Passes & Canyons Blog

Man, have I got a lot of work ahead of me. If you have gone through the Passes and Canyons, Motorcycle Touring in Colorado website thoroughly you know that even three years in it is still weak in information on some roads. The simple fact is that although I’ve been all over this state numerous times, there were some places I had not been back to since I started the website. Therefore, although I could show a map and talk a little about the route, I did not have the photos and other information I routinely collect and post.

Well, that’s about to change. The OFMC trip last week could not have been better tailored to meet my needs if I had planned the route myself with that in mind–which I did not do. I had made a list some time ago of 27 places I needed to get to. On this trip I hit 15 of those spots. It’s going to take time to work through it all but in the next few weeks you can expect to see improvements on a lot of pages, including:

• Colorado 92 from Hotchkiss to the Blue Mesa Reservoir
• Colorado 65 across Grand Mesa
• McClure Pass
• Monarch Pass
• Red Mountain Pass
• Slumgullion and Spring Creek Passes
• Wolf Creek Pass

And more. Here’s a map showing our route. What a great ride we had.

Biker Quote for Today

The ride IS the destination.

The OFMC went on our summer trip last week and it was a great week of riding. We stayed primarily in Colorado and many people (not me) were surprised that we could see so much of interest and make so many nice rides without going far. I knew this. That’s what this website is all about. I know that people come from all over the world to ride in Colorado. So we live and learn.

Anyway, this isn’t about our trip except for a couple things that happened along the way.

One of our guys, Jason, was riding his very new Harley-Davidson Road King. It’s less than two months old. So guess whose bike was the only one that had problems. We were close to Durango when Jason decided he needed to visit a dealer so he checked and found that Durango Harley-Davidson opened at 9 a.m. He planned to be there at 9 a.m. so they could work on it right away and he could get back on the road.

Well, it turned out that they opened at 8 a.m., and when Jason got there at 9 a.m. he was told they couldn’t get to his bike until about 1 p.m. because six other traveling Harley riders had gotten there before him and they also needed priority service in order to get back on the road.

Now, in our group this year we had five Hondas and three Harleys, and as I said, Jason’s Harley was the only one to have problems. And six other traveling Harley riders also had problems that day? I’m sorry but we couldn’t help but conclude that does not reflect very favorably on the Milwaukee folks.

And then there was Dennis’s issue. Dennis has owned a lot of bikes in his day, including Harleys, but recently he has been riding Hondas. Part of the reason for that has to do with Harley salesmen. It would appear that with their product in such high demand, many of them have never had to learn to actually sell. They do a great job of handing you the papers to sign when you’ve made up your own mind, and they’re happy to sell you the extras, but working to close a deal is apparently a different matter.

Let’s back up a few years. Dennis was riding a Big Dog but decided to replace it with a Harley. He went to a dealership knowing they wouldn’t take the Big Dog as a trade-in but figuring he could arrange some consignment deal. The salesman was brief: “Get rid of your clone and come back and I’ll sell you a real motorcycle.”

More than a little annoyed, Dennis headed straight for a Honda shop and bought a Honda.

Dennis was equally put out in Durango. He and several others went with Jason to the dealership and, as he puts it, the four of them were a captive audience for half a day. Bill, Brett, and Jason all ended up spending money there but the thing that really caught Dennis’s eye was one particular bike. A salesman noticed this and approached him. Dennis explained that he rode in on a Gold Wing and would need to get the right amount out of it in order for a deal to work. And the salesman dropped the ball. All he could offer was that Dennis could buy this Harley now and fly back to pick it up, and what he did with the Honda was his issue.

For hours afterward Dennis went over again and again how it could have been handled. “All he had to do was say ‘toss me your key and I’ll go over to the local Honda dealer and see what they think you can get on consignment.’ Or he could have just picked up the phone and called the Honda dealer and asked what they thought they could get for the bike. But he didn’t do a thing! I’m not going to buy it and fly back here to pick it up!”

Dennis had been extremely close to spending quite a few thousands of dollars but once again the Harley salesman blew it. So what if your dealership doesn’t take trade-ins. If you want to make a sale, and the sale is contingent on unloading the current bike, doesn’t it make sense for you to go an extra mile to try to grease those wheels?

Biker Quote for Today

When you look down the road, it seems to never end – but you better believe it does.

Ride Your Motorcycle to Work Day has arrived again and once again I’m not riding my bike to work. That’s not to say I’m not riding, I am. However, since I don’t have a job at the moment I would not have one to ride to. Last year I had a job but I worked at home two days a week and one of those was Wednesday, the day this event is always held. The year before that I was also out of work. And I think the year before that I had a job but I was on vacation, off on the OFMC summer trip. Some day I will ride my bike to work on this day, but who knows when that will be.

