Huntsville, Alabama.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Three new states added
26 states to go. (I think I'll pass on shipping the GS to Hawaii.)
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
People we like: Ted
We may never know more of Ted than his voice on the phone, but Ted is a service tech at Griffith Kawasaki in Cleveland, TN. He took 30 minutes on the phone to help us trouble shoot Connie's electrical problems.
This guy walked us through things nice and slow, kept trying new stuff, and was as excited as we were when we (thought) we fixed the problem. And he would have nailed the solution much earlier if we had given the main battery cable a good tug instead of a cursory poke when he started with that.
He was generous with his time, and knowledgeable to boot.
Thanks, Ted.
This guy walked us through things nice and slow, kept trying new stuff, and was as excited as we were when we (thought) we fixed the problem. And he would have nailed the solution much earlier if we had given the main battery cable a good tug instead of a cursory poke when he started with that.
He was generous with his time, and knowledgeable to boot.
Thanks, Ted.
People we like: Burger stand girl
On our first day of riding together, we had been dealing with the frustration of traffic, slow roads and slow going for a few hours. We were making terrible time through NY, CT and into MA. Frustation was totally setting in. We stopped at a roadside burger and ice cream shack in Pontoosuc, MA, and met burger stand girl.
She was just some kid, working a summer job. Nothing remarkable. But was so bubbly and happy and fun, in that infectious sort of way. It was hard to be cranky after talking with her, and without even trying, she set our moods back to right, and off we went.
Thanks, burger stand girl.
Monday, August 3, 2009
Karl Post-mortem
The BMW GS did great on the trip. No mechanical issues at all. It just keeps chugging.
Notes:
Notes:
- I should have checked the brake pads before I left. I just didn't think to. As a result, 2 of the 4 front brake pads were down to metal. (See pic of one below, next to an OK pad.) I didn't notice until things started grinding, and then it was too late. I'm in for a new set of front rotors now (at $265 each).
- The rear brake pads were also worn past spec.
- All pads have been replaced, and even with the bad rotors, it's an amazing difference. I'm not sure why I wasn't more in tune with the degraded braking as it evolved. Happened too gradually, I guess.
- I'm not sure if brake pads every 25,000 miles is a sign of city riding, or hard riding. But either way, it's indicative of something.
- I held off on replacing the rear tire, and it served me fine. Did great in the really twisty stuff. OK, but not great in the less twisty and wet stuff. But mostly I'm glad that I didn't replace it before the last 500 mile push of interstate back home. That would have done a good job of flattening off a new tire from the start.
- I'm at 6500 miles on this tire, which I'm thrilled with seeing how I ride. I'm looking at going through 2.5 rear tires for every front tire, which is another sign of hard riding.
- The engine was a bit buzzy for the second half of the trip. Either the valve adjustment isn't dead on any more, or the throttle body sync is off. Wasn't worth messing with on the trip, but I'll take it on soon.
- I haven't looked at the final drive to see how much loose metal is in there. I'm sure it's a bunch, but I can't bring myself to check. Again, I'll be in there soon.
- I've given up on getting my windscreen adjusted into something that doesn't blast me. I'm so used to it now, there's no point in stressing.
- I need to mess with my handlebar position to see if I can stop locking my right arm into place and freezing up all my shoulder muscles.
- The bulb in the low-beam is way too weak, which necessitates the use of the PIAA driving lights, which are way to strong for traffic. There needs to be a middle ground.
People we like: Neil and Jenny
I can't believe we didn't get a picture of these two.
Neil and Jenny live in Asheville, NC. Two of the nicest folks you'll meet. I found Neil on ADVrider. (It's THE site for people who do adventure touring. Click through, even if just to see the slide show on the home page.) He's got himself listed in the "hit me up if you're coming through town" thread, so I sent him a message. He sent me a message back, and I called him up about 70 miles outside of Asheville.
