PNW 2003 Pre Rally Ride Reports!

[sixtysix]

Sunday (8/10/03) we took a really cool 360 mile ride to the North-westernmost point in WA, so I could say that I had been to the North-Easternmost city and North-westernmost city in the continental US in the same year. I also needed to stick my feet in the Pacific ocean, to knock this off my long list of goals in my life. Ride started with a ferry across Puget Sound. Motorcycles get to load and unload first….no waiting!



Next we buzzed up to Sequim, to pick up Johnny Yukon. I hadn’t met Johnny before so this was a real treat.



We now had 3 XS-XJ owners together all riding 1200 Bandits, I sure hoped that nobody had alerted the local law enforcement! I am pretty sure that having this much fun is illegal!

The route took us up along the shore of the Strait Of Juan De Fuca, First we went through Port Angles and after that the ride got very scenic and very twisty one section of Route 112 was very twisty with mile after mile of nice smooth pavement….almost all of the traffic was heading the other way so it made for very brisk run up through.



Once we got on Rt. 113 right along the coast, the pavement we broken up a little, but the view of the mountains across the strait on Vancouver Island made it a great drive all the same.



The town of Neah Bay was our goal and then on to Cape Flattery. As we drove down towards the Cape, we could see fog rolling in, but decided to chance it. I didn’t realize there was 5 miles of dusty ‘no rain for last 25 days you got here’ dirt road to travel down. Man did our bike get covered with crap! Once we got to the Cape, there was a half mile walk down to viewing area. I think it was worth seeing!








After a quick lunch in Neah Bay we took off for the beach at La Push. One thing I found out about these PNW guys is they don’t sit around letting mold grow o their tires, speeds in excess of Bug 2 were common. Once we got to La Push, I got to stick my foot in the Pacific ocean, too bad we could not see all the rock formations because of the fog.



The ride back home included a stop at the Crescent Lake Lodge and a scenic ride along the lake. Several deer standing on the side of the road and a bunch of traffic kept the speeds down to Bug 1.





After we gassed up at Sequim and Johnny Peeled off for home, Mike and I enjoyed a high speed run back to the ferry under a beautiful, huge full moon.

Man what a great day of riding!

Want to see more pictures?
Imagestaion Album

[MartyA]

I am sitting here at work, rain outside, drudgery inside, sneaking a peek during lunch and these wonderful photos pop up. Gary, I STILL hate you!! Har har. Please try to keep us soggy easterners up to date. I know it will be easy, since you have nothing better to do....

Ride on, be careful, enjoy!!

[Huron52]

Not raining here Gary ...... but still wishing I was there....

Good pictures.....

[sixtysix]

keep checking the album link. New pictures are posted as I have them.

[Mike Hart]

pre-rally ride Wed Aug 13

On Wednesday morning, Jason Raley and Mike Holmes from Tacoma and Jeff Trap from Portland met Gary Granger and myself at my place for a great ride on what turned out to be a long day. Gary and I were 'warmed up' with close to 1000 miles already on our Bandits the past few days.



The Players - (from back to front) Mike, Mike, Jeff and Jason (Gary was taking picture)

The sky was cloudless as we headed north on I5 for 45 minutes to catch US20, the North Cascades Highway. We had breakfast in Sedro Woolley, which is the last town of any size on 20, and all enjoyed the riding and scenery.


North Cascades



Washington Pass


Gary at Washington Pass
In scenic Winthrop the mountains are gone. It was really hot east of the Cascades. At a remote gas stop, we were told about a river park with some welcome shade, we took on liquids, Jason and Jeff went swimming, and set off into the scorching sun again after a longer break than we had planned.

We encountered a couple of one-lane road work areas where we cut to the front of the line on the shoulder. We figured it was safer that way, since we'd wind up passing the dozens of cars and trucks in front of us anyway, better to do it while they were sitting still. On the last of these, the flag-lady didn't much appreciate us cutting in, lots of lecturing, but no way she could have held us back, there were no cops, even though she said it was illegal, well, I'm not so sure about that.

Turns out not much later (this was on Hwy 97) all those cars and trucks passed Gary and I - the sun was in my eyes and too late I saw some rectangular object on the road; I swerved, missed it with the front tire, but it hit the rear, and half a mile later I could feel the rear end getting squirrely. I pointed to the tire, and Gary pointed to the side of the road. BIG hole. 95 degrees. Out in the middle of nowhere. All the people that might have resented us cutting in getting a good laugh at our expense.

We kinda went over our options (none of them sounded at all appealing) while we waited for what I knew to be Jason's certain return to find out what happened to us.

Jason asked what happened, and when I told him he enthusiastically shouted "You're in luck!" I looked at him like he was crazy, but he said, "there's a Yamaha shop 3 miles down the road, and they don't close for 20 minutes yet". Now that is some good luck, for bad luck.

Gary cell-phoned ahead to Mike who was at the Yam place, told em to hang on and get the tire ready to go, while I rode on the flat on the shoulder at 30mph. Why not? I wouldn't ride on a plugged tire anyway, never mind this one was not repairable.

The service guy stayed overtime, they had one tire in my size, luckily a good one (Dunlop Sportmax D208 for my Bandit), and it was worth every penny to have us all back on the road about an hour after the flat.

