Passes & Canyons Blog

On that OFMC trip to the Grand Canyon where the communicators were useless I mentioned that Bill and John had to leave without me and we had to meet up later. Why was that?

For as long as I had owned this 1980 Honda CB750 Custom it had leaked oil. I would go for a ride and by the time I got home the lower portion of my right pant leg would be spattered with oil. Not a wonderful thing. So about six weeks before we were to leave on the trip I decided to do something about it.

I took the bike to a repair shop and told them I wanted the leak stopped. I didn’t really know what it would take to do that, but I trusted that they would. The guy at the counter had a much better idea of the situation, though, and he totally set me up. For what it’s worth, I figure what was needed was gaskets. At least, that’s my take on it now. But what he seemed to understand was that even a new set of gaskets was not a guarantee of no leaking.

So he told me, gosh, we’re going to have to tear the whole engine down to do that so while we’ve got it apart it might make good sense to give it a ring job, too. I was naive and trusting so I said OK, do that. Then he wrote up the ticket saying that the repair needed was the ring job. He made no mention of stopping an oil leak.

I made sure to tell him I was leaving on a trip in six weeks and the bike absolutely had to be ready by then. I didn’t see how that could be hard to do and he assured me that they would have it for me long before our departure date. So I left the bike in their hands.

What I learned later was that this shop was struggling financially. At this time of year they could make a lot more money doing quick jobs like new tires and oil changes, whereas tearing my bike down and doing my work was nowhere near as remunerative on an hourly basis. So they put their attention toward the cash flow jobs. Time went by and I didn’t get a call so I called them. No, it was not ready yet, but no problem, they would definitely have it for me in time. OK.

More time passed and I called again. Same answer. OK. And more time passed and now I was getting nervous. Same answer: they’d have it for me in time.

Finally, about three days before departure I called again and this time the jerk at the counter said no, there’s no way they’re going to have it ready for me in three days. That would be a Friday. The best they could do, he said, was have it for me on Monday. Can you say angry!? But what could I do? And what could Bill and John do? So they left without me, and we made plans to meet up in a few days.

I was livid. This was utterly inexcusable and clearly these guys didn’t give a rat’s patootie about me as a customer. And the thing was, this was a much bigger deal to me than it might have in other circumstances. But the thing was, when I bought this bike it was at the absolute lowest point of my life, before and since. I was at absolute bottom. And I bought the bike and it brought me unbridled joy! It literally gave me something to live for, at a time when I desperately needed something to live for. And in the nearly three years since I bought it it had been nothing but pure, absolute joy to me. And now, for the first time ever, there was anger and negativity connected with it. And I resented that bitterly! That they could introduce negativity into my relationship with the bike was beyond despicable. Unforgivable. The very worst blow they could strike. I hated the guy at the counter with the deepest passion.

And would they actually have the bike ready for me on Monday? Well, they did, though not until Monday afternoon, too late for me to even get started till Tuesday morning. So I picked it up Monday afternoon, took it home, packed, and got ready for an early Tuesday departure. Finally.

I’ll pick up the story next time; it’s far from over.

Biker Quote for Today

Sometimes I ride my motorcycle to nowhere to see nothing just so I can ride my motorcycle.

Every year after the first of January I look at my mileage for the year just ended. I did pretty well in 2022; rode the motorcycles more and put exactly 12 more miles on my car than I did in 2021.

First the car, because that’s my primary basis of comparison. I drove my car all of 2,506 miles. I wasn’t far off that with the Concours and well beyond it on the V-Strom. Nowhere close with the Honda, though.

The Honda only got ridden 729 in 2022. That’s down from 1,086 the year before. Which is a bit surprising to me considering that I thought I was trying to make a deliberate point of riding it regularly. Oh well, I’ll do better in 2023. And I’m also going to put some money into some work this good old bike is in need of.

The Concours had a better year than the CB750: 2,354 miles. That is up from 2,002 miles in 2021 and, as I said, almost as much as the car. Just 152 miles shy of the car. The Kawi got to go on the OFMC trip so it got a lot of miles off that one.

The champion this time around was the V-Strom. I rode that bike 3,866 miles in 2022. It got to go on the RMMRC Great River Road Ride and that was a good long jaunt. I hadn’t planned it that way. I was going to ride the Concours but had to make a last minute change when I discovered the valve stem on one of its tires was totally rotted away. It’s good to have more than one motorcycle.

Altogether that adds up 6,949 miles on motorcycles in 2022, versus 2,506 in my car. I may not put really big miles on any of my vehicles the way a lot of people do but by gosh, I do most of my getting around on the bikes. I kind of like it that way.

Biker Quote for Today

I love being on my bike, but I don’t consider that a sport: it’s too pleasant.

I made it out to Golden Saturday for the Last Brass Monkey Run, ABATE of Colorado‘s annual year-end event, but I sure as heck was not on a motorcycle. While the main roads were mostly clear, my street still had an inch of ice on it. Normally when it snows as much as it had just done a couple days earlier the city sends a plow down the middle of the street, but that never happened this time.

So I drove. As did a whole lot of other people apparently. It was the biggest turn-out for this thing in quite a few years. It used to be ABATE would reserve the entire Grizzly Rose venue and it would be full, but in recent years attendance has dropped severely–I have no idea why. I was going to insert a photo from the days when this was a really big deal but apparently I’ve got all those old shots archived somewhere. I need to get my photos organized better.

There were nowhere near enough people to fill the Grizzly Rose but at the Rock Rest it was a nice crowd. And for me it was nice to see a bunch of folks again who I hadn’t seen in a while. I used to attend my ABATE district meeting every month but about a year ago I decided it wasn’t really that good a use of my time. I’m interested in ABATE’s legislative work and there hasn’t been much motorcycle-related stuff going on at the legislature.

One of those folks I saw was Stump, who is ABATE’s legislative liaison. I asked him what is coming up this year and once again it doesn’t sound like much. He talked about maybe working to get Colorado to drop its designation of motorcyclists as (vulnerable? at-risk? something like that) road users. Why? Apparently in some states that is now being used as an excuse to call for mandatory helmet laws. If these people are at risk, then by golly let’s make them protect themselves.

I’m all in favor of wearing a helmet and I always do but I am one of those who believe it should be up to the rider to decide. As is ABATE in general. As is the American Motorcyclist Association.

Anyway, there doesn’t seem to be much going on so I no longer attend meetings, so it was good to see these folks again.

Back in the day, too, you used to see a lot of folks showing up on December 31 on motorcycles. This year there was only one. And years ago, it was actually a ride. Starting from various points around the area people would gather and ride to the Grizzly Rose. Not anymore. It’s too unpredictable with the weather so they have created an all in one room poker run instead. (My worthless hand came out to be an ace high. Not anywhere close to a winner.)

Still, it’s the last biker event of the year. So I went. And I had a good time. What more can you ask for?

Biker Quote for Today

I don’t have a bucket list but my bikeit list is a mile long.