Saturday, December 6, 2014

Monday, November 17, 2014

2014 Five Star Cycle Incentive Run

Five Star Cycle put on a great day of riding in the mud and snow. Check out the video below.

 

Sunday, November 9, 2014

Mines & Meadows 11/8/2014

I met up with JohnnyA, Shorty, and Husaberg Matt for a little riding in the mud at Mines & Meadows. It was fun riding with very limited traction in spots. I was trying out a new (CCK) needle in my carb. It's a single taper needle and I think I am a fan. 



Sunday, November 2, 2014

RCR Day at Five Star Cycle

Saturday I met up with some buddies at Five Star Cycle in Saegertown, Pa. A few of the guys hung out in the shop and lowered their Husabergs while myself and two others hit the trails behind the shop. I got some video of us riding the enduro loop. It was raining and very muddy and leafy, so traction was at a minimum. We also did a little riding on the MX track, but I didn't get that on video. Which was good, because I suck at MX tracks.


Thursday, July 24, 2014

Rocky Mountains Loop Days 6-7

Al needed to fly home so I spent the last two days driving back. I'm home now. It was a long but uneventful drive back. Even though the trip was cut short, I have probably 20+ GB of video and photos to go through and edit. I'll post things up here as I complete them.

I was really happy with how the 950 did in the mountains, as well as with the gear that I chose to bring. I'll be ready to go back west and finish out the loop in a year or two when I have the time again.

The only photo I took on my way home was of this storm that chased me out of my room in Kansas:


Monday, July 21, 2014

Rocky Mountains Loop Day 5

Al went to get checked out today so I went on a 250 mile solo ride that Al layed out for me last night.  I went north to Estes Park, through Rocky Mountain National Park and then back to camp on some canyon roads. I saw some wildlife, a big elk and a pair of moose.  It looks like I'll be doing another solo ride tomorrow while Al recovers. 

Rocky Mountains Loop Day 4

Al has been ill the last few days and decided he needed to see a doctor so we left Moab and took 70 most of the way back to Denver. When we hit some heavy traffic we headed to Breckenridge and took some nice dirt roads over the mountains back to Denver.  It was a long day in the saddle, over 350 miles. 

Saturday, July 19, 2014

Rocky Mountains Loop Day 3

Toyotas were everywhere this morning so we did skip Imogene and took Ophir instead.  I boiled my brake fluid on the way down, but didn't lose the rear brake until near the bottom.  Luckily there was a stream right where I lost pedal and I used the water to cool the caliper and get going again. After that, there was a long stretch of pavement to get us into Utah.  We got a break from the sun and heat by heading over the La Sals. We made Moab around 5pm and are staying in a motel tonight. 

Friday, July 18, 2014

Rocky Mountains Loop Day 2

Today we left Salida and rode through Cottonwood Pass, Tin Cup, Cumberland, Pitcan, Lake City, Cinnamon Pass, and ended the day with some great steaks at The Outlaw in Ouray.  Cinnamon proved to be a bit of a challenge on the big bikes, but we made it over without incident.  We forgot to get food pics before we inhaled our steaks, so try to imagine how good it looked before I destroyed it. It's FJ Cruiser week here in Ouray and they are all going to be up on Imogene tomorrow, so we may do a bit of a reroute. 

Rocky Mountains Loop Day 1

We got poured on last night, so we got a bit of a late start, drying our tents instead of the early start we planned. We left Denver and were greeted with a closed road within a few miles of leaving the campgrounds. Luckily Al knows the area well and he got us to the other side of the Front Range and some nice back roads that were much better than the slab the GPS wanted to reroute us on.

We stopped for lunch at the Sprucewood Lodge for lunch.  They cater to off-road riders and we saw a few dirt bikes and ATVs pull in while we were there. After we ate we headed for Rampart Road. Al asked me if I wanted to ride a short way down the bike trail for a photo. Of course I said "I'll do it if you will" . At the bottom of a steep rooty downhill Al clipped a tree with his pannier and the BMW took a dirt nap. We got it upright and back up the hill easy enough, but we had to mend his pannier with a rock and a crescent wrench before we could move on.

From there we headed to Cripple Creek and then Salida just as the sun was setting. We're holed up in a little fleabag motel tonight.

Monday, July 14, 2014

Rocky Mountains Loop 2014

My buddy Al and I are leaving for Colorado tomorrow to spend a couple of weeks riding around in the Rockies. If we manage to complete the whole loop it will be over 3200 miles of awesome Rocky Mountain terrain. I'll be riding my KTM 950 Adventure and Al will be riding his brand new BMW F800GSA.


I will try to do the same type of thing that I did on my TAT ride, and do some brief daily live-blog type updates here as I go, depending on internet access. We are planning on doing a lot of camping so there will probably be many nights where I can't get out anything other than a SPOT OK message. I will also do a more detailed report with HD video and more photos and stories when we return.

If you want to follow our progress I have set up a Spotwalla page where you can view my tracking data. I am currently only using the SPOT for OK or help messages. I am going to have some tracking using the Bubbler app on my phone, but that will only update when I have a cellular data connection. I plan on using the SPOT to send out an OK message whenever we will be stopped for any significant amount of time.

Stay tuned, this should be good :). 

Sunday, June 29, 2014

Niagara Ride - Day 3

Day 3 was a scenic route back home. I didn't get the exact mileage, but it was a long one, probably my longest single day distance yet. This portion of the route also had some dirt and gravel which was nice as a change of pace.

Video:


Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Niagara Ride - Day 2

Day two - We left Canada and headed towards the finger lakes of New York. We made quite a few stops along the way to check out a few state parks and some of the many waterfalls in the area. We ended the night in Watkins Glen at a neat BBQ and microbrew spot (Nickel's Pitt) where we had some great food and good entertainment.

Photos (Click to see larger version):















































Video:


Click to go to day 3

Thursday, June 19, 2014

Niagara Ride - Day 1

Eric, Russ, Frank, JT and myself took off early Friday morning for Canada and upstate New York. The first day we headed north to Ontario and Niagara Falls. I was surprised that we were able to go pretty much the whole way on nice secondary roads (I hate slab). We made it the entire way with no mechanical difficulties or flats. Niagara Falls was as touristy as I remembered, but the falls are impressive and we had a good time out on the town after getting settled in our rooms.

Photos:






Day 1 video:



Click to go to Day 2

Sunday, June 8, 2014

Spring Laurel Fork Campout

There was a big turnout for this year's spring Laurel Fork campout. We had an excellent ride down on Friday. Half way through Saturday's ride I hit an innocent looking little puddle that turned out to be a bottomless pit with a rock embedded in the side. The rock bent my front rim and sent me over the bars. Luckily the tube held air and the big KTM was still rideable. I decided to limp the bike back to camp after that so I didn't get much video on Saturday. This trip was also a shakedown run for my Rockies trip. Other than the weak front rim, everything else worked great. All of my camping gear easily fit on the bike and the luggage I am planning on using seems like it will work for me.

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Video: