Brenham Bed and Breakfast

This weekend was the shakedown ride before the big loop this summer. We got to throw out some miles, see how the bikes are running, get some fun in before taking the bikes off line for maintenance.

This weekend was just a short run out to Brenham, TX. Basically, it was an 85 mile ride out there, putt around town, and 85 miles back. I got to swing by the BMOA Rallye out in New Ulm, TX. This was a gathering of vintage European bikes. Lots of old Triumphs, BSA, Nortons, and BMWs. This was the first time Vern got to see field games at a rally, it was humorous..... I think the highlight was "Riding The Plank". A 20 foot long 2X4 is laid on the ground, and you have to ride from one end to the other without falling off of the board. More than one bike went down. The big one was a fully dressed out and loaded BMW R100RT. When that bike fell off the board, it went straight to the ground and threw the rider about 5 feet to the side. All of the field games run at low speed, so he wasn't hurt. Neither was the bike. It was funny, nonetheless.

All in all, it was a nice relaxing ride. I have decided to pick up a more distance friendly bike. I am picking up a BMW R90/6 with hard bags on Tue. It should hold up a bit better on long distance rides. I should go from a 350 mile day to a 500-600 mile day. I will post pictures once I get them.

Enjoy,

Dave

Texas Ural Rally Days.......

Let me start off this post by saying that I am a dork. A really, really big dork. We capped off the weekend at the local KOA for some butt parkin around the campfire. Come time to leave about midnight, put on my jacket, and the inside of my jacket was cold. Hmmmm.......I was really warm a few minutes ago......did we just drop 20 degrees in 2 min? No kidding, move away from the fire, it is cold. Only about 50 degrees. Start coming down the highway and I notice that I am getting a bad shimmy from my front end. That was when it dawned on me that it was DAMN COLD!!!!!!!! Uncontrollable shivering does bad things to the handling on motorcycles. The next thing we see is Dave rolling down the access road access road heading for the truck stop to buy a sweatshirt. That way I can hit the highway and get to the hotel. Turns out the the truck stop is one exit before the hotel. Now that I have feeling back in my hands, I can actually post.....

Started out the day with breakfast at the Czech Stop in West, TX. Had some kolaches. If you have never actually been inside it, it is a gas station with a bakery inside. There are even tables......3 of them. We end up sitting out with the bikes and eating breakfast. If you think having one Ural is a conversation starter, try sitting in a group of 7. After breakfast, its time to head for the Texas Ranger Museum in Waco. We pull in at Wal Mart for something or other, and one of the bikes is running a bit funny. Turns out that the right carb is loose.....way loose....like, about to fall off the bike loose. On most bikes this would just be funny, but on a boxer twin, it would be pretty freaking hilarious.....followed by biblically tragic. With the cylinders poking our the sides of the bike (over your feet), and the carbs hanging on the back of the of the cylinders next to your shins. If one of those falls off while you are riding, it will take an act of god to get you unscrewed. The only thing holding the carb up at that point is the throttle cable and the fuel line, and the fuel line is a lot shorter and something has to give...... Fortunately we caught it before it dropped. I know we always joke about parts falling off of Urals, but I have never heard about anything that important trying to eject......

After the repairs, we made it to the museum. For those who don't know...the Texas Ranger Museum has nothing to do with baseball. It is actually a pretty neat place. 80% of the exhibits are guns......"Here are the guns used by each ranger through history", "Here are the guns recovered from Bonnie and Clyde".......Here are the historical guns of the earliest rangers. After the museum, we went to eat at this place called Crickets. Food wasn't bad, service was survivable. After food it is back to the hotel to get a bit of rest and then head out to the campground to hang out around the campfire, and setup the circumstances for the opening of this post.


Dave

The Great Ural Weekend.....

This weekend a group of Ural riders in TX are meeting in Waco. I got to meet a few of them tonight. Great bunch of guys. I understand how Kel feels when she rides with us now. I had the only solo bike there (without sidecar). Most of the people are camping, but I am staying at a hotel......with an in-room jacuzzi. actually, i am on my way to the bubbles now.....bbye. I will post again, with pictures, after the ride tomorrow. (edit) Ok, so the jacuzzi sucks. Very little hot water. The only thing worse than no jacuzzi is a COLD jacuzzi. There will be a discussion with management over this.