By the time we hit Asheville, Neil had found us a place to stay, and come up with a BBQ recommendation for us. He and Jenny came down the the restaurant, and had beers and hung out for a couple hours. Great conversation about riding, Asheville, everything. They took off, and pointed us toward the bars to hit (which were conveniently located right by the hotel Neil picked out).
We had been talking about the good roads in the area, the ones the locals ride. Neil offered to put together a route for us, and sure enough, when we got back to the hotel I had an email waiting laying out a whole path of great roads from Asheville to Roanoke. Not many people will roll home late on a school night and spend time with maps laying out a route for people they just met. These two are champs.
Neil was even good enough to call us on our bullshit when we bailed on the last part of the route he sent in order to slab it back to DC. He tried to tempt us with Pisgah Pale Ale, and was closer to winning us over than he knows.
Thanks, Neil and Jenny. You always have a place to stay in DC or NY.
Neil and Jenny live in Asheville, NC. Two of the nicest folks you'll meet. I found Neil on ADVrider. (It's THE site for people who do adventure touring. Click through, even if just to see the slide show on the home page.) He's got himself listed in the "hit me up if you're coming through town" thread, so I sent him a message. He sent me a message back, and I called him up about 70 miles outside of Asheville.
By the time we hit Asheville, Neil had found us a place to stay, and come up with a BBQ recommendation for us. He and Jenny came down the the restaurant, and had beers and hung out for a couple hours. Great conversation about riding, Asheville, everything. They took off, and pointed us toward the bars to hit (which were conveniently located right by the hotel Neil picked out).
We had been talking about the good roads in the area, the ones the locals ride. Neil offered to put together a route for us, and sure enough, when we got back to the hotel I had an email waiting laying out a whole path of great roads from Asheville to Roanoke. Not many people will roll home late on a school night and spend time with maps laying out a route for people they just met. These two are champs.
Neil was even good enough to call us on our bullshit when we bailed on the last part of the route he sent in order to slab it back to DC. He tried to tempt us with Pisgah Pale Ale, and was closer to winning us over than he knows.
Thanks, Neil and Jenny. You always have a place to stay in DC or NY.
Day 7 recap
Dawsonville, GA to Asheville, NC
It was finally time for a full day in the mountains. These are the kind of roads that have names like The Dragon, The Skyway and Hellbender. These are the kind of roads where you take extreme handling machines to their limits.
We left Dawsonville (known for nothing more than having outlets) on GA 19 north. It's a nice road. Twisty, but not unreasonably so. A good warm-up. We caught a couple minutes of light rain, but net even enough to care about.
We rolled through small towns, keeping an eye out for food, and came across a roadside BBQ stand in McCaysville, GA. I think the only other thing it's known for is being the station for the Blue Ridge Scenic Railway. We pull over as soon as we can, and shut off the bikes. I decide to move mine across the street, so we can see it from the restaurant, thus meaning we don't have to worry about locking up/carrying all our crap. Eric goes to pull Connie over, too, but she won't start.
It's clearly something electrical. We poke at it for a second, and decide to tackle it after lunch. The BBQ was good, but we were both a little distracted. We wrap up lunch, and start going through checklists, diagnostic steps, our own limited knowledge of electrics. No dice.
Eric's starting to think through the "dead bike, arrange a tow to a shop and kiss Moto3our goodbye" scenario. I'm looking up bike shops nearby to call. Finally he calls Griffith's Kawasaki and Gets Ted Freeman on the phone.
Ted takes a half an hour running Eric and me through things to check. He isolates it to a bad fuse (not blown, just bad) and Connie's happy again.
Add all this to a late start, and it's already almost 3pm. We're 40 miles from Tellico Plains, which is where the fun starts. So we head out.
