Passes & Canyons Blog

After two years of bare-bones legislative sessions, we are finally starting to see movement on other issues, including some of concern to motorcyclists in Colorado.

House Bill 22-1043 was introduced January 12 by District 16 Rep. Andres Pico and District 2 Sen. Dennis Hisey to clarify the distinct and separate definitions of motorcycles vs. autocycles. As we have seen an explosion in recent years of three-wheeled vehicles that are clearly not motorcycles, these vehicles, nevertheless, continue to be classified as motorcycles. Note that some three-wheeled vehicles are rightly classified as motorcycles, and this proposed legislation addresses that fact.

This is a problem because crashes occur the data connected to them get lumped in with the data from motorcycle crashes, with a clear possibility of wrongly skewing the actual motorcycle data. This in turn can be used for policy-making that is erroneous. Thus the need to create a separate category of vehicle and keep the two separate.

Here’s the current abstract for the bill:

Current law defines an autocycle as a motorcycle. Section 1 of the bill removes autocycle from the definition of motorcycle. The definition of motorcycle is changed to add that a motorcycle needs to have handlebars to steer and has a seat the rider sits astride. The definition of autocycle is also changed to clarify that an autocycle doesn’t use handlebars directly connected to the front tire or tires to steer. In removing autocycle from the definition of motorcycle, the bill makes the following clarifications and changes:

Section 2 clarifies that the driver of an autocycle need not have a motorcycle endorsement regardless of the autocycle’s maximum speed and that all 3-wheel motorcycle drivers need a general or limited motorcycle endorsement;

Current law requires all motorcycle drivers to wear eye protection unless the motorcycle has 3 wheels, has a maximum speed of no more than 25 miles per hour, has a windshield, and has seatbelts. Section 3 clarifies that this exception applies to drivers of autocycles, not motorcycles, fitting that description.

Current law requires a motorcycle driver who is under 18 years of age to wear a helmet unless the motorcycle has 3 wheels, has a maximum speed of no more than 25 miles per hour, has a windshield, and has seatbelts. Section 4 clarifies that this exception applies to autocycles, not motorcycles, fitting that description.

Current law imposes a fee of $4 to register motorcycles for motorcycle operator safety training. Redefining autocycles as not being motorcycles means that autocycle owners will not pay the fee.

Section 5 removes the authorization for 2 autocycles to drive abreast in one lane.

Sections 6 through 31 make conforming amendments.(Note: This summary applies to this bill as introduced.)

The bill has been assigned to the House Transportation and Local Government committee. We’ll be watching its progress and will report back if a time comes when it appears that contacting your legislators would help push it through.

Biker Quote for Today

When a car started telling very bad jokes the motorcycle was disgusted and exclaimed, “Are you four-wheel?”

I’ve been having an email conversation with Mike Brown, of Exit Tours, about doing some rides with his group. To recap, Exit Tours is structured as a club and for your annual membership fee you get one free ride and then others are fairly inexpensive.

So Mike is making a big push this year to reach a higher level of participation and to that end, I’m assuming as an introduction, he is putting on a no-charge, no-membership-needed Fathers Day Ride to the Alpine Tunnel, set for June 18 and 19. This looks very interesting.

The group will gather near Greens Creek, near Salida, and camp the night of the 18th and do the ride on the 19th.

Here’s the description of the ride:

Ride to the Alpine Tunnel on Sunday June 19.
The Dual Sport ride is a 121 mile Loop with a challenging section on Tomichi Pass.
Snow may be present in late June.
We will provide an alternate Adventure bike loop option over Blacksage and Waunita Passes to Pitkin and the Tunnel site, return over Blacksage and Waunita Passes.
This route is a bit Longer, but does not include any real challenging sections.
Ride counterclockwise from Greens Creek to Old Monarch Pass, Snowblind to Tomichi Pass to the Alpine Tunnel on the Dual Sport Loop.
Then head towards Pitkin on the old Denver, Southpark & Pacific Railroad line.
Lunch & Fuel in Pitkin.
Waunita Pass to Black Sage Pass to Sargents on Hwy 50.
To over Marshall Pass to down Hwy 285. Poncha Springs on Hwy 50 to Greens Creek.
Fuel and Food available at the Silver Plume General Store in Pitkin on either loop.
Phone Compatible GPS Tracks will be provided.
This is a FREE club ride with no other Amenities provided.
Fill out the form on the Sign-Up link if you want to go on an epic ride on Fathers Day and receive GPS tracks.

