August 2, 2022
It's time to do another one!
The bike needed a couple of things taken care of; these tasks are completed. The packing checklist is generated; items are being checked off daily.
The trip is going to include the completion of the coastal highways of California and Oregon. The coastal roads of Washington probably are postponed for another trip, weather permitting.
Our trip up is 'vacation-like' in that we'll take a few extra days to arrive in time to spend a long weekend with family.
As they head off to work the following week, we will consider wandering around the state of Washington (again, weather permitting) for a few days, returning in time to spend another long weekend with family. From there, we'll have to head for home.
It's my intention to document the trip in this blog entry more or less as it happens. You, dear reader, are invited to come back to the blog for periodic updates.
Fri August 5, 2022
Day minus 1: The checklist is nearly completely checked off, the package has arrived, the family here knows we will be gone, and...we're ready! We'll be up and on the road early; sharing the tracking link only with family this time. The subsequent blog entries will be at the end of the each day of riding, dependent upon internet connectivity.
Sat August 6, 2022
Day One: Tucson to San Bernardino, CA.
Typical ride into SoCal - barely. Trying hard not to wear ourselves out on day one of a multi-day trip - a challenge. A few pictures?
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| Packed and ready to roll! |
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| Absolutely nothing changes out here along Interstate 10 west of Phoenix |
It's a weekend, so crazy traffic all over the place. One more day of that and it hopefully calm a bit. Maybe. It was HOT - 111° as we rolled thru Palm Springs. We probably left a couple of hours too late...lesson learned.
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| Day One - 425 miles |
Day Two: San Bernardino to Santa Rosa.
I'm avoiding the westbound traffic, but will have to deal with some of the northbound I-215 traffic.
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| What would you do with 60,000 lbs of tomatoes? I'm betting this is going to be sauce later this week. I'd guess there were a dozen rigs like this with tomatoes. Onions were another big load. |
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| Food, bio-break, fuel. The largest Tesla Supercharger facility I've ever seen sits to the image right, behind the McD's. |
From here, we clip the corner of the Mojave Desert, get through the Central Valley (ugh!), and into the NorCal region in Sonoma County.
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| Crossing the Mokelumne River Bridge, near Isleton, CA |
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| Had a nice roadside chat with the Chippie on the right, as he was monitoring for illegal passing on the road we're about to turn onto. |
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| Yes, same place we stayed at a decade ago - picked on purpose. |
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| It was a nice walk across the street for dinner. We begin to hit more coastal & cooler air tomorrow. |
Traffic was Sunday afternoon normal; hard to believe soo many cars on the road on a Sunday. Got to the room, just as the headset batteries died. Good timing.
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| Day Two - 497 miles |
Mon August 8, 2022
Day Three: Crescent City to Lincoln City
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| Foggy rush-hour traffic, Santa Rosa, CA |
I had vaguely recalled the ride along 101, but once we'd past Arcata, we were in a new area for us. More rugged coastline.
This is what I want to see.
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| Southern portion of Mattole Road, Humboldt County, CA |
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| Southern portion of Mattole Road, Humboldt County, CA |
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| Southern portion of Mattole Road, Humboldt County, CA |
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| Day Three - 320 miles |
Tue August 9, 2022
Day Four: Lincoln City, OR Short day of riding today, but all along the coastline. Interesting little tourist trap town, but nice. I'd consider coming back. Weather dictates if we do the Tillamook tour or not.
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| Day Four - 320 miles |
Wed August 10, 2022
Day Five: As I'd outlined the trip, at this point, we were going to into tourist mode. After passing this time on the Tillamook Creamery, we zipped over to Mt. St Helens. Again, a bit of a let down, as it's ~100 miles of one-way riding to see it. So, it's another reason why we need to come back.
There was really one one more place to check out, and fortunate that we were able to backtrack a small amount and head over to the Columbia River Valley. One of those places where the road was the destination, but there were other things to enjoy there as well.
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| Wahkeena Falls, OR |
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| Along the Historic Columbia River Highway |
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| Multnomah Falls, OR |
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| Multnomah Falls with the Lodge in the foreground |
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| Day Five - 290 miles |
Thu August 11, 2022
Day Six: That was a fun trip up this way, but I did screw up my routing along the way. I missed the Rowena area, yet I did cross the Columbia River at the Hood River Bridge. 4,418' of metal-grate bridge decking on two wheels. It took a bit for my butt to unclinch from the seat after that.
Day Six - 302 miles
From here, we'll take a pause from blogging and enjoy family time.
Tue August 16, 2022
''Guests, like fish, begin to smell after three (or four) days.'' attributed to many, including Franklin, over the centuries. We'll take off for a couple of days and do some light exploration. Trying not to completely intrude into our kids' life for a full couple of weeks, I had in the back of my mind a get-away to see some other stuff - and I basically wanted to do some more riding. I really wanted a couple of stops...a quick trip up to Blaine, WA to see the border crossing. Now, we probably would have crossed, but due to continued restrictions by the Canadian government, the best we could hope for was a quick photo:
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| The physical line is easy to spot on the roadway; small markers next to the roadway also show the border. |
I'll tell you that the public facilities there were some of the best I've ever in. 藍 The building is at the right of this image.
