A 17 Day ride to the American west coast and back

[scottieh]

Preface: I got jealous of Charlie's title because his name described what I had done, except his coast is very different from mine. So I take mild comfort knowing we have done similar yet very different rides. Therefore I am naming my post after his with a slight exception: A 17 Day ride to the American west coast and back.

I decided to leave town because I was working too damn hard. I had just gotten a fat check from a job and wanted to go on an adventure to the American west coast, a place I had never been to before, on my trusty Yamaha Tenere 3AJ. My ultimate goal was to go camping at the Rainbow Family National Gathering in Washington State. That is a loose collective of hippies and gypsies and street kids and homeless and whoever else wants to show up. It's free, in a different national park each year, and always a lot of fun. No electricity, no running water, no alcohol. Living in Austin Texas meant I would have to travel about 4000 km to get to Portland, Oregon, the largest town nearest the site of the gathering. My route was loosely planned to accommodate the worries of one girlfriend and two parents. Ultimately, that route went out the window as the riding environment changed. My goal was to take my time and have as much fun as possible. Here's a map and a link to the planned route both there and back.

http://tinyurl.com/4yb8e6d


http://tinyurl.com/3mnp2mo


Since I work a career as a filmmaker I usually try to take as few pictures as possible so I apologize for the lack of images. I ended up meeting some people in Moab who took a lot of my picture, but that was towards the end. I did not buy a camera for photography until more than halfway through the trip.

[GeoffD]

Looking forward to this one scottie

[Mezo]

Inland route for sure, much more interesting than going through the big citys.



Mezo.

[scottieh]

My plan for packing was to be as minimal as I could afford to be. I decided to bring a sleeping bag, tent, sleeping mat, extra pants, shirt, 2 pair underwear, 4 pairs socks, a wide brimmed hat for desert, a cold weather hat for the cold, and enough tools to fix any problem the bike could throw at me. I also decided to bring food so that I could camp the whole way and eat restaurant food as few times as possible. That required some saddle bags, so instead of going to a dealership and buying some $150 bags, I went to Goodwill and bought some luggage with shoulder strap hooks for $20 and lashed them together underneath the seat and across the back plastics with rope and cheap d-clips. Problem solved. I also brought spare tires because my current ones were on their last leg.




My trip goal was to spend as little money as possible, meaning no restaurants and no hotels. I decided camping and couch surfing were the answers. I joined a great website called couchsurfing.org and within a few hours of joining had already set up couches to crash on in four cities from Portland to Salt Lake City. I also needed to get insurance and inspect and register my bike since I had done none of those things since I bought it in August of 2010. Getting insurance is easy because any insurance company wants you to give them money. Inspection was also easy. It involved a headlight flash, a horn honk, and some turn signal checks. Start it up, shut it down and sign it up! Inspection passed! Current mileage, 77xxx Km. I called the county about registering the bike to my name (still in the previous owner's name) and the total cost and time to do it made me pretend like that problem did not exist. I figured I could talk my way out of any situations or simply pay the penalties when they came rather than wait for the proper paperwork to arrive. It was a good choice.

My goal was to be in the Los Angeles area as soon as possible. However, Texas is a huge state that demands to be treated more like a country so getting to California needed to be treated more like an expedition than a day trip. I knew I needed to do an Iron Butt (1000 miles or 1600km in 24 hours) to stay on schedule so I planned to leave a day early and camp a few hours down the road at some caverns in a town called Sonora. The ride to Sonora was a nice small highway stopping in old German settlement towns and I got to Sonora as the sun went down and the deer started to come out. I don't really like riding at night in Texas because in the central Texas area you're more likely to hit a deer than a car. I had the whole campsite to myself and enjoyed watching the deer graze alongside pheasant, jack rabbits and wild turkey. It was the western part of central Texas where the desert meets the hills, so there were lots of sloping hills with boulders everywhere, cacti, shrub bush and no mosquitos! Had a great night of sleep and woke up early to begin my 1,000 mile trek across the country on its most brutal highway for bikers, Interstate 10.