If you go to the Exit Tours website you’ll notice in the pictures that all the bikes have knobby tires. I have a V-Strom and I run 80/20 Shinko tires. That’s 80% biased to street, 20% biased to dirt. I asked Mike if that would be adequate on the alternate routes that are less challenging. His answer was not reassuring.

However, I mentioned the ride to Bruce, who checked it out and immediately signed up, and he said he has ridden most of those routes before and he thinks I could do it OK.

So I’m not sure here. I would definitely like to do this, and I suppose I could have some more dirt-capable tires put on the V-Strom but I just had new tires front and back put on, and mounting tires is a real expense. Gonna have to think on this.

If you, on the other hand, are totally prepared for this kind of ride you may want to seriously consider signing up.

Biker Quote for Today

We know you’re a poser if you won’t ride down a gravel road.

I just got back about 20 minutes ago from my first ride of the new year. Nothing special, just a run out to Patty Ann’s in Kiowa for lunch. But what a great day to be out on the bike.

There have been a couple other nice days already but our street was still covered in ice and snow. Yesterday’s sun finally cleared enough that I had about a 10-inch path I could take to carry me past the ice that was still there. And by the time I’m home now that path has expanded to about three feet wide. That alone tells you it’s a nice day to be outside.

There were five of us of the RMMRC who met up at Sam’s #3 and with uncertainty about the roads we opted to stick to the main highways, figuring they, for sure, would be clear. I was leading.

Out Parker Road to Franktown and then east on CO 86. Nothing eventful, just clear roads and not that much traffic. At Patty Ann’s we were sorry to learn that due to the universal lack of workers they were cutting no slack and since we had arrived after 11 a.m. we could not order off the breakfast menu. Darn, because I really wanted the huevos rancheros. So did Roy. Oh well.

To the total shock of no one, we were approached while we were there by two guys in riding gear, asking who owned a particular bike. So there were stories to be exchanged and ride invitations extended. Roy is always good about recruiting new members for the RMMRC.

Heading back, Roy had the idea to head north on the Kiowa-Bennett Road but Harlan offered what we all thought was a better route. With him in the lead we headed west on CO 86, through Franktown to Castle Rock, across I-25 and then turned north on Daniels Park Road. Where the road splits at the entrance to the park we turned east and then at that first roundabout turned north on the road that eventually becomes Quebec St. Shortly after, we started shedding riders as each person turned toward home.

And that was that. Chalk up one motorcycle now ridden for January with two more to go.

Biker Quote for Today

100 reasons not to date a biker: 7. It’s perfectly natural to have a motorcycle parked in the living room.

I’ve been reading Rider magazine for as long as I’ve been riding. John had a friend who rode, who died, and his widow gave John a bunch of the guy’s magazines, which John passed on to me after he had read them. One was Rider. I remember the cover photo on that first issue featured the Honda Pacific Coast, which was brand new.

A lot has changed with motorcycle magazines since then, with some folding and others going digital-only. Somewhere maybe about a year ago it occurred to me that I had not received an issue of Rider for quite some time. Had they folded? Quit publishing on paper? Had I allowed my subscription to expire? Had they gone digital-only and was I still being automatically renewed while not getting anything for my money?

I sent an email to their subscription department. (They definitely had not simply folded.) Was my subscription current, I asked, and if so, why had I not received any issues? Had they gone digital-only? Because if so I would probably choose to cancel my subscription. Or were they still publishing a hard copy that I just was not receiving?