On the way to Tellico Plains (and the Tennessee end of the Skyway) we have a nice but pretty uneventful ride up TN 68, until about 5 miles from the Skyway. On the other side of the road, a truck goes screaming by, with a Tellico Plains cop in hot pursuit. They must have been doing 90. On majorly twisty back roads. I don't think there's any way you can learn to drive like that on those roads, other than growing up in it. Barely a minute later, another Tellico cop goes flying by, chasing the other guys. And that opens the flood gates. Next is a sheriff car, followed by 3 unmarked black trucks, lights and sirens going off like they're announcing the rapture. After that it was a slow stream of cop cars coming from every direction, and funneling down 68. Even after we turned off onto the Skyway, we heard sirens for a while.
...Which means there were no cops to be found on the Skyway. I'm not sure they would have been out looking for us to begin with. The traffic was sparse. I saw a grand total of maybe 10 bikes and 5 cars in both directions for the entire length of the Skyway (36 miles). They probably don't bother with the mid-week stuff. I could have sworn Brian and I were there mid-week in 2006, but we came across at least 5 times that amount of bikes and cars. Maybe the rain forecast kept everyone away?
We had been lucky, and the rain had missed us all day. The Skyway was dry and clean. For those of you who haven't been on this road, you should go. I can't imagine it will be nearly as fun in a car, but it's still sure to be amazing. The Skyway goes from 900 ft to 5400 feet, and back, in those 36 miles. (Sorry, Brian. I hate to say it. But it's better than we remembered. It felt shorter this time, but better.)
It's twisty but very driveable/rideable. There are at least a dozen scenic overlooks along the way. The cloud line started at 3700 feet when we went through. Riding through clouds is surprisingly different than riding through fog. It's simultaneously easier to see and moister.
We stopped at the first overlook and chatted with some riders, and then hit the road again. I've known I have a good suspension/tire setup going on my bike, but this is where I got to learn how good it is. I came up behind two sport bike riders from Eastern Carolina (Tyler and Gary). Gary was out for a more serene ride, so Tyler and I took of for a slightly more spirited ride down the NC descent. The whole way down I was right with him. We hit the bottom and he flagged me down to pay me and my bike a compliment.
After the Skyway, we made our way over to the Dragon. I won't go into a long description, but it's the Times Square of twisty roads. (It's extreme, packed with people, some sort of center of the universe, sensory overload, the locals avoid it, people go because that what they think they are supposed to do [it's not lost on me that I say that, yet also picked it as a destination...], etc.)
I was expecting about 250 bikes, but there were easily under 40. It wasn't nearly the carnival it was before. Again, rain and mid-week were probably the cause, but I was still surprised. We chatted with some guys we met on the Skyway, and took a coffee/bathroom break. By the time we hit the dragon, it was about 5pm.
We pull out, to hit the road, and within a minute are behind a silver Ford SUV (with a Harley Davidson sticker and local tags) doing 25 mph. Now the speed limit on the Dragon is 40, but this guy is taking his sweet damn time. Now there are so many bikers on this road, trying to outride it, that cars always pull over. They have built in dozens of pull-offs, and drivers use them to let riders pass. This guy wasn't having it.
Eric and I were getting more and more frustrated. It's not that we couldn't tear through there at 60, it's that it's actually harder to ride a road like that at such low speeds. Motorcycles are very stable, but that stability is a result of forces in motion (If you lock the throttle and jump off a motorbike doing 60, it will keep rolling straight and upright until something stops it. You try the same thing at 15, and it will flop over.) We do this for 8 miles (the Dragon is 11 long) and hit the first overlook and decide to turn around, and ride it back.
The second run starts out great, but about a minute in, a thunderstorm comes out of nowhere, and I pull over to put on rain gear. Takes a few minutes, and when we go to leave, Connie won't start again. We spend 20 minutes on the dragon, in the rain, trying to get Eric's bike to start. And no dice. No cell reception, no traffic going by. Nothing. Finally, we decide Eric's going to ride my bike down rest of the way, and use a phone down there to get his roadside assistance on the case.
While i'm waiting for him to come back with an update, I start poking around and discover a loose battery main cable. I tighten it up, and Connie fires right up. I make a mad dash down the hill, and catch Eric on the phone. He calls off the cavalry, and we go over all the connections again, cleaning terminals as we go.