The I-10 highway crosses the southern deserts of America right along the Mexican border. It is a major thoroughfare for trucks and the speed limit is around 80mph (about 130km/h). Packed down with all my gear and geared to a 38 tooth rear sprocket, the best I could muster was about 70mph (120km/h). Add to the mix a LOT of unpredictable wind, intense desert heat in mid summer, and dust, and you get a terrible road for motorcycles. By the time I hit the border of Texas at El Paso, I had already been riding for 7 hours. I saw two car fires and was stopped at a US Border Patrol station to be asked if I was a US citizen. In New Mexico the wind picked up. These roads cut through the desert where there were straight lines, meaning it passed by mountain gaps that allowed tremendous gusts of wind to roll over the mountains and through the passes and across the highway directly at traffic. I spent the majority of that highway slanted at an angle into the wind to combat the forces of nature that bore down on me. It was hard work and made for terrible gas mileage. By Arizona it was starting to get dark. I hit Tucson and drank coffee at a cheap diner. By Phoenix I was tired so I pulled off at a gas station and sat down against my bike next to a Seguaro cactus for a nap. The cacti grow tall here. Seguaros are the kind of cactus you see in people's imaginations when you picture the American Southwest.


I left Phoenix with high hopes. I was only about six hours from completing my task of reaching LA in 24 hours. And then I got a flat. It was actually my first flat tire and the sensation of swerving down the road standing on the pegs was quite unique. I pulled over, looked at the bike and realized I had not brought a stand for the bike. As many of you know the 3AJ does not have a center stand and I have yet to find a suitable replacement for that feature. However my Givi Monokey case looked to fit the bill so I jammed it underneath the skid plate and voila! Freewheeling tire! The tube revealed a pinch flat and the tire showed signs of dry rot. I became paranoid about future flats so I arranged to have my replacement tires put on the bike in Palm Desert, California. I also wanted to patch the flat tire because I was now using my spare tube and my patch kit was out of glue. I aired up to 25 psi with my shitty cigarette lighter pump and stopped at the nearest truck repair shop to fully air up to 35psi and have them patch the busted tube. $10 for 10 minutes of work because I was out of glue.

I sort of took it easy on the speed from there, thinking that going slow would reduce my chances of getting a flat, but I think all it did was make me intolerably nervous. I finally crossed the California border through one of their antiquated agricultural check stations and noticed an immediate change in attitude. There were solar panels everywhere. Even the county veterinarian had solar panels. I still had to ride for three excruciating hours through the desert alongside speeding SUV's driven by holier-than-thou housewives and soccer moms to get to Desert Palm where a mediocre mechanic changed my tires for me. There I met my friend Steve who was going to ride with me up the California coastline into Portland and we booked it up to his house in the high desert where Joshua Trees reigned supreme. Even though it was still the desert, the altitude dropped the temperature about 10 degrees from the valley. I was happy to be someplace cooler. The desert riding had really taken its toll on me and the wind and dust and trucks had made me feel pretty bad. Some steak and a few beers solved all my complaints and I went to bed as happy as ever. Tomorrow we were going to ride some of the beautiful mountain passes of California.

[Mezo]

[scottieh]

Woke up late around 9am to find my buddy Steve packing his life up. He had been renting a room in a house for about 6 months now and his roommate was becoming more and more of a dickwad so Steve decided it was finally time to leave. We ate breakfast and I helped him load everything into boxes and then into his truck. In the past two years Steve has been in two accidents, died and resuscitated twice, broken about every bone in his body, lost a kidney, and dropped about 40 pounds. And yet less than 3 months out of the hospital he had already bought a new Harley and was planning on riding it back home across country but his friends made him rent a truck instead. Now he's going to make the same trip back across country on his bike and visit his family on his bike again. His motto is "I can still shift and I can still twist the throttle." Even though I knew the packing and moving was going to cause us to not get to the coast by the end of the day, helping a friend solve some of his life problems was just as gratifying as screaming through the twisties. I'll gladly help a good person in need over riding my bike any day.

