Bones
06-13-2006, 09:16 PM
The risk in setting high expectations for any experience is that you can be left with serious disappointment. But once in a while, things come together and you find yourself amidst even high expectations being exceeded. And that, my friends, is a beautiful thing.
Some months ago, my riding partner and I began working on finding a decent excuse to take a ride. A real ride. He has been working towards buying a pair of Cruiserworks boots for about 4 years now. Perry rides fast but he shops slow. Cruiserworks is located outside Durham, NC. I live in Upstate, NY and he lives in North Central, PA. Seems like we needed to take a ride down to NC to check out some boots.
As it turns out, his son, daughter in law and grandaughter just moved from Oregon to the Asheville, NC area, so another reason for heading South emerged.
Our style of planning is to chose a general direction on the map, but not any specific routes, and just head out. I had a week clear for riding, but other than that, no restrictions.
My R1200GS had new Tourances mounted a week ahead of the trip, his R1150R had new Metzler Marathons put on and off we went.
Rather than a day by day account, I will offer some highlights, insights and general musings. I will also post below the shutterfly link so you can scroll or slideshow the pictures, which tell the story better than I do, I am sure.
In 7 days we traversed : NY, PA, MD, W VA, VA, NC, TN, KY, back into W VA, OH, then on the last day, up through Eastern Ohio, across PA and since we arrived at Perry's home at 4 PM, I decided to hoof it the last 100 miles to NY and back to my house rather than spend another night away. 2530 miles.
We rode through rain only for about 3 hours the first day. We had an occasional shower here and there, but otherwise great weather as the pics show.
Pace: Perry and I met while standing around in a BMW shop having our respective bikes wrenched a few years ago. A nice conversation led to a "hey let's take a ride together some time..." and the next season, we did. That was more thousands of miles of riding together than I can count. Sometimes you find a riding partner where things just mesh. We split leading and following pretty evenly, but never really plan it. There seems to be an intuitive sense about when to pass, when to take a break, when to stop for fuel, when to eat, etc. Neither of us likes to ride with more than one other person and both of us do a lot of riding alone. Sometimes we roll along at a languishing pace. Other times we crank along at 85-90 (as we did crossing from eastern to western NC this trip). Just depends on the day and the mood.
This trip was mostly spent on roads I can only describe as etherial. West Virginia offered literally 200 mile uninterupted stretches of challenging curves with great pavement and surreal scenery. Then, you would pull through a little town and be back to twisties for another few hours.
We spent about 10 hours a day riding. In places like W VA, the avg. speed was not high because of the terrain. But it was so satisfying, it is difficult to describe.
Virginia was similar, but with the elevation changes and curve radii being a bit more stretched. It was a State covered in a sheet of green velvet.
Western North Carolina, starting in the Black Hills area near Asheville was breathtaking, as well. From a distance, the greenery was lush and looked like thick moss covering all surfaces.
I was once told that the Blue Ridge Parkway was " a waste of time" because the speed limit is only 45. Now, I like to ride fast, hang off and twist the throttle. So don't misunderstand me, here. There is no way in hell you can ride the BRP at anything much over 45 anyway! If you run a turn wide, you are given the opportunity to travel 5-6,000 ft. down at terminal velocity. Riding the 40 or so miles of the BRP that we did at 45 was fantastic. I had no need to try to go faster....and we had no traffic, no peace officers in sight and the road surfaces were superb.
Tennessee and Kentucky have some great riding, too, but it took us a while to figure out which parts of those States have those rides hidden. We found them, though.
West Virginia has a lot of poverty. Kentucky (at least the parts we traversed) has money. I found the folks we encountered in W Va to be quite friendly and helpful. They were most intruigued by the concept of two Yankees riding bikes all the way down there "just to look around."
