Passes & Canyons Blog

Per my last post, about how riding motorcycles is the perfect socially distanced pursuit, the RMMRC has taken this concept to heart. Last week alone there were two group rides that were structured and promoted as being coronavirus conscious. Another is planned for this week.

I went on the first ride last week it was really nice. First off, it was a beautiful day, great for a ride. Second, it was my first time on a bike in about two weeks, so I was due. And third, it was a small group, five people, and we just had a good time on some good roads.

Sort of good roads, that is. Actually, sand and gravel were the order of the day. We went into the hills and this was probably the earliest I have gone into the hills after the winter has abated. The main highways were clear and clean. We didn’t stay just on the main highways.

Meeting up at the Phillips 66 station out by Morrison we headed up to Kittredge on Bear Creek Road and then turned south on Myers Gulch Road, which has turned into Parmalee Gulch Road by the time it reaches US 285. And oh man, was there ever a lot of sand and gravel. Mostly on the curves. Bob and Robert, who I call the Go-Fast Boys, were in the lead an even they slowed down. Just too much loose stuff in too many curves.

Hitting 285 we headed west to just past Conifer where we turned off toward the Platte River on Foxton Road. This had me a little puzzled because we were supposedly heading to a park a bit north of Pine. I knew we could get there this way but the last time I was on it the road along the Platte was unpaved. Were these guys on Gold Wings (three of them) really OK on a stretch of gravel? I was on my Concours, which hates gravel, but I figured I could manage.

So we got to what the map tells me is SW Platte River Road and turned west and what do you know, it was paved. In fact, it was paved so long ago that the asphalt was terrible, with a lot of gravel from disintegrated asphalt scattered everywhere. Obviously it has been a very long time since I’ve been on this particular stretch.

But it was paved and as long as there was a solid surface under the loose gravel the Connie did fine. We reached the intersection at Buffalo Creek and turned north toward Pine, cruised through Pine, and then turned off onto Crystal Lake Road, which took us back down to the Platte at a Jefferson County open space park I never knew existed. Nice place.

We parked–a separate space for each bike, no grouping into parking spaces–and each grabbed the food we had brought with us and then we sat spread around two picnic tables, well separated from each other, and ate and chatted in the balmy spring warmth. When we left we took the road on up to Pine Junction and turned east on 285.

Back at Conifer we turned onto Pleasant Park Road, which eventually feeds into Deer Creek Road and then into Deer Creek Canyon Road. This was where we really hit the sand. It wasn’t just in the corners, it was all over the road, all along the road. Then out to Wadsworth at Chatfield Reservoir, and on home from there. By the way, coming east on C-470 it finally looks like that long-term expansion project is finally nearing an end. That will be a relief–that has been such a huge mess for about three years.

And that was my beautiful ride on Tuesday. What did you do?

Biker Quote for Today

Why bikes are better than women: You can share your motorcycle with your friends.

This thing has been spreading (kind of like a virus) so you may have already seen it. If not, you came to the right place.

In this time of coronavirus pandemic there is constant talk of “social distancing,” that is, not getting too close to other people because they may infect you or you may infect them. So hey, what’s the best possible way to socialize but keep your distance? Riding motorcycles, of course.

Here’s a thing I got from an ABATE member.

BE ADVISED

Avoid crowded spaces — ride motorcycles.

Do not use public transportation — ride motorcycles.

Well ventilated spaces are virus free — ride motorcycles.

Protect your nose and mouth — ride motorcycles.

Recommended use of gloves — ride motorcycles.

Try not to touch contaminated surfaces — don’t let anyone touch your motorcycle.

Avoid shaking hands — do not remove your gloves when getting off the motorcycle.

Keep a safe distance from people who sneeze or cough — ride motorcycles.

Maintain a positive and prudent attitude — Only way to ride a motorcycle.

FEEL FREE TO SHARE THIS IMPORTANT INFORMATION

Wow, I couldn’t have said it better.

Biker Quote for Today

I need some time off from reality. Just a few days away from people and all their bull crap.