Nevertheless, as I said, that doesn’t mean I’m not riding. In fact, once again it is the week of the OFMC trip and on this particular day you’ll find me scooting around Taos. Yesterday we cruised on down from South Fork, the little town on the east side of Wolf Creek Pass, and tomorrow we head off for Ignacio. There are eight in the group this year. After I get home I’ll tell you more about the trip and include some pictures.

Meanwhile, I hope you ride (or rode, depending on the time of day you read this) to work today. Let’s amaze people with how numerous we are.

Biker Quote for Today

Work to ride and ride to work.

Hot ziggety, it’s almost time for our summer trip!

It looks like eight members of the Old Farts Motorcycle Club (OFMC) will be making the ride this year. I, myself, was uncertain for the longest time. I’ve been out of work and feared I’d be offered a job and then not be able to immediately turn around and take a week off. Long story short, I worked it out.

It’s a good thing because this is the year we’re doing the trip I’ve been pushing for for several years. We’re mostly staying in Colorado, with a couple days in New Mexico. Lots of times we’ve taken these long rides, across numerous states. I love those trips but I have also wanted to spend some time just riding, not traveling. That is, check into a motel and stay there for a couple days doing day rides. Then move on and do it again. And let’s really do Colorado.

Well, with eight guys no one gets everything they want, but I got a lot of what I wanted. Most of us will head out on Friday and gather in Cripple Creek. On Saturday we’ll mosey along to Salida, stopping to see Bishop Castle along the way. Most of these guys have never seen Bishop Castle so this will be a real treat for them.

On Sunday we’ll continue west and cross Independence Pass, with Snowmass the destination. The next day we’ll cross McClure Pass and we’ll take CO 92 to the Blue Mesa Reservoir. Then we’ll head to Lake City and Slumgullion Pass, finally ending the day’s ride at South Fork.

The following day it will be on over Wolf Creek Pass and down to Taos, NM. We’ll spend two days in Taos and play some golf.

Next it’s back to Colorado, to Ignacio and from there to Montrose, where John lives these days. We’ll spend a couple days there, either playing golf or doing day rides. And then home.

Of course, one of the good things about these rides is that they will enable me to finally get some photos of some of these passes. There are a number of these roads I have not been on since I started this website, and thus have not gotten any photos of them yet. That’s about to change, and you’ll see the results on the various pages for these passes.

So hot dang! Got some bikin’ to do soon!

Biker Quote for Today

Riding faster than everyone else only guarantees you’ll ride alone.

All right, now this is great!

I’ve talked before about the group of guys I ride with and how we call ourselves, with tongue in cheek, the Old Farts Motorcycle Club. That’s tongue in cheek because, for one thing, several of these guys are pretty dang young.

Well anyway, John did a design a couple years ago of a logo for the group, forming a motorcycle from the letters OFMC. A very ingenious design. Zoom ahead a couple years, and now as we’re getting ready for this summer’s trip John has had the design turned into a sew-on patch and it looks great. Here, see for yourself:

I can’t wait to get my hands on these. He had enough made so we each get six, and I have three spots picked out already. One will go on my leather jacket, and one will go on a baseball-type cap. The third will go on a denim shirt that already has a patch on it that I want to cover up. It’s a really nice shirt but the patch is for a company where I used to work that I would describe as a bunch of jerks who know nothing about treating people with decency and respect. I haven’t been able to cut it off so I’m just going to cover it up. Then I can start wearing the shirt!

So, oh boy! The bike trip’s coming soon!

Biker Quote for Today

Sometimes the best communication happens when you’re on separate bikes.

Barry from Alabama responded to that last post about hypothermia, asking about the weather in the fall when the aspens are turning color. Let’s talk about that.

The aspen trees in Colorado turn a brilliant gold in September, for the most part. It varies depending on elevation; the higher areas turn before the lower areas. As you can see in this photo, here there are some trees that have already shed their leaves, others are still golden, and yet, in the foreground, there are still green leaves.

September is a great time to be riding in Colorado, but you have to understand that the weather is unpredictable, especially in the high country. You can have the most gorgeous days imaginable or you can get caught in a snowstorm. It’s not at all uncommon to have both in the same day. An 11,000-foot pass is going to be cold even in July and August. You can get snowed on on top of Mount Evans any day of the year. Plus, at that time of year, even if the weather is sunny and warm during the day you have to count on it getting darn chilly as soon as the sun goes down. Therefore, it’s essential to be prepared.

Referring back to the hypothermia posting, you’ll want to be sure to bring any electrics you have: vest, heated grips, whatever. You’ll use them and be glad you have them. Dress in layers; you can always take something off but you can’t put it on if you don’t have it with you. If you’re getting cold, don’t be too macho to stop frequently and warm up.