A few minutes later, we are back on the road, riding the Hellbender (NC 28) in sunny skies and beautiful weather. The road rolls along a river, which was filled with fog and was quite striking. Eventually we find our way into Asheville, and meet up with some fine NC hospitality (Neil and Jenny are getting their own post). BBQ, beers, conversation and then it's off to bed.
It was finally time for a full day in the mountains. These are the kind of roads that have names like The Dragon, The Skyway and Hellbender. These are the kind of roads where you take extreme handling machines to their limits.
We left Dawsonville (known for nothing more than having outlets) on GA 19 north. It's a nice road. Twisty, but not unreasonably so. A good warm-up. We caught a couple minutes of light rain, but net even enough to care about.
We rolled through small towns, keeping an eye out for food, and came across a roadside BBQ stand in McCaysville, GA. I think the only other thing it's known for is being the station for the Blue Ridge Scenic Railway. We pull over as soon as we can, and shut off the bikes. I decide to move mine across the street, so we can see it from the restaurant, thus meaning we don't have to worry about locking up/carrying all our crap. Eric goes to pull Connie over, too, but she won't start.
It's clearly something electrical. We poke at it for a second, and decide to tackle it after lunch. The BBQ was good, but we were both a little distracted. We wrap up lunch, and start going through checklists, diagnostic steps, our own limited knowledge of electrics. No dice.
Eric's starting to think through the "dead bike, arrange a tow to a shop and kiss Moto3our goodbye" scenario. I'm looking up bike shops nearby to call. Finally he calls Griffith's Kawasaki and Gets Ted Freeman on the phone.
Ted takes a half an hour running Eric and me through things to check. He isolates it to a bad fuse (not blown, just bad) and Connie's happy again.
Add all this to a late start, and it's already almost 3pm. We're 40 miles from Tellico Plains, which is where the fun starts. So we head out.
On the way to Tellico Plains (and the Tennessee end of the Skyway) we have a nice but pretty uneventful ride up TN 68, until about 5 miles from the Skyway. On the other side of the road, a truck goes screaming by, with a Tellico Plains cop in hot pursuit. They must have been doing 90. On majorly twisty back roads. I don't think there's any way you can learn to drive like that on those roads, other than growing up in it. Barely a minute later, another Tellico cop goes flying by, chasing the other guys. And that opens the flood gates. Next is a sheriff car, followed by 3 unmarked black trucks, lights and sirens going off like they're announcing the rapture. After that it was a slow stream of cop cars coming from every direction, and funneling down 68. Even after we turned off onto the Skyway, we heard sirens for a while.
...Which means there were no cops to be found on the Skyway. I'm not sure they would have been out looking for us to begin with. The traffic was sparse. I saw a grand total of maybe 10 bikes and 5 cars in both directions for the entire length of the Skyway (36 miles). They probably don't bother with the mid-week stuff. I could have sworn Brian and I were there mid-week in 2006, but we came across at least 5 times that amount of bikes and cars. Maybe the rain forecast kept everyone away?
We had been lucky, and the rain had missed us all day. The Skyway was dry and clean. For those of you who haven't been on this road, you should go. I can't imagine it will be nearly as fun in a car, but it's still sure to be amazing. The Skyway goes from 900 ft to 5400 feet, and back, in those 36 miles. (Sorry, Brian. I hate to say it. But it's better than we remembered. It felt shorter this time, but better.)
It's twisty but very driveable/rideable. There are at least a dozen scenic overlooks along the way. The cloud line started at 3700 feet when we went through. Riding through clouds is surprisingly different than riding through fog. It's simultaneously easier to see and moister.
We stopped at the first overlook and chatted with some riders, and then hit the road again. I've known I have a good suspension/tire setup going on my bike, but this is where I got to learn how good it is. I came up behind two sport bike riders from Eastern Carolina (Tyler and Gary). Gary was out for a more serene ride, so Tyler and I took of for a slightly more spirited ride down the NC descent. The whole way down I was right with him. We hit the bottom and he flagged me down to pay me and my bike a compliment.