I got a reply that due to Covid they had halted printing hard copies but all the latest issues were available online, and yes my subscription was still current. But most importantly, they were resuming hard copy publishing with the December 2021 issue, and to compensate me for missing so many issues they were extending my subscription. In fact, when that issue arrived I saw that they had extended my subscription for two full years. Nice. Thanks.

So this first hard-copy issue had a bunch of surprises in it. Mark Tuttle, the editor-in-chief since forever has left. Retired I assume. There in the lead piece, always written by Mark, was Greg Drevenstedt. Holy smokes.

This drove me to see when it was that Mark left. I’ve worked with Mark for years and am still sitting on a story I pitched to him that got delayed repeatedly. So I dug into the online-only issues. It turned out that Mark’s last issue was December 2020. I found this by working backward to see when Greg’s first issue was, and found that in January 2021. But then there was another surprise in store for me in that issue: Clement Salvadori was retiring and the January 2021 issue was his last.

Holy smokes again. Clem had been with Rider since before I started reading the magazine. He was one of my favorite writers. Oh my gosh.

Life moves on, I guess. Things change. Meanwhile, though, it’s nice to be receiving Rider in the mail again.

Biker Quote for Today

I used to own a motorcycle that couldn’t go anywhere. Later I found out it was because it was two tired.

I always tally up the miles I’ve put on my bikes and car at the end of the year and for the seventh year in a row I put more miles on the bikes than on the car. Not that I put all that many miles on anything this past year.

My total mileage for 2021 on the bikes was 5,419. That breaks down to 1,086 for the Honda CB750, 2,002 for the Kawasaki Concours, and 2,331 for the Suzuki V-Strom. My Hyundai Elantra only got driven a total of 2,494 miles in the year. Can you say “home body”?

I know most of this is due to Covid but it’s funny because I don’t feel like I’ve been all that restricted. Life has really been pretty much normal, with the exception that Judy and I haven’t taken a lot of trips.

Not that we haven’t traveled. We did fly to Kansas City, where we rented a car and drove around in the Midwest. That was a really nice trip. But we didn’t go camping once all year, and we usually go several times. With everyone suffering cabin fever the campgrounds have been swarming and getting a campsite reservation is tough.

And while that was Judy’s only trip for the year, I went on two motorcycle trips, with the OFMC and the RMMRC, and I also went yurt camping with the guys out at Ridgway State Park. It used to be you could go somewhere and rent a cabin but I guess now the big thing is yurts. They have to be cheaper to build so I’m guessing that’s why, but it’s pretty much the same thing.

The main point is that I haven’t exactly been stuck at home. And I did put more miles on the Honda this year than last, and more miles on the car, too. More than twice as many miles on the Suzuki, but fewer on the Kawasaki. And more miles overall on the bikes than the previous year.

So I’d largely call it a good year. Still, I’m hoping 2022 will be better. And I hope it is for you, too.

Biker Quote for Today

We know you’re a poser if there are no wrinkled, faded, creased, or scratched areas on your leathers.

There were a few brave souls who rode their bikes to the ABATE Last Brass Monkey Run on December 31, but I was not one of them. I drove.

As forecast, the high for the day was in the low 30s. More importantly, the sky to the west was very threatening. All was dry, however, until I got out west of Kipling, at which point there were a few flakes in the air.

I reached the Rock Rest just before 2, and the event was billed to run till 4, but they had already shuts the games down. Velma had to go out to her car to get the materials for me to renew my membership for another year. If I had arrived 10 minutes later I would have missed seeing everyone I know.

They did have a good turn-out, though. Nothing like the old days when they used to fill the Grizzly Rose, but by today’s standards a good healthy turn-out. But especially those who rode were turning their thoughts toward home.

And with good reason. After half an hour or so of chatting with folks I hadn’t seen for awhile I figured I’d head out and Larry and Kathy were just clearing the (now much heavier) snow off their bike, preparing to head for home in Aurora. I wished them safe riding, then got in my car and followed them out of the parking lot. I figured I’d ride along behind them for safety’s sake but then they turned a direction I hadn’t expected. It occurred to me that to get to where they live in Aurora it made more sense to take I-70, whereas I was heading east on US 285.