Tips: When traveling long distances on a motorcycle, try not to get the runs. Perry chose a lunch spot one day. Now, I usually only eat some peanut butter crackers and drink water or some soda when on long rides, then catch up on eating at dinner. But "what the hell?" Well, hell took wrath on my bowels about an hour after our fateful stop at the "Sub Shack" which I now will refer to as the crapper shack. Each field began to look like an opportunity to run into it and strip off my leathers. But I made it to the next fueling station.
Unfortunately, the bathroom was SCARY. BUT, the paper towel dispenser was full, so I quickly created and area rug in front of the commode. To access one's own rear panel, so to speak, when wearing Vanson leather pants and Vendramini Marathon boots, you have to take them off. There is no pulling them down. I survived this experience and looked to a higher source for intervention all the while. My apologies to the many folks who were banging on the door who I told to "go away." Fortunately, this all passed (both figuratively and literally) within an hour and we were back on the road.
I carry a roll of toilet paper in the side cases, just in case. Perhaps I should have chosen a field instead of the convenience store. Who knows. All I know is I am staying with peanut butter crackers and diet pepsi from now on, during the day.
Ergos: the Sargent seat on my GS worked great. No other mods were made to the bike other than adding a laminar lip to the stock screen. I think bar backs might have been helful for the day we rode interstates across NC, but otherwise, I didn't need them. I think 7 ten hour days on the bike is a decent test of ergos. The Tourance tires are great tires for both dry and wet conditions.
Engine: I am finding the GS to eat a bit of oil, as did my R up until about 10,000 miles. In 2500 miles, I needed to add 16 ounces of oil.
Packs: Motofizz tail pack...really well made.
Electrics: Used them on two days, but they were worth every penny and then some. Being cold makes riding miserable and dangerous. Being warm makes it a pleasure. Call me a wuss if you like. I like my electrics.
The Head: Seven successive days of riding all day to the point of easy fatigue does some great things to one's brain chemistry, especially when the weather is nice. Endorphins. I rarely drink when not on vacation, but we did have some Irish Whiskey each night. That, on top of the endorphins, some easy conversation and good laughs.....what a great time.
The photos will do better justice to the trip than I am doing typing. So, here is the link. Hope you enjoy the scenery.
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AbNmLJq4bOH3A
Hope the link works. We will find out shortly.
Jeff
Some months ago, my riding partner and I began working on finding a decent excuse to take a ride. A real ride. He has been working towards buying a pair of Cruiserworks boots for about 4 years now. Perry rides fast but he shops slow. Cruiserworks is located outside Durham, NC. I live in Upstate, NY and he lives in North Central, PA. Seems like we needed to take a ride down to NC to check out some boots.
As it turns out, his son, daughter in law and grandaughter just moved from Oregon to the Asheville, NC area, so another reason for heading South emerged.
Our style of planning is to chose a general direction on the map, but not any specific routes, and just head out. I had a week clear for riding, but other than that, no restrictions.
My R1200GS had new Tourances mounted a week ahead of the trip, his R1150R had new Metzler Marathons put on and off we went.
Rather than a day by day account, I will offer some highlights, insights and general musings. I will also post below the shutterfly link so you can scroll or slideshow the pictures, which tell the story better than I do, I am sure.
In 7 days we traversed : NY, PA, MD, W VA, VA, NC, TN, KY, back into W VA, OH, then on the last day, up through Eastern Ohio, across PA and since we arrived at Perry's home at 4 PM, I decided to hoof it the last 100 miles to NY and back to my house rather than spend another night away. 2530 miles.
We rode through rain only for about 3 hours the first day. We had an occasional shower here and there, but otherwise great weather as the pics show.
Pace: Perry and I met while standing around in a BMW shop having our respective bikes wrenched a few years ago. A nice conversation led to a "hey let's take a ride together some time..." and the next season, we did. That was more thousands of miles of riding together than I can count. Sometimes you find a riding partner where things just mesh. We split leading and following pretty evenly, but never really plan it. There seems to be an intuitive sense about when to pass, when to take a break, when to stop for fuel, when to eat, etc. Neither of us likes to ride with more than one other person and both of us do a lot of riding alone. Sometimes we roll along at a languishing pace. Other times we crank along at 85-90 (as we did crossing from eastern to western NC this trip). Just depends on the day and the mood.