Dave

The merry band of idiots and the devil's backbone

So, we decide that there must be riding. I am definitely in need of Brain Drain-o (tm). How do I choose to clear my brain.....? By pulling a 6 bike chain to and from the Devil's Backbone. First off, I have to say that the name sounds menacing. People hear about it and talk about the number of deaths each year on it. This quickly conjures up visions of the blacktop of doom. Since I went to college in San Marcos, right at the bottom of the backbone, I had a bit more realistic view of it. I tried to warn everyone appropriately that it was not that bad.....unless it was windy. The whole stretch of road is only about one mile long, but it is along the top of a ridge with canyons on both sides. This can lead to some horrid cross winds. There are also deer in abundance. The big thing about the backbone is that it is not scary the first time through. The second time through you think you have it nailed and want to go fast. That is where you realize that all of the turns are decreasing radius turns, that are blind, with deer, and up to a 500ft drop off....on BOTH sides of the road. The nice thing about the backbone is the trip to it, not the backbone itself. From Austin, there is a lot of very nice twisty road that goes through some small towns. There are a few spots where you could collect some trees if you are not careful, but overall it is pretty much sweeperville. Here is the route:



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The running joke through the whole trip was that we were a WWII re-enactment group. There were 6 of us. Me on the Russian beast, Kel on the BMW R90/Sidecar, Glenn on the Kawasaki, Vern on the Goldwing, Gary on the Harley, and Laura on the Suzuki. For the next ride I want to pull our friends with the BSA and the Ducati, and we can have the full cast of WWII. Quite possibly the defining point of the trip was when we stopped in a parking lot to make some adjustments and the Harley was parked on a slope. The kickstand was pacing downhill so when we went to leave, Gary could not reach the ground on the uphill side of the bike. This put him in a position where he could not get leverage on the Electra -Glide. Kel's monkey had to go over and push the bike off of the stand so he could get it moving. No, we will not ever let him live that down. The Glide was what he got for wrapping his old 1400 Intruder around a cow. I guess there is a learning curve on those big Road Sofas.

We made it back in one piece, got a couple pictures, had some awesome mexican food at this little restaurant at the junction of RR12 and RR32. The pictures are included below....I know they suck, but I took them with my phone. Deal with it.






Time to get ready for my next run to the Ural campout in Waco in two weeks. This will be the first time this many Ural riders have gathered in one place in texas in a long time....ever I bet.

Have fun,

Dave

going mobile

finally got a data plan on the cell phone so I don't have to take the notebook with me when I travel. I should also have a sattlite tracker soon. I will update as soon as I get the link to the track site set up.

Dave

Unseasonably warm........

Basic high school math here..... unseasonable warm weather + a merry band of idiots = housework getting put off till the next rainy spell. Actually, we had a good excuse...Vern got a new bike. An 85 Goldwing. Of course we had to take it out and see how it was going to handle on all of the different kinds of roads that we tend to ride. All of them......in one weekend. Granted, we only killed off about 300 miles this weekend, but in the grand scheme of things, that was actually pretty good. Vern is learning a new bike, and Kel is training a new monkey. This has to be a fairly light weekend. We are jokingly referring to it as a "paper mache'" butt weekend.

Saturday we added another bike to the line, a friend from work. We went to San Marcos through Wimberly. Had to go and get some of the best cheap Mexican food I know of. A little place in San Marcos called Mana's. We got to let Vern see the twisty stuff on RR 12 on the way down, and try out the straight line cruising coming back up TX 21/US183. Now that he knows it works, we shall never take that road again......long and straight........painfully straight. Here is the map......



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Sunday was a little bit more exciting. Vern got his confidence up on the oldwing, and Kel's new Monkey got down to business. We decided to do Hamilton Pool Rd out to 281 and then 1431 back to Austin. I thought Kel's monkey was going to giggle himself to death. He was all over that chair moving weight to balance out turns. Having a good monkey actually brought her cornering speeds up to where those of us on 2 were going. He now has a new title....he is now the PFM (Poo Flingin' Monkey). We made it to Marble Falls just as the Bluebonnet Cafe closed, so we hit the River City Cafe instead. Not bad food, but the Bluebonnet it ain't. Here is the map for Sunday.




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Hopefully, next weekend I will be able to schedule a solo go away. I need some one on one time with Eyegor......

TTFN.

For the polar bear in all of us.........

Its 30 degrees outside and it looks like a nice day for a ride. The initial plan was to run to Fredericksburg to get BBQ. When we made it to the turn on Hamilton Pool Rd, we decided that pie would be a better choice. Also about 60 miles shorter. We ended up making the run to Marble Falls and have some pie at the Bluebonnet Cafe. Damn good pie. Just to provide a bit of perspective on the temp...... 30 degrees at 65 MPH equals about 10 degrees. All told, we knocked off about 150 miles and we were under freezing with the wind-chill most of the way.

So, I made some interesting discoveries about my new trick shoulder. The cold is nasty. The colder my shoulder gets, the more stiff it gets. As long as I am going in a straight line, it isn't a problem. When I go into a turn it is a bit blocky on the turns. I also learned that long sweeping left turns are ok, but the long sweeping right turns hurt after a while. I am pretty much assuming that this will go away over time, but it still temporarily sucks.....

Here is the route we took....



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