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| "Peace Arch" (obscured by the tree) physically straddles both countries. |
From here, we wandered back south to WA-20 and the northern part of the Cascade Loop. A couple of hours before we got to Wenatchee, we were definitely out of the mountains and into the Yakima Valley deserts of Washington.
Wed August 17, 2022
The next day, we continued the Loop along US-2, back toward civilization, ending at Mukilteo. Timing kept us rolling, and a quick detour to Camano Island and back finished the ride. The Cascade Loop was pretty darned good (at least the portion of it we did accomplish), and it's highly recommended.
It was here that the unmistakable odor of gear oil permeated the garage.
Panic ensued - briefly. More on that in a bit.
From Thursday through Saturday (Aug 18 - 20), the bike was largely ignored, while family time was thoroughly enjoyed.
Sun August 21, 2022
I procured some gear oil and a means to drain & refill. The beginnings of gear failure were noted, but it had looked like this back home. So, replaced the oil, then went on a 20 mile ride, saw no external leaks.
"Well, maybe I didn't have that drain plug fully torqued. That replacement crush washer fixed it..."
Uh, nope.
I wouldn't know that until I was 170 miles down the road at our first fuel stop.
Mon August 22, 2022
For those reading along, you typically smell gear oil before you see it. It has a very unique odor that's unmistakable. At the first fuel stop, I was thinking that perhaps I hadn't cleaned up the mess on the bottom of the bike. It's still warm, and...uh, nope.
I'd already made a room reservation for tonight, so it was simply get it to the motel and sort things out once we got there...uh, nope. sense a theme?
Along EB I-84, about 30 miles east of Boise, traffic comes to a dead stop. The smoke from a grassfire was clearly crossing the roadway and the highway was closed. I was sooooo fortunate that I was able to go in a reverse direction and into the weigh station that we'd just passed!
The building was closed, but there were some nice shade trees to sit under as we watched the line of vehicles get longer and longer. A couple of other motorcyclists joined up with us. We discussed the minimal amount of alternate ways to get to the next community to the east, where these riders had a room reserved.
It sure seemed much longer, but my tracking shows we were there roughly an hour before being able to continue.
We passed on dinner, got cleaned up and went to bed after 9 hours and 640 miles of riding.
Tue August 23, 2022
Tuesday morning, the epiphany hit me. After consulting another rider (who is a much better wrench than I'll ever be) he gave me a couple of ideas to ride it home. Went to the store, bought another bottle of gear oil (first one wouldn't fit on the bike) and plugged what I thought was the only source of the leak. That worked for about two miles. A second store and a second attempt at trying to contain some gear oil and we finally began to head south.
The theory was to try and put some gear oil into the gear housing and hope enough would survive riding for a couple of tanks of fuel.
It's working, as we made it to Henderson, NV after xxx miles and yy hours of riding.
Wed August 24, 2022
Home after xxx miles and yy hours. The gear was removed, and the bike summarily ignored for the moment. What an adventure. A bit shy of three weeks and nearly 4000 miles later, I thought only BMW's had final drive issues, and only (older) Harley's had oil leak problems.
Thu August 25, 2022
Yet, I was able to get it home. By riding it - two-up, fully loaded. Yes, had to put in a bit of oil after ~300 miles of riding, just so there was *some* lubricant...
Starting the eBay search now for a replacement. Damn - since the last time I had to buy one of these, prices have gone up. Of course, this model is no longer made, that jacks the price up a LOT.
Fri August 26, 2022
Requisitioned replacement motorcycle component.
Sat August 27, 2022
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| The entire ride |
The ride had a couple of goals...they all didn't happen:
- As mentioned above, we probably left a couple of hours later than we should have on day one. As it was we still had time to go eat before the room was ready, and I really did not feel like pressing on any further on the first day, which was a smart decision. It worked out.
+ Continue the ride along the Pacific Coastline as much as we could stand. Able to do all of Oregon. In spots, a much nicer stretch of road than similar California coastline. I'd certainly not recommend a 'do it all at once' ride along the Pacific Coast. I mean, it's nice and all, but that's some pretty substantial riding. Not to mention full of tourists. I know, best month to do it is September and October, when many of the tourists have to go back to work and school.
- Ride Mattole Road & the 'lost coast' of California. Stated to become a bit of a time drain; looks like this will have to be done on a subsequent trip. Seems to be doable on a touring motorcycle, but just wasn't 100% certain it would be on this particular trip.
+ See the sights along the Historic Columbia River Highway. The waterfalls are cool...really cool after 6pm and the crowds have all rolled back into civilization.
PXL_011212058_S.jpg+ There certainly seems to be a lot more that we've missed on this first moto ride to the PNW. That's okay; just another opportunity to do more on future rides.
++ Got to visit with family, teach grandchild things at a year and a half old. Can't wait for the next visit.
Fri September 23, 2022
Replacement motorcycle component arrived.
Sun September 25, 2022
Replacement motorcycle component installed.
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| Yeah, that was a bit of effort... |
Next ride? Might be a bit...
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