This trip was mostly spent on roads I can only describe as etherial. West Virginia offered literally 200 mile uninterupted stretches of challenging curves with great pavement and surreal scenery. Then, you would pull through a little town and be back to twisties for another few hours.
We spent about 10 hours a day riding. In places like W VA, the avg. speed was not high because of the terrain. But it was so satisfying, it is difficult to describe.
Virginia was similar, but with the elevation changes and curve radii being a bit more stretched. It was a State covered in a sheet of green velvet.
Western North Carolina, starting in the Black Hills area near Asheville was breathtaking, as well. From a distance, the greenery was lush and looked like thick moss covering all surfaces.
I was once told that the Blue Ridge Parkway was " a waste of time" because the speed limit is only 45. Now, I like to ride fast, hang off and twist the throttle. So don't misunderstand me, here. There is no way in hell you can ride the BRP at anything much over 45 anyway! If you run a turn wide, you are given the opportunity to travel 5-6,000 ft. down at terminal velocity. Riding the 40 or so miles of the BRP that we did at 45 was fantastic. I had no need to try to go faster....and we had no traffic, no peace officers in sight and the road surfaces were superb.
Tennessee and Kentucky have some great riding, too, but it took us a while to figure out which parts of those States have those rides hidden. We found them, though.
West Virginia has a lot of poverty. Kentucky (at least the parts we traversed) has money. I found the folks we encountered in W Va to be quite friendly and helpful. They were most intruigued by the concept of two Yankees riding bikes all the way down there "just to look around."
Tips: When traveling long distances on a motorcycle, try not to get the runs. Perry chose a lunch spot one day. Now, I usually only eat some peanut butter crackers and drink water or some soda when on long rides, then catch up on eating at dinner. But "what the hell?" Well, hell took wrath on my bowels about an hour after our fateful stop at the "Sub Shack" which I now will refer to as the crapper shack. Each field began to look like an opportunity to run into it and strip off my leathers. But I made it to the next fueling station.
Unfortunately, the bathroom was SCARY. BUT, the paper towel dispenser was full, so I quickly created and area rug in front of the commode. To access one's own rear panel, so to speak, when wearing Vanson leather pants and Vendramini Marathon boots, you have to take them off. There is no pulling them down. I survived this experience and looked to a higher source for intervention all the while. My apologies to the many folks who were banging on the door who I told to "go away." Fortunately, this all passed (both figuratively and literally) within an hour and we were back on the road.
I carry a roll of toilet paper in the side cases, just in case. Perhaps I should have chosen a field instead of the convenience store. Who knows. All I know is I am staying with peanut butter crackers and diet pepsi from now on, during the day.
Ergos: the Sargent seat on my GS worked great. No other mods were made to the bike other than adding a laminar lip to the stock screen. I think bar backs might have been helful for the day we rode interstates across NC, but otherwise, I didn't need them. I think 7 ten hour days on the bike is a decent test of ergos. The Tourance tires are great tires for both dry and wet conditions.
Engine: I am finding the GS to eat a bit of oil, as did my R up until about 10,000 miles. In 2500 miles, I needed to add 16 ounces of oil.
Packs: Motofizz tail pack...really well made.
Electrics: Used them on two days, but they were worth every penny and then some. Being cold makes riding miserable and dangerous. Being warm makes it a pleasure. Call me a wuss if you like. I like my electrics.
The Head: Seven successive days of riding all day to the point of easy fatigue does some great things to one's brain chemistry, especially when the weather is nice. Endorphins. I rarely drink when not on vacation, but we did have some Irish Whiskey each night. That, on top of the endorphins, some easy conversation and good laughs.....what a great time.
The photos will do better justice to the trip than I am doing typing. So, here is the link. Hope you enjoy the scenery.
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AbNmLJq4bOH3A
Hope the link works. We will find out shortly.
Jeff