Finally after unloading at his storage unit and eating lunch we left Yucca Valley around 2pm and began riding for the mountains. Steve spends almost every day riding around Southern California so he knows the area well. His first road was a 3,000 foot climb into the San Bernadino National Forest. Before this trip my bike had never left the rolling hills of central Texas which has an elevation of 550 feet above sea level (880 meters). I had to pass through Tucson, Arizona to get to California and that city is about 2,300 feet (3680 meters) and the bike ran fine. This time I had to climb 3,000 feet in about 10 miles through a complicated series of switchbacks that make for a biker's paradise. Just look at this map!



The 3AJ struggled for the first time in my life with it (except for when I had to complete 5 miles of a 4WD trail while stuck in third gear earlier this year). The altitude started to affect air/fuel mixtures and the steep hill climbs had me twisting the throttle to max just to keep up 80km/h. Once up in the mountains though it was smooth sailing. The road wound in and around a large high-altitude lake called Big Bear Lake and offered some of the best riding of my life. Nothing faster than 60km/h before another round of hairpin curves and endless downhill chicanes. It passed through gorgeous small mountain towns and past tall aspen and pine trees, something I had not seen in years. I was thrilled to be riding in the cool climate of a high altitude after having to struggle through the hot dry deserts of southwest America. We got to one section of road so twisty that it locked up my back brake. I believe it was due to the lack of spacers between my brake pad and the brake cylinder so it overheated. I sped up to Steve and signaled for him to pull over. At first I thought it was because the mechanic who changed my tires had put the caliper back on the swingarm improperly but after a quick systems check, I bled the brake a little and everything functioned as it should. A little heard scratcher but I'm always up for a mental challenge every now and then. We finished the first section and stopped for gas. Steve said he was going to take me on one more mountain ride, this time through the Angeles mountains north of Los Angeles.

We crossed a major highway and were surrounded by Joshua Trees again. Joshua Trees are cacti-like plants that only grow in specific regions of California. They can grow up to 8 and 10 feet tall and can survive on 8 inches of rain a year. You can replant them if you are careful but you must put them back in the ground facing the same direction as you took them out, otherwise they die. Where Steve lived in Yucca Valley, they were everywhere. They are a kind of sacred plant that cannot be disturbed. It was a new experience to be riding alongside them for sure.



We climbed another 3,000 foot elevation change into the Angeles Mountains north of Los Angeles. This road Steve later explained to me is a Sport Biker's paradise. It was designed in the 1920's to be America's most scenic highway. It is also one of the deadliest roads in America per mile traveled. Many bikers have lost their lives here. As Steve explained a lot of young Marines get off duty from the 29 Palms Marine Base about 2 hours from there and buy the biggest baddest bike they can afford and try to learn how to ride in the Angeles Mountains. Many of them cannot make the turns at the speeds the bikes offer and they go flying off the edge. The road is one sweeping curve after another, wrapping itself around the side of the mountain for 55 miles of unintersected highway. Actually there is one highway intersection that connects Arrowhead Lake to the Angeles Crest Highway (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angeles_Crest_Highway) and there is only one restaurant the whole road. We skirted along enormous cliff drops with signs that warned of Big Horn Ram crossings. Gravel covered some corners as rock slides are a fact of life on this highway. The road crests a pass at 7,900 feet above sea level, the highest I have ever been in my life and we stop for lunch at the restaurant, breaking my first rule of the trip - no restaurants. It was about 4pm on a Wednesday and there were 10 other bikers, some GSXR's and Ducatis who were also stopping for lunch or a drink before finishing the second half of the road. I drank a single beer, trying to restrain myself and be sober for the ride home. I did not want to be another statistic. Just look at this road!

