Passes & Canyons Blog

One of the OFMC guys emailed us all asking if we wanted to go for a ride on Sunday (yesterday). I replied that yes, I was planning to ride, but I wouldn’t be with them. My Sunday ride was in British Columbia.

On an Electra Glide Classic, rented from EagleRider in Vancouver, we took off on a loop east through Hope, up to Lytton, to Lillooet, and up and over and down to Whistler. I know, you’ll need to look at a map to see this, or maybe I’ll have to figure out Google Maps and set up a link. Suffice it to say that a) it was a terrific ride, and b) it was an exhausting ride. The thing with Whistler is that there’s only one road and to go anywhere you either go and backtrack or you take a very long loop. We did the loop. It was dark by the time we got back to Whistler.

So the first thing I have to say about riding in British Columbia is that it’s different than riding in Colorado. In Colorado we have some canyons but mostly we go up over passes, down through valleys, then up over more passes. In BC you basically go up one canyon, up another canyon, down another canyon, and on and on. And the big difference is that their hills here are so steep they make ours look like bunny slopes.

Picture this. You’re riding along a highway that is cut into the side of a steep slope. The river is 1,000 feet below you and then as far ahead as you can see the mountain rises 4,000 or 5,000 or 6,000 feet above the road. And it’s all at a very steep angle. You do some climbing, and you do get down to water level on occasion, but mostly it’s following the shoulder of the hillside on and on, with lots of curves but little climbing.

When we did climb it was up over the pass between Lillooet and Whistler. By then it was getting dark and it got cold. And as we started to climb we started accumulating raindrops on the windshield. Oh, oh, we don’t need to get wet now. But it was never more than a few drops so not so bad. I still got a minor bit of hypothermia that had me shaking once we got to Whistler until I got some hot tea in me. But we got here. At last! And we have the bike for another day so we have to go riding again. And there’s really nowhere else to go but back over to Lillooet and do a loop over there. At least that will allow us to see all that in daylight.

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Biker Quote for Today

Get on your knees every Sunday and pray the road throws you another curve.

OK, I’m going to shill a bit here but it’s a product I use and believe in and I’ll make it worth your while to read this.

I was contacted the other day by a fellow working with Microsoft to market their Streets & Trips application. He offered me a free 2011 version and also offered to provide free copies to a few of the folks who read this blog.

Now, the fact is, I’ve been using Streets & Trips ever since I starting building the www.MotorcycleColorado.com website back in 2005. Every map on the site was created using Streets & Trips. And when I got a new computer I bought a new version of the application because the old version wouldn’t run on the 64-bit processor in the new machine.

That’s all to say, I like it, it’s easy to use, and it does everything I need it to do. In fact, it does a lot I don’t even use it for. I don’t have a GPS unit but if you do you can use Streets & Trips to generate files for your GPS. Don’t ask me to explain what it does or how because, as I said, it’s not a feature I use, but it’s there. And honestly, the 2011 version is not a lot different from the 2009 version I’ve been running. But if you don’t have any version, getting your hands on the latest could be very cool.

So here’s the deal. As part of this marketing campaign, Microsoft is running a “Cruisin’ the National Parks Trivia Sweepstakes” through the end of this month. Visit the site, answer the trivia question put up each week, and you could wina $50 Visa gift card. On that same page there’s a button to “like” Streets & Trips on Facebook and for everyone who does Microsoft will be giving $1 to the National Parks Foundation.

And here’s your chance to pick up a free copy of the software. Leave a comment at the bottom of this blog post telling about the most amazing thing you’ve seen riding your motorcycle through a national park. Three of the best stories will be selected and you’ll get a copy. When posting your comment be sure to leave your valid email address because I’ll need to contact you to tell you you’ve won and get mailing info to provide to Microsoft so they can send it to you. Ready? Set? Go!

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Biker Quote for Today

Any adventure journey has secret destinations unknown to the traveler.

I had written before about possibly taking a ride to Alaska on a Kawasaki KLR650 that needs to get to Anchorage for this year’s Adventures for the Cures ride. Ain’t gonna happen. Dang.

Doing this would have cost a bunch of money, more than I can afford, but my friend Dan Patino of Go 2 Motorcycle Tours, who was to be riding the other bike, was confident that he could come up with the funding to defray our costs. Unfortunately his efforts were for naught. Thanks for trying Dan. I had also contacted one of my editors asking if they would be inclined to sponsor us but they put me off and I didn’t pursue it once it started looking unlikely that Dan’s efforts would be successful.

So now my sights are set on the annual OFMC ride, coming up in about a month. But first I have to get past this next four days of RiderCoach training. We’re back at it in full force on Thursday and the pressure will be constant until late Sunday afternoon. I feel pretty confident but I’m going to be overjoyed to have this ton of weight lifted off my shoulders. At the moment I just have this feeling of dread.

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Biker Quote for Today

Ride hard or stay home!