But as heavy as the snow was in Golden, by the time I reached Kipling it was all dry, so it probably wasn’t all that bad for them. Just cold–darn cold. Yeah, they’re more hard core than me.

So we’re finally done with 2021. Here’s hoping 2022 is a lot better for almost everyone.

Biker Quote for Today

Every time people find out I ride a motorcycle they freak out and tell me about some time that someone they know got in an accident. I don’t get it. I don’t go around telling pregnant women that my dad left.

Or maybe not.

I was going to spread the word about the last organized ride of 2021, ABATE of Colorado’s Last Brass Monkey Run, but I just checked the weather forecast. Not good. Dang, I was planning to ride.

The Last Brass (as it’s referred to for short) is always held on December 31, regardless of weather. They tried moving it to the nearest weekend for a couple years but that didn’t work out so it’s back to December 31.

The current venue is the Rock Rest Lodge out at 16005 Old Golden Road. This is a nice old place that has been renovated and turned into a trendy lunch and dinner spot. Back when Sue and I lived out there, walking distance from the Rock Rest, it was just an old country bar where we’d go on Saturday night for country swing dancing. Big dance floor. The decor is a ton of funky old stuff, in a style that has become popular but unlike most places where it’s all imported and staged, this stuff was legitimately brought in and put in place years and years ago.

But the weather! Looking right now at the forecast it’s saying a high of 34 degrees and snow. Dang, dang, dang. Just a few days ago they were predicting something in the 40s and clear. It would have meant electric vest and heated gloves and all but I was going to ride. With 30s and snow, no, that’s not going to happen. I mean, heck, I’ll still go but in my car, and of course it will be interesting to see the few bikes that do show up. Because someone always rides.

I’ll go, too, because it will be a chance to see my ABATE friends. I used to attend the monthly meetings but with legislative issues–my main ABATE interest–pretty much non-existent the last few years, I have quit going to meetings. Just not worth my time. ABATE still holds poker runs and all but I’ve never cared about those. For me it’s always been about protecting motorcyclists’ rights.

Anyway, if you’re super hardy or just want to get out and mix with some other bikers for a few hours, come on out to the Rock Rest on Friday. And if you see me say hi, OK?

Biker Quote for Today

The hybrid bike was upset. “I can’t just be a half motorcycle,” it moped.

I find it pretty amazing how those container ships stack those things so high above the ship’s deck. It looks really top-heavy but clearly there has got to be a lot of ship below the water to keep it stable.

On dry land, the seemingly comparable situation is the way you sometimes see loads of hay stacked to tower way, way above the truck hauling it all. The difference being that there is no truck out of sight down below the road so that top-heavy load better be well stacked. Sometimes it is not.

Twice this past year, out on motorcycle trips, I encountered situations where those bales were not well stacked and secured.

The first was on the OFMC trip. We had been in Wyoming, having left Torrington, and were headed to Walden, back in Colorado. At Laramie we took US 230 southwest as it passes through just the southern edge of the Snowy Range.

Coming around a bend there was a warning cone in the road and a quick glance ahead showed why. A truck loaded to the sky with huge bales of hay was part-way off on the side of the road with its load leaning menacingly toward the highway. Oh my gosh, there’s a real mess trying to happen. We gave it all a wide berth.

At least that guy didn’t lose his load. He had folks there to help and they were doing whatever it would take to put it all back to right. But clearly somebody didn’t do their job all that well when that truck was loaded. Or maybe that driver was just going way too fast.

It was a very different case, however, when, on the Colorado Cruise with the RMMRC, we were crossing Grand Mesa on our first day out. As we came down CO 65 toward I-70 in Debeque Canyon there were warning cones in the road. And there ahead was another hay truck. But this one didn’t have any hay on it. It’s entire load was scattered on and around the highway. Somebody had a real mess to clean up. And somebody probably got seriously reamed out by their boss.

Gosh, the things some people will do just to keep life interesting for us traveling motorcyclists!

Biker Quote for Today

You know you’re a biker if you have a refrigerator in the garage just for beer.