[

Dropping in from the mountains to Los Angeles was a bit of a culture shock. We left Yucca Valley, a city of 50,000 shy residents and escaped into the mountains. Coming out of it to the mansions of north Burbank was a little like a fish crawling on land for the first time. We quickly hit rush hour traffic on the 101 and I got to practice lane splitting for the first time legally. In California, going between cars when there is a striped white line while traveling slower than 25 miles per hour is legal. I've heard of people who do it at 100mph. That wasn't going to happen for me, but waiting in traffic wasn't an option either so Steve lead and I followed him as he cut a zigzag through the 4 lanes of congestion. Steve taught me how to shoot the gap last year on my first long distance trip when I had a cruiser that could do 100mph. This year he lead me to lane split some increasingly impossible gaps and having never done it before and hauling around all my packs and tires was thrilling. It's technically illegal in Texas but I still do it, however being given the approval of the law was amazing. I wish I could live in California just so I could lane split. Traffic sucks. We rode for as long as Steve could see the road, which was about 20 miles past Burbank. Since his accidents, Steve can't ride well at night, so we talked about camping illegally in the mountains but found a hotel instead (rule 2 broken). Tomorrow we would finally get to the coastline and I would get to feel the cool breeze of a new ocean.

[scottieh]

Here is the pre-trip packing job. I don't know why but I forgot to turn the motor on, so no put-put-put-put-put for you ladies and gents in this video:

[youtube]v0_wYZafu1w[/youtube]

[CharlieGreger]

Awesome pics mate, That bike looks somewhat top heavy with those new tyres tied to the top box like that. How did your home made saddle bags hold up for the trip?
Its always a bit of a discussion whether to use hard or soft luggage on a trip. and I suppose each will have their benefits over the other. I did an off-road riding course for big dual purpose bikes at the end of November last year, and the instructor reckons that if you are only going to take a rucksack with you on your trip, you should wear it on your back, so that in case you need to stand in a hurry, the weight is transferred to the pegs making you more stable.

Though saying that, it would have been a hell of a sight to see you standing on your pegs with tyres around your neck

[Mezo]

Though saying that, it would have been a hell of a sight to see you standing on your pegs with tyres around your neck

Phaaaa (cornflakes on my monitor)

Mezo.

[scottieh]

I knew this day was going to be memorable because we were finally going to get to the Pacific coastline, have our fun on Highway 1, and reach San Francisco all in one day. We were also going to travel through the Big Sur region of California, made famous for its beautiful redwoods amongst a coursing shoreline. Jack Kerouac spent a summer in a cabin in the woods there and wrote about it in his novel "Big Sur." Here is a quote:

"Everything is the same, the fog says 'We are fog and we fly by dissolving like ephemera,' and the leaves say 'We are leaves and we jiggle in the wind, that's all, we come and go, grow and fall' — Even the paper bags in my garbage pit say 'We are mantransformed paper bags made out of wood pulp, we are kinda proud of being paper bags as long as that will be possible, but we'll be mush again with our sisters the leaves come rainy season' — The tree stumps say 'We are tree stumps torn out of the ground by men, sometimes by the wind, we have big tendrils full of earth that drink out of the earth' — Men say 'We are men, we pull out tree stumps, we make paper bags, we think wise thoughts, we make lunch, we look around, we make a great effort to realise everything is the same."
-Jack Kerouac, "Big Sur"

Leaving Ventura, the 101 highway quickly changed from an urban thoroughfare to a rural 4-lane highway that wound through the rolling hills of California. The weather got warmer as we went further inland and the scenery changed from suburban to spectacular. The 101 is bordered by large ranches of mostly untouched pasture land for cattle and horse grazing. I don't know how the rest of the state looks off the highway, but if it is anything like what I saw driving from Ventura to the coast, I want to move there. We stopped to pee off the highway and watch swallows fly in and out of a bridge overpass. It's sunny, about 78 degrees fahrenheit, and we're about 10 miles from the coast. I could go on. I like it here. The only problems with California are that it is extremely overpopulated and outrageously expensive. I can understand why - it's gorgeous.