We gassed up and had a quick "dinner" at McDonald's in Leavenworth, and heading east the road winds along the river for a while, so I got to scrub in the new rubber a bit before we hit the high speed sweepers of Hwy 2 Stevens Pass. It was going to be dusk soon, we wanted to get near civilization again before the deer took over the country roads, and Bug 2+ seemed like a good idea at the time. Luckily no deer, no LEOs, that was some crazy fun blast over the pass.

It was a 13.5 hour 450 mile day for Gary and I, and a 15 hour 500+ mile day for the 3 staying in Tacoma. We agreed to shorten the next day's ride by about 50 miles, and arranged to meet at 9am at the Denny's in North Bend, on I90. I slept like a stone, so glad to be riding the next day to the rally, and not rescuing my bike out in the hellish boonies. to be cont'd

[Mike Hart]

Ride to the Rally

Rally day is here! Gary and I had gassed up and oiled our chains the night before, so it didn't take much to head out into rural east King County to North Bend to meet the Tacoma crew.

As soon as we got to Snoqualmie Valley, it was thick fog. It was nice to be riding in cool weather. The fog lifted at Carnation, and 45 miles from home, after stopping for pictures at Snoqualmie Falls, we arrived at Denny's (the restaurant) 5 minutes early, at exactly the same time as the others. Hey, this is working great!


Snoqualmie Falls

We blasted east on I90 for about 80 miles, coming out just south of where I'd had my flat the day before. It was hot and cloudless again as we gassed up and took on cold drinks before heading into Yakima Canyon. This is a really nicely paved twisty road along the Yakima River Canyon. I'd heard there was a lot of police presence here, and advised we keep to a maximum of 15 over. Hah, fat chance! Gary and I let the others get far enough ahead, hey, if we give them enough space and they do hit radar, the trooper will be writing them and not looking at radar when we come by! Still, we didn't really get crazy, just fast enough to have a really good time. Yeah, we're a couple of heartless bastidges.


Yakima Canyon

Then on to Hwy 12, which goes over White Pass, which is a great road, and very scenic. At one point on this road, you come around a curve and there is Mt. Rainier right in your face, huge as can be. We hit another one-lane road work spot, and luckily there was some shade, and the flagger was cool, didn't mind at all, seemed to like the bikes.


Mt Rainier right in front of us!

12 took us to I5 just south of Chehalis, about 30 minutes south of Olympia. For some reason it was very turbulent, and after all the great roads we'd been on in the last 36 hours, it was a pain to endure the slab to the exit for US 101, at which point it's only a few more miles to Denny's (the host).

We decided to stop at a Honda dealer very close to Denny's, Jeff found some boots he'd been looking for, and a throttle lock, I found orange t-shirts on sale 2-for-1, Gary grabbed a cargo net, we jawed with the owner for a while, then on to Denny's.

It made perfect sense to us to take the 300 mile route to Denny's, rather than the half-hour from Jason's house, or one hour from my house.

All of a sudden, we're there, out at the end of the road out in the woods outside Olympia. Johnny Yukon, Dennis McLaughlin, Ken Daniels, and Jim Middlestadt were already there, the beer was cold, let the party begin!

[ratbyk]

PNW XS PICS

The following link will take you to some of the pics that I took at the Zanders over the PNW XS Aug meet.
Enjoy. Ken

http://www.imagestation.com/album/?id=4289333001

[Geezer]

Hey guys I check out that full dress XS11 at BFB's in Beaverton that was mentioned around the camp fire on Saturday.

They're asking $2100 for it. I'm going to wait and see if they still have it in November and make a low ball offer. It's in pretty nice condition and I don't think they'll budge while there is still nice riding weather.

Geezer

[sixtysix]

The 2 day attempt at Mt. Baker

Mike forgot to mention that we tried to make it to the top of Mt. Baker twice on consecutive days. The only real rain of the whole rally would keep us from getting any good pictures anyway.


Rain, rain, go away!

The first attempt ended at the Snack bar just shy of Glacier, Mike noticed that there were some chess boards around and proceeded to spank the proprietor in a couple of games.

The next day we made to the top, but it was cloudy and we only looked around for like 5 minutes.







When we were ready to leave I noticed that a nail had embedded itself in my tire, and was slightly concerned because the nearest bike shop was about 30 miles away.



Just then it started to rain. Since we had come up in the dry I was sure it would stop as soon as we started down and I didn't bother to put my rain gear on. Big mistake!! I got soaked.

My leather jacket was wet and my feet and hands were wet, worst of all it was only about 60 degrees on the mountain and I was worried about freezing to death on the way home.

Luckily, there was a ski shop at the bottom of the mountain, and the door was open. I needed dry socks and I had Gortex liners to put on over them, so the guy told me the were not open but when I told him I needed dry warm socks he was only to glad to take my money ($12 for Medina wool socks, ).

Anyway to make a long story short, we when to the closest bike shop and pulled out the nail and found it had not actually punctured the almost new rear tire.

So we went home and packed up our stuff for the trip to Denny's place. I found that Mike used to be a dealer for Vanson leather and had some great conditioner that fixed up my leather jacket (after it dried out that is )