Here’s an example of what you might encounter. Our OFMC group usually takes its trip in July or August but a few years ago we decided to go in September. We headed out of Denver the first day, up US 285, and then south on CO 126 and CO 67 toward Woodland Park. It turned cold and wet and we soon had our rain suits on. We got to Woodland Park and headed down US 24 toward Colorado Springs in sleet. From Colorado Springs we headed southwest down CO 115 to Penrose and then took US 50 on to Salida, where we stopped for the night. By the time we got to Penrose we had peeled off the rain suits and rode in warm sunshine the rest of the day. A typical day in Colorado.

I suppose I could ramble on, but what’s the point? You get the picture. I’ll address Barry’s other questions in the next couple posts.

Biker Quote for Today

Saddlebags can never hold everything you want, but they CAN hold everything you need.

Continuing something of a theme I’ve been developing this week, I want to talk now about hypothermia. As in getting really, really cold in an unsafe manner.

Hypothermia: An abnormally low body temperature, often caused by prolonged exposure to cold.

I wrote a on Monday about my day riding Motorcycle Lead for a bicycle race. The wind started blowing and the temperature dropped and it started to snow. By the time I got off the bike I started to shake and shiver uncontrollably. That was the beginning of hypothermia. Then on Wednesday I wrote about fairings and how they do so much to keep you warm. This was not planned but I might as well round out the discussion.

The first time I got a taste of hypothermia was on one of the earliest rides I did with my buddies John and Bill in our group that we call the Old Farts Motorcycle Club. We had been down in New Mexico and were headed back into Colorado when we got caught in a cloudburst. We didn’t have rain suits back then, we just got wet. At the time it didn’t seem like such a big deal. In Colorado it is common to have brief rain showers, and then the sun comes out and all is fine. We didn’t get drenched or anything, and we just kept riding.

Awhile later we reached Alamosa and, stopping at the first traffic light in town, agreed unanimously that we really wanted to find a coffee shop before we did anything else. We were cold.

We got to a coffee shop and ordered a pot of coffee and started shivering and shaking. A lot. A whole lot. Over the course of the next hour or so we probably drank eight pots of coffee but just kept shivering. Somewhere along the line we realized that this was hypothermia. We had gotten wet, but the wind dried us out when the rain stopped, but with the moisture it also extracted a dangerous amount of our body heat.

Hypothermia can be dangerous. It can cause you to become mentally confused, which can lead to dangerous or deadly mistakes when riding a motorcycle. It’s not a good thing.

So what should a motorcyclist do to avoid hypothermia, and what do you do if it happens anyway? First off, don’t drink coffee. Hot coffee may seem like just the ticket but you would do a lot better to drink hot cocoa or have a bowl of hot soup. Something with calories. Of course, if coffee is the only warm thing around, as was the case for me at the bicycle races, do what you’ve got to do. Wrapping up in a blanket or sleeping bag is a very good thing, too. If the hypothermia is serious you should not hesitate to call for emergency medical care.

It’s better to avoid hypothermia in the first place. The first line of defense is the proper gear. Carry a good rain suit and don’t delay too long in putting it on. Use your electric vest if you have one. Heated grips would be good. I swear by the fairing on my Concours, and the windshield on the CB750. Wear plenty of layers. Stop frequently and get warm in a convenience store/gas station, cafe, or rest stop. Wear synthetics or wools that don’t hold the moisture in direct contact with you skin. Avoid alcohol if you’re going out somewhere where you’re likely to get cold.

Mostly it’s just common sense: stay warm in whatever way you can. Don’t be an idiot. It’s better to arrive late, or call off the ride, than never arrive again.

Biker Quote for Today

Never be afraid to slow down.

What do you do when the name of your motorcycle club no longer really fits, but you’ve got the coolest logo around and you are not about to jettison that? I mean, check this out:

Old Farts Motorcycle Club was always tongue in cheek, and in the beginning we were nowhere near old. Heck, I was still in my 30s. The original three of us are all quite a bit older now, and we’ve been joined by several other guys our age, but we’ve also been joined by sons and their friends. They’ve only borne the OFMC title grudgingly.

On this year’s trip the discussion began in earnest. We had some good proposals. For the sons it was proposed that OFMC could mean “Our Fathers’ Motorcycle Club.” For the friends it could be “Our Friends’ Motorcycle Club.” And finally, to cover everyone, it could be “Our Fuckin’ Motorcycle Club.”

So there was no decision one way or the other. More than anything, I guess the idea is going to be that the name is “OFMC,” and you can let those initials represent whatever you want. Everyone is happy and we still have our killer logo. Is this a great country or what?!