Fall Roadtrip Wrapup and major mechanical issues

    I know it has been a long time since I got back from my trip, but it has been a very eventful few months.  I can finally close out that trip report.

    When I made the stop in Pine Bluff, MO, I noticed that I had an odd tapping in my motor at times.  I ran under the assumption that my valves were getting a bit loose (like they do).  I put it on the checklist of things to do when I get home...."Adjust my valves".  When I got home, I swapped the bikes out and rode the R90 for a couple weeks.  I just didn't have time to get to the valved with the work schedule and all.  One fateful morning I was running late, so I decided to take the 1150 because it is a much faster startup in the morning.  About halfway to work, I noticed the ticking....then it turned into a full blown rattle....then a loud clatter.  I managed to get the bike hack to the house and made the decision to send it to the shop.  They ended up pulling the left jug to see what was up, and guess what they found......





    Things did not bode well for our young hero.  2300 miles across 8 states in a little over a week.  2 miles into the first ride after the trip, the motor lets go.  Not a little lets go, but a catastrophic kablooie.  The cam chain follower on the left side let go.  It is an $11 part, but to get to it, the entire motor has to be removed from the bike and taken completely apart.  Here is my baby on the lift:



    It is a very helpless feeling seeing your bike gutted on the lift like that.  That bike held together over that entire trip, and then let go 2 miles into my commute to work.  My baby drug my silly ass back home wounded.  He could just as easily dropped that part in any state, but he held together long enough to get me home.  That is the kind of love that doesn't wash off with soap and water.  Now he is all stripped on a lift waiting for some love. 

    We decided to go with a 90% rebuild and reseal, and new clutch since he was apart, so it took some time to get him back together.  I almost died when they got him back together and handed me the baggie that held the broken part. 



    It let go at a stoplight.  If that think would have let go on the highway at speed, who knows what would have been the result.  I will definately be buying my bike a beer, I certainly owe him one.

    While he was in the shop, I figured I would ride the R90 for a while.  Unfortunately, she had other plans.  The wonky headlight switch decided it was time to short out and shut down the charging system.  I had planned on taking her offline to do some upgrades, but not just yet.  She ended up going in for upgrades and repairs about 2 weeks later.  I will get the details up on that upgrade when she gets home from the surgeon.

    Fortunately, I was not alone in my time of suffering.  The Roll the Bones rally was kind of rough on The Kel's GS.  It seems that the suspension on the sidecar was not really up to the kind of riding that she likes to do, and it kind of BENT THE HELL out of the sidecar suspension.  Now her bike is in the shop getting the sidecar frame straightened and reinforced.  The builder is confident that the new setup will be much more sturdy when it comes to jumping railroad tracks....YAY!!!!!!!

Here is a little video of some of the rally:



Here is the full playlist of Roll the Bones videos:



She should have the GS back in the next couple weeks.....I hope.

Enjoy,

Dave

Texas Adventure Ride Day 1

     Today was the first day of TAR. The trip to the host hotel and check in. It was actually a very nice ride. I am spending the weekend as The Kel's monkey. Basically, that means I am navigating, acting as the reverse gear, and trying my damnedest to keep the sidecar's wheel on the ground. 

     Tomorrow we get to actually go out and bounce around the back roads of the hill country, but check in day has a charm all its own.  We pulled in about 3:00 in the afternoon.  We were pretty much the first people here.  That means we got to watch all of the other people get in.  The range of people showing up to the rally is amazing.  So fat I have seen everything from the LiFan 200cc Enduro bike, to the normal cast of characters....BMW, KTM, KLR.  Of course, everybody is riding the best bike.  The guys on the small bikes are going to bounce down the trails that are only a couple feet wide.  The guys on the midsize bikes are going to be running dirt roads and maybe some of the trails.  The guys on the Iron Pigs...they are here to go fast on the dirt and gravel roads.  The most humorous part of this whole dynamic is watching them arrive.  The 200 to 450 cc bikes normally show up on trailers.  The 450 to 650 cc bikes tend to ride short distance or trailer long distance.  The big ones tend to ride in.  There are still a few that kind of made us chuckle though.  The guy who rode his 450cc bike in from Colorado helped a guy unload his BMW R1200 GS from a trailer that he pulled down from Ft Worth.