We turned onto the coastal highway 1 at Saint Luis Obispo and the rolling hills got steeper with rock formations dotting the peaks. The temperature began to drop and suddenly I saw the ocean. The sensation was like how many people describe ascending the summit of a mountain - mostly they are tired and relieved to be there, but not necessarily ecstatic. Later, the feelings of accomplishment arise, but often long after the actual act was performed. To me after riding over 1300 miles in two days to see a coastline was gratifying, but tiring. It all began to sink in as we stopped for coffee at the small coastal town of Morro Bay. We checked our gear, made some phone calls and had a brief lunch of hard boiled eggs and cappuccinos. I played guitar listening to the sound of gulls floating by. Life was good. We took off again and I soon saw signs for an "elephant seal viewing area." I had to stop. For those who don't know, elephant seals are about the biggest, meanest, loudest seal on the planet. They spend their day either laying on the beach or banging their heads together fighting over something. Their repulsive size and attitude makes them special to me. I can't really explain why. Watching them lay in the sun, bark like diesel truck engine brakes, and bash their heads together in the surf was a nice side trip. Here is a picture of one.



As we got further up the coast the towns began to spread out and long stretches of highway composed of switchbacks and hairpin turns became the norm. It would have been the best tarmac ride possible had it not been overrun with vacationers and sightseers. Of course we were there to sightsee, but we rode fast and we were often at the mercy of other people to pull over to let us pass. The 1 is a dangerous road because of frequent washouts and landslides that oftentimes destroy the road and can make it impassable. We heard rumor that the road was closed at one point but we were pleased to discover construction in progress and a 1-lane section of highway open. We passed all cars and rode to the front. As we rode longer we got cockier and began taking chances crossing over the double yellow line to pass slow cars. Soon we were being blocked by one particularly slow section of cars, so looking ahead and seeing open road I passed all four cars on a long sweeping turn with Steve right behind me. Steve later said the look on the woman's face when she saw me passing her on the turn was priceless. A combination of terror and horror. Like insulting someone's gravestone.

The road wandered away from the coast and we entered the Big Sur region. I saw my first redwood, a tall pine tree of ruddy brown bark and 150-feet tall. We stopped to pee again and everything smelled wonderful, like fresh pine. I found almost all of my best memories were of the times we stopped to urinate on the foliage as it was among the few times we actually got off our bikes to wander off the road. Like hitting the slow-mo button and actually experiencing nature for what it was worth. Sadly Steve can't walk more than 100 feet due to his numerous accidents so our excursions off the bike were typically restricted to pee and gas breaks.




We stopped in Carmel, about a half hour south of Monterrey and had dinner at a seafood restaurant. I had wild salmon caught in the Monterrey bay and trucked the half hour down the coast to the restaurant. It was about as fresh as could be, short of buying it from the fisherman. We left town still chuckling about the sweeping overtake and darted through traffic into San Francisco. Again racing the sun for the sake of Steve's vision, we finally reached the cold fog of the San Francisco Bay area. Our destination was a converted warehouse in the center of the city where we were promised a bed by a man I had met at a Texas Burn (like Burning Man but in Texas). Their space was a former sign-making factory that centered around a large concrete warehouse common space used by all for artistic purposes. There were about 8 bedrooms, two bathrooms, a communal kitchen, a roof deck, two stories of sprawling art projects, and various small projects like the rebuild of a 1980's Kawasaki K1000 that had been stolen, wrecked and then recovered. I was desperately worried about my tires holding up for the remainder of the trip so we planned to drop into a motorcycle accessories store in the morning to find new tires. I ate some adult brownies and had a nice evening relaxing in the comfortable high of a free bed in the center of a great city.