RideDualSport.com
Member
I have returned from a 4000 mile, two week adventure tour of the Mountain States (New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Colorado and Wyoming) and my hands are still buzzing and ears ringing! The first week of the adventure was spent with a friend on his 102,000 mile BMW RT and the last week was entirely solo, I used a cool phone app called TrackMyTour which allows you to set waypoints on a map and blog your travels and read comments from friends.
Here is the rough outline of my adventure with waypoint created using TrackMyTour:
This adventure started as an idea to ride to Seattle since my family is there, but the distance and time were not stacking up in my favor. So when I heard from a buddy that he was going West on his own ride, I asked to join him. He rides in a looser less structured manner than I do. Other than having a few National Park destinations, no actual routes were planned. This turned out to be a good thing for me to experience because I usually over-plan my rides down to the exact road I will take. The sense of adventure and freedom were indeed amplified on this trip because we did not have to be at any particular destination and a particular time.
Here we are having dinner at our place in the desert on the first evening of the trip, its only now that I start to relax after exiting the big city.
We are easily into New Mexico on the first day, as my buddy posts on TrackMyTour
Whoa! What happened to New Mexico? 300 miles of nasty high wind sand storm highway riding! Glad to be out of it!
On our way to Alpine Arizona we stop at a small bar in an even smaller town and down some COLD Pabst Blue Ribbons while conversing with the rugged locals who work the mines. A cool truck outside the bar:
Entering Clifton on the way to Alpine:
Normally I may not have cruised by the historic part of town, again part of the advantage of slowing the pace down and exploring!
Thank you Stovey!
Welcome to North America's largest producer of copper. My riding partner took a hike from one of the mine over-looks and found a hillside covered in grave sites marked with primitive crosses...copper at a high cost.
Having passed the Morenci Mine we continued on Hwy 191 to Alpine, this is one of my most favorite roads.
The Super Tenere was shod with new Tourance tires which handled crisply and had plenty of traction. With such wide handle bars the S10 navigated the turns with little effort.
My new AGV helmet fits really well, is light weight, comfortable and highly ventilated. It is not as luxurious as a premium grade touring helmet, for example it does not have pockets in the liner for your ears, and its a bit loud from the buffeting of the windscreen, earplugs are needed and do help a lot.
The Super Tenere's suspension goes a long way towards aiding rider comfort, the bumps, ripples and cattle guards are easily soaked up.
Before going down the other side of the mountains we get to enjoy a nice change of scenery and a respite from the constant 20 mph hairpin turns.
Time for a break!
Time to play with the camera too!
Dinner in Alpine is satisfying and we get a room for a reasonable price, it was a solid day of riding and a good start to our adventure!
more to come... :ricky
Here is the rough outline of my adventure with waypoint created using TrackMyTour:
This adventure started as an idea to ride to Seattle since my family is there, but the distance and time were not stacking up in my favor. So when I heard from a buddy that he was going West on his own ride, I asked to join him. He rides in a looser less structured manner than I do. Other than having a few National Park destinations, no actual routes were planned. This turned out to be a good thing for me to experience because I usually over-plan my rides down to the exact road I will take. The sense of adventure and freedom were indeed amplified on this trip because we did not have to be at any particular destination and a particular time.
Here we are having dinner at our place in the desert on the first evening of the trip, its only now that I start to relax after exiting the big city.
We are easily into New Mexico on the first day, as my buddy posts on TrackMyTour
Whoa! What happened to New Mexico? 300 miles of nasty high wind sand storm highway riding! Glad to be out of it!
On our way to Alpine Arizona we stop at a small bar in an even smaller town and down some COLD Pabst Blue Ribbons while conversing with the rugged locals who work the mines. A cool truck outside the bar:
Entering Clifton on the way to Alpine:
Normally I may not have cruised by the historic part of town, again part of the advantage of slowing the pace down and exploring!
Thank you Stovey!
Welcome to North America's largest producer of copper. My riding partner took a hike from one of the mine over-looks and found a hillside covered in grave sites marked with primitive crosses...copper at a high cost.
Having passed the Morenci Mine we continued on Hwy 191 to Alpine, this is one of my most favorite roads.
The Super Tenere was shod with new Tourance tires which handled crisply and had plenty of traction. With such wide handle bars the S10 navigated the turns with little effort.
My new AGV helmet fits really well, is light weight, comfortable and highly ventilated. It is not as luxurious as a premium grade touring helmet, for example it does not have pockets in the liner for your ears, and its a bit loud from the buffeting of the windscreen, earplugs are needed and do help a lot.
The Super Tenere's suspension goes a long way towards aiding rider comfort, the bumps, ripples and cattle guards are easily soaked up.
Before going down the other side of the mountains we get to enjoy a nice change of scenery and a respite from the constant 20 mph hairpin turns.
Time for a break!
Time to play with the camera too!
Dinner in Alpine is satisfying and we get a room for a reasonable price, it was a solid day of riding and a good start to our adventure!
more to come... :ricky