     While standing outside this evening, I was looking at the parking lot.  It was interesting because the parking lot only looked about half full.  For a sold out hotel, it was kind of odd.  Then I realized that there were only 3 cars in the parking lot and the rest were bikes.  I have to say that the distribution of bikes in the parking lot looked kind of like a prison movie.  The big bikes were all fairly evenly spaced around the front of the lot, grouped by manufacturer.  At the back of the parking lot, clustered up at the back of the parking lot backed up against the fence

     Then there is the RV and mobile shop brought in by the CMA.  These guys rock.  The Christian Motorcyclist Association show up at Rallys and set up free hospitality and emergency repair areas just in case you need help.  They also help coordinate roadside rescues if you need it.

    Time to fall out, lots of riding tomorrow, hopefully there will be video and some pictures.

Dave

Day 4, Little things revisited.....

    More little things.....wow.....  If you get enough little things, the big things get drowned out and you don't even notice them anymore.  This trip started kind of odd for me.  The night before we left I got an odd urge to look up my old friend Russell on the internet.  I do it every once in a while, but I don't look that hard.  This time I found him.  A part of me kind of wishes I didn't.  It turns out he died in 2009.

    Russell was a very good friend, a surrogate big brother, a very good mentor.  We spent a lot of time travelling, partying, and doing things best not committed to paper.  He fell off the map back in 1994 when I moved to Austin and he moved out of state.  He was a tattoo artist and a biker.  One of the things I always thought of when I travelled was that I could run into him at any random Denny's or coffee shop, or gas station somewhere in the country.  Maybe we would be going the same direction and ride together, maybe we would just ride off in different directions.  There is a slight possibility that he may even punch me in the mouth for not keeping in touch better.  Either way, that was always a possibility that was ahead of me when I started my bike.  I started off this trip with a bit of sadness over that new discovery.  This time I knew for a fact that I would not run into him in somem dive restaraunt.  The Kel summed it up best when she called him Shrodenger's Biker.  If not observed, he is both alive and dead, around the next curve, or not.....  Now I know.  He is not. 

    This would have been a sad moment for me, but while we were riding the Talimena Skyway we were passed by a pair of riders.  One on an old Moto Guzzi, one on a newer R1200GS.  We let them pass at the beginning of the ride because we were going fairly slow.  We actually met up with them at a scenic overlook and chatted for a few minutes, but let them go ahead of us because we didn't want to slow down ther pace.  We eventually got in to the Queen Wilhelmina Park Lodge, and started getting gear off so we could hit the restrooms and get some lunch.  About that time, those same two guys pulled up and started shucking gear.  I got to talk to the guy on the GS for a bit.  It turns out that the guy on the Guzzi is a bit older and much more experienced rider, the guy on the GS was younger and fairly new.  The older guy was leading the trip and showing all of the out of the way places, and fun that could be had, and the younger guy was following along trying to absorb everything as fast as possible.  That was when it dawned on me that even though Russel died, he really wasn't dead.  He is still out there in the form of every other pissy old biker that is pulling a rookie around with him showing him how to squeeze a bit of fun out of life. 

    After we got inside to get a table, they were totally empty except for one couple.  I dumped my gear on the table to hold our spot.  When we got a good look at the other couple in the restaraunt, it turns out that it was The Kel's Dad and his travelling companion.  500 miles away from home, in an empty restaraunt, and who do we see?....Dad.....wow.....talk about a bit of exploding head syndrome.  We ended up spending much longer at lunch than we expected, and then took a bit shorter route back to the hotel.  Very good roads up here, must come back soon.