I was pretty darn surprised awhile back to check my email and find an invitation to come speak to the BMW Motorcycle Club of Colorado at their monthly meeting. (They don’t all ride BMWs, thus the “Sort Of” in the title above.) Apparently Carl was familiar with this website and this blog and he felt that I would be able to make an interesting presentation. Would I come talk about my writing and my travels? OK, if you think so I’m willing to do it.

First I had to prepare. I wrote out an entire presentation, not that I intended to read it, but just to draw my thoughts together. Then I distilled it down to a list of words and phrases, figuring that would be all I would really need to keep track of where I was going. Finally, I put together a PowerPoint slide deck with photos and images to complement the oral presentation. If you read this blog you know I end each post with a “Biker Quote for Today” so I interspersed some of my favorite quotes among the images.

I would be taking my laptop, which has PowerPoint on it, but just to be sure I saved the deck as a .ppsx file, which is supposed to be a presentation format that can be played even if you don’t have PowerPoint. I copied the file onto the laptop and also onto a jump drive. Redundancy, you know.

So the presentation was to be at the February meeting but the weather was getting nasty that day. Also, I had a minor cold–nothing that would have stopped me from going but when Carl called to say let’s postpone till March I was not unhappy.

March 11 came and I was ready. I thought I was getting there in plenty of time but figured it made sense to get everything set up right away. That was a good plan.

We needed to hook my laptop up the flat-screen TV that so commonly now replaces the old projection screen. But the TV did not want to make nice with my laptop. After several people of increasing technical competence tried and failed to get them to talk, Carl pulled out an old tablet he had on hand and hooked it up. The TV liked his table, so we inserted the jump drive. Redundancy!

This was just at the point when the meeting was starting. So they had their usual business to attend to and then it came time for the speaker. (Oh yeah, that’s me.)

I double-clicked on the file and got a message saying the computer could not open this file because it did not have the right program. More tech-savvy folks jumped in to trouble-shoot and I figured I’d better start talking even minus my visual aids.

I don’t know if it was apparent to the folks in the crowd but it quickly came apparent to me that I needed my visual aids, so I was pretty relieved when someone else pulled out another laptop that had PowerPoint on it and presto, I was in business. Now instead of just talking about my articles published in Rider magazine I could show them. Instead of just talking about my bikes I could show them. And perhaps most importantly, I could show the slides of quotes. Truthfully, I had the impression those were the highlights of the presentation for quite a few of the group.

When it was over I hung around and several people came up to talk to me. I have to tell you, writing this blog is very much a leap of faith. I write stuff and put it out there but I have no idea who might be reading it, if anyone is reading it at all. So it always tickles me when, as happened here, people speak to me about this or that blog post I wrote that they read. Wow, people really do read my stuff!

Apparently, you do. Thanks. I do appreciate it.

Biker Quote for Today

You know you’re a biker if every time you hear a vehicle with headers you look for a Harley.

I tend to be pretty environmentally minded and so for years I’ve been a little proud that I ride motorcycles, which get better gas mileage and use fewer resources.

That said, is it really true that we who ride are easier on the environment than people in cars? This is a question I have raised more than once and the answer is never clear cut. So I’m approaching this from a different perspective today.

The point I want to focus on today is that, if we only used bikes for transportation and were saving all that gas and resources it would be a simple yes. But we don’t. In fact, many of us almost never use our motorcycles as basic transportation, we ride them for recreation.

Which is to say, when we ride them we are burning more gas, creating more pollution, using more resources, than if we had other recreational pursuits. When the OFMC takes off on a trip, each of us is riding a motorcycle, getting good gas mileage. But how does the gas usage of our whole group equate with what we would burn if we all rode in one van? I’m sure that flips the equation pretty seriously.

Now, I do use my bikes for transportation some of the time. I have a number of regular errands that I almost always run on a motorcycle. But most of my riding is just joy riding. It’s a beautiful day, I want to be out in it. So off I go.

One option that grows more viable with time is getting an electric motorcycle. Can I see myself with one of those at some point? Absolutely. In fact, I went up to Boulder a few years ago with cash in pocket intending to buy an electric scooter. I didn’t because it was used, and thus had some issues, and the seller did not strike me as altogether trustworthy when he spoke to the issues I raised. But yeah, I’d say there is a 100% probability that some day I will have an electric two-wheeler.

