view the eclipse a month-and-a-half later in Wyoming which was 2000 miles back. So, I decided to continue with my tradition of storing the bike and flying home. This of course can be a little bit challenging arranging storage in an unfamiliar area and sometimes expensive. So last year I made an enquiry about storage somewhere in Montana/Wyoming area. Much like “Silent Ray” did for me several years ago in San Jose, Big John answered the call in only a few minutes. I contacted his friend “TJ” some time after (not having made concrete plans for anything yet) and was shown incredible kindness and accommodation.
Sometime in late spring I headed East from Vancouver Island, experiencing snowstorms in Yellowstone to tornadoes in Idaho and everything in between. I enjoyed an awesome party shared with countless others on Parliament Hill, flew home for 6 weeks before returning and starting the trip ‘home’.
Experiencing the eclipse was an event of a lifetime and was well worth the hellish 6 hour drive north to Billings with the 8 billion others that had come up with a similar plan. I arrived fairly behind schedule an had learned earlier that TJ wasn’t even in town that week but had actually made arrangements for a tenant of his – Justin, to meet me at his house and park the bike in his finished basement. Wow.
Justin then drove me to my hotel, but not before buying me a beer and sharing some stories. A month or so later (I can’t really recall) I returned. Justin picked me up at my hotel and brought me to a fine restaurant where TJ and his wife were already halfway through a bottle of cab-sav, and the four of us had a terrific dinner together…which I was politely refused my offer to pay or even contribute to. Double Wow.
We then drove back to their house where we talked a little shop and I got to sit on TJ’s wife’s (apologies – I forgot her name) brand new Indian. The next day I resumed my adventure.
It was sometime during this wonderful display of hospitality that I decided not to return to Vancouver but just keep on driving – south as it happened. I met up with my brother in SLC who was the project manager at a ground breaking ski-lift project. ‘Left the bike there, flew home, worked my 2 weeks and returned, this time ending up in Phoenix. I found gated indoor storage for less than $2/day not 2 miles from the airport and have returned twice since November to go for a ‘winter’ ride.
Speaking of winter rides…another call out to ‘Anthony’ on the black ST 1300. Where were you? I showed up at the meeting place and waited.
Anthony was shadowing me during a sunset ride in a State park in Tuscon one evening and stopped to talk to me when I pulled over for a break. He told me that he and a couple of his friends (one with an FJR) meet at 0530 hrs every Sunday for a ride up Mt Lemmon. I told him that the weather was calling for sub-zero temps that day and also noted that the sun isn’t even up that early in November. He assured me that they would be going and I responded that I would join, I mean he was nice enough to invite me, right?
Well a couple of days later when I was setting my alarm for 4:30 am (ughhh), I couldn’t help wonder if this guy was yanking my chain and his buddies in the ST forums were all going to get a good laugh. Regardless, I hauled my *** out of bed and donned my fuzzy undies and rain gear. I drove out to the meeting point in the middle of nowhere under light rain and pitch black darkness arriving about 10 minutes late. With no one there, I raced up the mountain hoping to catch up. During the ride I of course was second guessing myself; maybe he meant 5:30 PM? ‘No, he said ‘sunrise’. At some point during this internal distraction and the faint light of the rising sun through overcast skies, I felt a little sponginess in the steering, not unlike what I felt a couple years earlier when I got a fast puncture to the rear tire.
I came of the throttle and finished the moderate left-turn around the climbing mountain road only to see the road almost entirely covered by snow (almost an inch) with a definite flat sheen on top.
*GULP*
It took 20 minutes to come to a safe stop, do a 28-point turn and coast back down the 500 feet or so of ice and snow I had just miraculously made it through without dumping the bike.
‘Stupid stupid stupid!’ I thought of myself the entire time. Completely oblivious to the outside air temperature and road conditions as I pondered the meet-up on the trip up. It would have been an obvious no-go had I connected the two simple dots of overnight precipitation and sub-zero temps (ahem – sub-freezing temperatures for you Yanks) that was displayed on my dash. It was also apparent that that little mushiness in the steering was probably the bike hitting a patch of black ice caught between the edges of dry pavement.
When I reached the bottom of the mountain (about 45 minutes to an hour after I passed through earlier), there was a County Mounty parked on the road with his cherries going and a “Road Closed” sign beside the cruiser. I stopped and asked the parka-clad Officer “What’s Up?”.
“ ’Road’s closed. A foot of snow up the mountain. Where the hell did you come from?”
“The mountain”, I replied.
“But…what the? How..” he stumbled,
“I’m from Canada”, as I pointed to my licence plate. “Have a good day, eh”
The look on his face made the trip worth it.
So I am halfway through my patrol at sea as I type this. I booked a round trip flight to Phoenix in a couple of weeks. Planning on spending at least a couple of days in San Diego but looking for ideas for along the way. Definitely doing USS Midway, but Sea World and the Zoo don’t interest me all that much (I see whales daily and I did a necropsy on a dolphin 3 days ago).
The inspiration for this thread was really this biking lifestyle I’ve adopted and how much I really enjoy it. In the past 5 years I have seen a good 2/3rds of the continental US of A by FJR and for four of those five winters, the bike has been someplace other than my garage. It may be something some of may want to consider trying. I’ve contemplating coming up with some type of a user-group where it’s members offer storage and/or lodging in exchange for the same but haven’t put a lot of time into it. Again, outside playing.
But sharing my travels and meeting up with people like you sure it a big part of what makes it so much fun.
Thanks again.
If anyone is up for a ride in March, let me know.
R