I recently acquired a copy of a “Colorado Motorcycle Skill Rating Map,” put out by the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT). It’s a concept taken from a similar map that is intended to give riders in South Dakota’s Black Hills an idea of how challenging those roads are. Whereas that map covers just the Black Hills, the CDOT map covers the whole state of Colorado.

CDOT called on ABATE of Colorado to help put the map together, and ABATE pulled in the Colorado Sportbike Club so as to include that group’s perspective as well.

Unlike so many other state maps where the roads have different colors depending on whether they’re interstate, U.S. highway, state highways, unpaved, or whatever, this map shows all roads as either green (easy), orange (moderate), or red (difficult). Not surprisingly, the entire eastern part of the state is green. From the Front Range west it’s a mix of colors.

The truth of the matter is that for those of us who live here, the map offers little we didn’t already know. The main quibble we might have is that, accustomed as we are to riding in the mountains, for us, marking almost any road red is a stretch. That’s not the point, though. This is a map aimed at tourists, the people who don’t live here. And for many of them, the roads we whip around with confidence may be challenging indeed.

So the real benefit of a map like this for us is that if there are any red roads on the map that we haven’t been on, this is a heads-up that we need to head that direction. Beyond that, I’d love to have maps like this of every other state. I don’t care if a road is rated “difficult” or not. I just have a strong hunch that any road with that rating is likely to be a good motorcycle road and one I’d like to ride. And as well as I know Colorado and many of our neighboring states, there are a lot more states where I wouldn’t have any idea which roads are the best. Maps of this sort can provide that information.

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Biker Quote for Today

A good ride is one from which you can walk away. A great ride is one after which you can use the bike again.

We’re at that time of year now here in Colorado when you may or may not be able to ride some of the best roads in the state. May can be a little early to be coming here to ride but I know people are already doing so. Just this past weekend, when I was down at EagleRider in downtown Denver there were about eight Harleys lined up at the curb waiting for a group of European (German?) riders, who showed up while I was there.

I hope those guys didn’t have their heart set on riding Trail Ride Road because that ain’t gonna happen. The latest word from the Department of Transportation is that the hope to have that road open in early June.

On the other hand, DOT announced today that Independence Pass will open today. I’m guessing that if you ride that pass in the next couple days you’d better dress warmly. Right after it opens that road is likely to have high walls of snow on one or both sides of the road and temperatures at altitude are not balmy.

As for the other seasonal roads, here’s what DOT now says on their website.

Pikes Peak road: Currently the road is open 13 of the 19 miles. Weather permitting it will be open all the way later today.

Mount Evans road: “Due to recent heavy snowfall, the Mt. Evans Highway is not expected to open for another one to two weeks. Crews have been diligently working each day to get the road cleared of snow and ice. However, snow is cleared one day and then more snow falls overnight, requiring crews to retrace their plowing operation from the previous day. Crews are currently re-clearing the area between Echo Lake and Summit Lake and will then clear the last four miles to the summit.”

Cottonwood Pass and Kebler Pass are still closed as of this date, May 26, 2011.

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Biker Quote for Today

Harleys: Making men into boys since 1918.

It’s too early to know if this is actually going to happen, but if it does it will be fabulous. I may be riding a Kawasaki KLR 650 (like the one above) from Seattle to Anchorage, AK, in late June, early July. Wow! How cool is that?

It’s all still very iffy. It will depend to a very great extent on money.

The whole business comes out of my familiarity with Sue Slate and Gin Shear, who run the Women’s Motorcyclist Foundation. They are organizing a breast-cancer research fund-raising ride in Alaska in August, and they have a need to get their own KLRs to Anchorage. That’s where I come in.

Dan Patino, who runs Go 2 Motorcycle Tours here in Colorado, would be riding the other one and we’re both eager to go. The problem is, by Dan’s estimate, it could cost us each as much as $2,000 for gas, food, lodging, and airfare to Seattle and then home from Anchorage. Yikes! I don’t have that kind of money to do anyone a favor, even if I get a great trip out of the deal.

Neither does Dan but Dan has ideas. First off, he’s hoping to make this ride an extension of the Adventures for the Cures ride up in Alaska and do some fundraising. And as a fundraiser, he has hopes that we can get some sponsorship. Specifically, he hopes he may be able to persuade an airline to pick up our airfare expenses and perhaps a hotel chain to take care of our accommodations. Meanwhile, I have already queried Rum Bum, who I write for regularly, about sponsoring us in some way, too. Maybe they could pay for some or all of our gas.

So I have no idea whether any of this will come about. We just got started talking about this two days ago. And without sponsors there is no way I can manage it. But oh man, if Dan can pull it off and line up sponsors to defray at least a major portion of our expenses . . .

Alaska. I have never been to Alaska, and it’s the only state I haven’t been to. I really, really want to go. And the opportunity to ride a motorcycle up there. Wow, have I died and gone to heaven? But I’ll try not to get my hopes up too high just yet. One thing for sure: You’ll be hearing about it here if this things comes off. I’m crossing my fingers.

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Dual sport & adventure riding is cheaper than therapy