Which brings me to the second part of this discussion: Do we really care about being green?

Do we really, truly care? Yes, I care about being green, that’s why I recycle, cut my waste to almost nothing, turn lights off, walk a lot, take light rail . . . so many things that I do. But do I care so much that I’m going to stop “wasting” gasoline on motorcycle joy rides?

Emphatically NO! I love riding motorcycles way too much for that.

So does this make me a hypocrite? I guess it does, at least a bit. Am I going to beat myself up over it? Probably not. I’ll just take solace in knowing that whatever I do that is harmful to the environment, most people do a lot more. And I accept that if you are going to live in our so-called modern society this is what happens.

But I really should keep my smugness in check.

Biker Quote for Today

Fast cars and motorcycles raisin’ hell in cowboy boots. — Tim McGraw

I try to avoid driving a car as much as possible but I don’t always ride motorcycles. For instance, any time I can ride the light rail rather than drive I do. And I walk. I walk a lot. And you know what? Walking has a lot in common with riding motorcycles.

I was walking to the gym the other day and as I went down the other side of our block I had three encounters in quick order. There is a house over there where the entire front yard is landscaped, using a lot of rock and with plants wedged in here and there. And it was bursting with green! Spring had definitely arrived in that yard. Now, since then we’ve had a soaking rain and it is Spring everywhere, but this was the first.

Two houses later I saw a squirrel in a tree, going in and out of a hole in the trunk. I had to wonder, how does a tree come to have a perfectly round hole like that? My presumption is that a limb grew there but died long ago. As the rest of the tree grew around it the limb itself eventually rotted away and then the critters probably clawed away the soft, dead wood and created this hole. It was interesting.

And another three houses down I heard clucking. Like chickens. And sure enough, there was a chicken coop next to the garage in the back yard. That was never there before.

So what does all this have to do with motorcycles? What do you tell non-riders when they ask what it’s like to ride a motorcycle? Almost invariably you will mention at some point how being on a bike puts you out in nature, not enclosed in a box away from nature. You’ll mention the smells that people in cars never smell. You’ll mention the micro-climates you experience that people in cars are totally unaware of. I know those are two of the things I noticed right away when I first started riding behind my friend John, before I bought my own bike.

Well, same with walking. All three of those things I described are things I would not have been at all aware of if I had been driving. Judy and I both go to the gym but she drives while I walk. I’m always telling her what’s going on in the neighborhood, things that I see because I walk that she misses because she drives.

Plus I get the exercise of walking.

Biker Quote for Today

Why motorcycles are better than men: motorcycles don’t smell bad.

If you care about passing the hands-free bill that would prohibit a lot of this nonsense of cagers killing bikers because they’re on their cell phones the time is now to contact your state representatives. I’ll just insert what Stump sent out.

The important information this week is about SB20-065 (Use of Mobile Electronic Devices While Driving). The Bill will be heard by the House Transportation & Local Government Committee on Wednesday, March 18, in the Legislative Services Building (200 E 14 Ave on the first floor, conference room on the left as you enter the building). The meeting starts @ 1:30 pm and right now it is scheduled 2nd on the agenda. Below is a list of the committee members. Please contact them asking for their support of the bill. ABATE’s official stance is to support the bill, as it will make our roads safer, but of course, you always have the option to represent yourself and oppose it.

Matt Gray, Chair matt@matthewgray.us 303-866-4667

Tony Exum tony.exum.house@state.co.us 303-866-3069

Terri Carver terri.carver.house@state.co.us 303-866-2191

Marc Catlin marc.catlin.house@state.co.us 303-866-2955

Meg Froelich meg.froelich.house@state.co.us 303-866-2921

Edie Hooton edie.hooton.house@state.co.us 303-866-2915

Stephen Humphrey rephumphrey48@yahoo.com 303-866-2943

Jovan Melton jovan.melton.house@state.co.us 303-866-2919

Alex Valdez alex.valdez.house@state.co.us 303-866-2925

Donald Valdez donald.valdez.house@state.co.us 303-866-2916

James Wilson representativewilson@gmail.com 303-866-2747

Last year this bill passed the Senate but died in the House. We need to make sure it passes this time.