    To close it out, we are heading back early.  Our house alarm has been going off every day at 5:30.  No idea why, but it has.  Today was the third false alarm in a row.  It is going to take us 2 days to get home, but that means we will just have one more false alarm before we get there.  Then we can figure out what is up with it.  This is where the little things come in.  Most people would see ending a vacation early as a disaster.  It does kind of suck out loud.  Either way, I got some awesome riding in, saw some beautiful scenery, met some awesome people, and closed out a chapter of my life.  I guess now instead of looking forward to running into Russel on the road somewhere, I should just look forward to turning into a slightly shorter version of him.  I guess that is a fair trade on some level.  Who knows? 

Here is the video for today:

Some footage from my bike.....



Some footage of The Kel



Here is the picture set for today:


Here is the route for today:



View Larger Map

Day 2 and 3

     Yesterday we just kind of poked around Paris, TX.  Kel had never seen the Texas Eiffel Tower or the Jesus in cowboy boots.  I got a few pics, they are up on yesterday's entry.  Today we are in Poteau, OK.  The ride up was pretty much straight through the center of the Choctaw Nation.  There is some very nice scenery up here.  When I get a bit of time, I am going to put some video up of the ride today.  The video is kind of shaky, but it isn't bad.




     We ended up fighting some wind today, but it was worth it.  Tomorrow we are going to explore the Ouachita National Forest.  That will be cool.

     The best part about the ride today was the fact that my mind has finally cleared.  The noise has finally died down and I got the chance to just hang out in my head and not think about anything but the ride.  Basically, we hit the break over point.  It will take us more than one day to get home no matter what we do.  That means we are gone.  I like that.

     This morning in Paris, we hit the cold front.  We rolled out at about 65 degrees.  After a couple months of 100+ degree days, that was downright chilly.  We actually pulled our wind liners out for our jackets.  They didn't stay on past about noon, but that is not the point.  WE USED THEM!!!!!!!  YAY!!!!!!



     Here is todays route.



View Larger Map

Day 1, a bit late.......

Day One,

    It was a very nice ride today.  We managed to get out of Austin about 8:30 or so.  Road trips have a tendency to take on a theme.  Regardless of what you try to force on it, it will develop on its own.  I have a sneaking suspicion that this trip has already picked its theme.....The little things.

    When I first started riding, I really enjoyed the fact that once you get moving you are on your own.  The only things that really matter are the day to day events that affect whether or not you get home alive.  All of the stuff at home, all of the stuff at work, all of the silly stuff that pollutes your brain and distracts you from just being alive.  When you ride, especially for distance, your entire life is on the bike.  One minute you are admiring the view, the next minute a deer comes out of the brush and sends you sliding down the road.  Any little thing can get you.  Things as small as a bird hitting you or an odd little crease in the the asphalt are all it really takes.  Understanding this, and accepting it, gives you a sense of freedom from the daily noise and lets you really think with a clear head. 

    Getting your brain into this mode makes you notice little things.  The little things that could be deadly, the little things that could be a trip ender, or little things that make you laugh so hard you total your underwear.  Today was all about the little things.  The Kel blew the zipper on her riding pants, she also lost the back half of the sole from a boot.  We also ended up getting trapped for about 15 miles behind a truck pulling a mobile home that was shedding insulation the whole way.

    Now we are sitting in Paris, TX.  Tropical Storm Lee is hitting the gulf coast and making a big mess with high winds and heavy rain.  Our plan is to spend the day around here and shoot some pictures locally.  Then on Monday, we will look how the weather is doing and see where we want to go.  I will get some pics up tomorrow, right now, it is time for bed.

Here is the route for today:


View Larger Map


Here are some pictures:

 


Have fun,

Dave

A couple quick clips from the weekend....

I will post a more complete entry whenever I get back in town.  Until then, here are a couple clips with the new camera:

Me on FM337:



Kel on TX16 (me chasing):



TTFN

Dave