After the Skyway, we made our way over to the Dragon. I won't go into a long description, but it's the Times Square of twisty roads. (It's extreme, packed with people, some sort of center of the universe, sensory overload, the locals avoid it, people go because that what they think they are supposed to do [it's not lost on me that I say that, yet also picked it as a destination...], etc.)
I was expecting about 250 bikes, but there were easily under 40. It wasn't nearly the carnival it was before. Again, rain and mid-week were probably the cause, but I was still surprised. We chatted with some guys we met on the Skyway, and took a coffee/bathroom break. By the time we hit the dragon, it was about 5pm.
We pull out, to hit the road, and within a minute are behind a silver Ford SUV (with a Harley Davidson sticker and local tags) doing 25 mph. Now the speed limit on the Dragon is 40, but this guy is taking his sweet damn time. Now there are so many bikers on this road, trying to outride it, that cars always pull over. They have built in dozens of pull-offs, and drivers use them to let riders pass. This guy wasn't having it.
Eric and I were getting more and more frustrated. It's not that we couldn't tear through there at 60, it's that it's actually harder to ride a road like that at such low speeds. Motorcycles are very stable, but that stability is a result of forces in motion (If you lock the throttle and jump off a motorbike doing 60, it will keep rolling straight and upright until something stops it. You try the same thing at 15, and it will flop over.) We do this for 8 miles (the Dragon is 11 long) and hit the first overlook and decide to turn around, and ride it back.
The second run starts out great, but about a minute in, a thunderstorm comes out of nowhere, and I pull over to put on rain gear. Takes a few minutes, and when we go to leave, Connie won't start again. We spend 20 minutes on the dragon, in the rain, trying to get Eric's bike to start. And no dice. No cell reception, no traffic going by. Nothing. Finally, we decide Eric's going to ride my bike down rest of the way, and use a phone down there to get his roadside assistance on the case.
While i'm waiting for him to come back with an update, I start poking around and discover a loose battery main cable. I tighten it up, and Connie fires right up. I make a mad dash down the hill, and catch Eric on the phone. He calls off the cavalry, and we go over all the connections again, cleaning terminals as we go.
A few minutes later, we are back on the road, riding the Hellbender (NC 28) in sunny skies and beautiful weather. The road rolls along a river, which was filled with fog and was quite striking. Eventually we find our way into Asheville, and meet up with some fine NC hospitality (Neil and Jenny are getting their own post). BBQ, beers, conversation and then it's off to bed.
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Day 9 stats
Hopewell Junction, NY
(Final Totals)
(Final Totals)
| Day 9 | RP | EG |
| Time out on bikes | 2:09 | 7:03 |
| Moving time | 1:11 | 5:15 |
| Miles (GPS) | 55 | 304 |
| Miles (Odometer) | 58 | - |
| Overall average speed | 25.3 | 43.1 |
| Moving average speed | - | 58.1 |
| Max Speed | 78 | 91.6 |
| Totals | ||
| Time on bikes | 88:44 | 87:14 |
| Moving time | 58:24 | 57:00 |
| Miles (GPS) | 3181 | 3229 |
| Miles (Odometer) | 3340 | - |
| Guaranteed miles (GPS) | 3181 | 3229 |
Day 8 stats
Washington, DC
| Day 8 | RP | EG |
| Time out on bikes | 11:35 | 11:20 |
| Moving time | 8:23 | 8:26 |
| Miles (GPS) | 520 | 518 |
| Miles (Odometer) | 546 | - |
| Overall average speed | 44.8 | 45.6 |
| Max Speed | 101 | 89 |
| Totals | ||
| Time on bikes | 86:35 | 79:11 |
| Moving time | 57:13 | 51:55 |
| Miles (GPS) | 3126 | 2830 |
| Miles (Odometer) | 3282 | - |
| Guaranteed miles (GPS) | 3282 | 3128 |
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