Not surprisingly, the bill to renew the Motorcycle Operator Safety Training (MOST) was approved and passed along to the House Finance Committee. Why do we have the Sunset review law if bureaucracies are renewed without any real consideration of their ongoing merit? Why can’t we just let them die?

Once the Finance Committee rubber-stamps it the bill will go to the full House. Contact your legislators and tell them it needs to die.

Biker Quote for Today

You might be a Yuppie biker if you have doubled the weight of your bike with bolt-on chrome.

With a predicted high of 70 on Saturday it was inevitable that the RMMRC was going to get a ride together. I probably would have been inclined to go but when Judy said she wanted to go that totally decided it.

This was going to be a different type of ride than we typically do. In the summer of course we tend to head for the hills. In winter, however, you pretty much have to stay on the plains, but you can still get hills going southeast toward the Palmer Divide. On Saturday we headed northeast, to Fort Morgan.

When I first thought about it I figured it could be nice, we might do some riding along the Platte River. Then, thinking more about it, I realized that was not likely. If you look at a map you’ll see that although the south fork of the South Platte comes right through Denver, from here it heads north all the way to Greeley, where it joins the north fork of the South Platte and then flows east. And after awhile it turns north toward Nebraska where it meets the North Platte.

All of this means you would have to ride pretty far to do much riding along the Platte. So what did we have to look forward to riding to Fort Morgan? A lot of straight roads across the prairie. Section line roads requiring a lot of zig-zagging in order to go northeast. Of course I-76 goes that way as a diagonal but nobody wants to ride the interstate.

So that’s what we did. There were eight of us on seven bikes and we saw a lot of prairie we had mostly never seen before. And which, frankly, I don’t have a lot of interest in seeing again any time soon. I mean, it was nice once, but once was enough.

We got into Fort Morgan, made a stop at the local museum–which was actually a pretty nice one–and then headed over for lunch at a local Mexican place.

And then it was back to Denver and we just got on the superslab. A couple of us got off at Barr Lake in order to skip the slab through town but at that point, as Judy said, we were just covering miles because we were getting tired of being in the saddle.

Yeah, there’s a reason we don’t generally ride to the northeast.

Biker Quote for Today

You know you’re a biker if you refer to your bike as if it had a legal first name.

I was embarrassed a couple weeks ago when riding with some folks from the RMMRC. I had told Robert, who was leading, that the road north out of Daniels Park was paved all the way now. So he led the way along that road, turned left at the T intersection as I intended, and we soon found ourselves on gravel.

Mind you, it was very good gravel, probably drowned in magnesium chloride, making it practically paved, and we kept going. But I had been certain it was paved and I could not have been more wrong. How the heck did I make that mistake? Who knows.

So I studied an online map to see what the deal is down there and I found that if we had gone right at that T then we would have been able to get all the way back up to the city on paved roads. Yesterday was a gorgeous, warm early March day so I had to ride and it made sense to head down that way to cement this route into my memory.

I headed south on Quebec down, down, and further down to the south. Quebec became Monarch Boulevard and eventually I reached Castle Pines Parkway. I turned west until I reached Daniels Park and then followed the road we took that day that bent north and then I reached the T intersection. This is North Daniels Park Road and Grig’s Road. This time I turned right.

On a side note, while coming north through Daniels Park I passed a herd of bison. I didn’t know they had bison at Daniels Park.

I knew from the map that Grig’s Road was going to do some serious bending, and it did. It turns out that it has to jog around a good-sized arroyo. Homes backing onto that arroyo must have a really nice view and setting.

Heading straight south momentarily, I reached a roundabout, as expected, and turned due east again. This was Daniels Gate Road and it made a couple curves, then bent northeast and intersected . . . Monarch Boulevard. So I had made a loop.

OK. I really, truly have a clear idea of that area now.

Biker Quote for Today

An expert is a person who has made every mistake possible in a very narrow field ~ Neils Bohr