Don't ride with Nate

Everybody knows you aren’t supposed to ride with Nate…

This is me. I’m Nate…not that Nate, but a different Nate.



I ride this bike:





It’s a 2008 KLR650, and it’s been farkled beyond it’s own good. The list of mods is lengthy, so I won’t bore you with them, but if you have a question, ask.

I don’t do long-range epic journeys, but I do some pretty awesome day trips and weekend trips. I don’t ride very far, or very long, but I ride often. I’m usually pretty lazy about taking pictures, but since one of my favourite things to read on ADV is the ride reports, I’m trying to work on that. Getting a tankbag (soon) will facilitate in the easy factor to take pics. I also have to slow down and stop riding through the woods like a hooligan on a stolen bike, so I can actually stop and take some pics. Working on that too.

Anyway, more of my bike:



(thanks hawk)





More to come…
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This weekend Fredgreen and I went camping, despite being told not to ride with Nate. I mean look at C-stain &#8211; he rode with Nate and now walks with a limp. I really need to get some &#8220;don&#8217;t ride with Nate&#8221; stickers made up&#8230;

Anyway, here is where we&#8217;re going



More specifically



New France Nova Scotia is a ghost town. It was once a bustling lumber community back in the early 1800&#8217;s. they had a railway, a casino, a hotel, even a DC dynamo that was able to power the town, giving it the nickname: Electric City. After lumber prices fell in the early 1900&#8217;s, the newer generation had no interest in keeping New France alive, and it was abandoned. There is a story about a Fiery Ghost riding a horse made of smoke riding through the townsite&#8230;last account was in the 1950&#8217;s. Apparently this apparition rode through the town, stopped at a chapel, took a knee and prayed before drawing a sword and entering a cellar to have a sword fight before vanishing in thin air&#8230;Spanish Conquistador? I dunno, but when we went in there this time, it rained to friggin hard for anything made of fire.

I started my day loading up the last minute preparations, and hitting the road late as usual. (If I were on time, the world would be running behind). I was to meet fred at his house, which is about an hour and a half from mine. I hit rain about 30 minutes in to my trip. Hard rain. Oh well, I&#8217;m going camping, I have whiskey and Cuban cigars, I don&#8217;t care. I didn&#8217;t take any pics until I got to Fred&#8217;s.

Here fred is putting some pure osmosis filtered mountain air in to the tire of his BMW.


Then Fred realized he was ill-prepared for refreshments, so it was off to the liquor store.


Fred&#8217;s bike hasn&#8217;t got a luggage rack for his wolfman bags yet, so he just piled it high. This is the first of many stops to adjust his load. Many jokes were made about him blowing his load, losing his load, dropping his load all over the trail&#8230;yeah, we&#8217;re really just children trapped in adult&#8217;s bodies&#8230;YMMV.


It was raining hard on and off getting in to New France. Not many pics were taken, as we just wanted to get there, get camp set up, and get our drank on. We camped on the shore of long tusket lake, as we have done before. First order of business, get a fire going and dry out some gear.


The fire was a pain to get going &#8211; nothing would catch. I even ripped some of the back pages out of my mapbook &#8211; the ones with words about the national parks, and they were damp. We eventually whittled some sticks, and caught the shavings on fire, and finally we had something to stand around. Then it was time to eat & drink.

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My spot:


Fred&#8217;s a tree-dweller:


And just behind my tent, the road continues along a beach, and over to the townsite of New France.


I brought some steaks and a potato, which I shared with fred. He had a bunch of freeze dried stuff, and sometimes you can&#8217;t turn down a steak when your buddy brings two. No pics of the food, it was a race to drive it in to me, as I was tired, cold, soaked and very hungry. The aftermath:


Did you know you can get alphabet pretzels now?


The next morning my bike turned in to a laundry rack. I thought maybe my stuff could dry a bit while I made my coffee and ate my oatmeal.


It didn&#8217;t work&#8230;wet boots in the morning aren&#8217;t fun. I didn&#8217;t even have any breadbag socks.


My laundry room and kitchen/dining area


A little left over from last night&#8230;you know, in case of emergency, if it was a miserable day&#8230;


Fred starts to rouse.


This really is an incredible spot, and I really am glad that I get to ride here and seldom see people.




This was flowage from the rain running down the road and pouring in to the lake that night. It rained hard.



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<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <wunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <wontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--> So the plan was to head out of there, and make a day trip and then camp somewhere else for the second night (after getting more liquor of course). Our spirits were a little broken with all the wet weather, and the trails were seriously effed up. I’ve never ridden before ridden through a puddle so deep that the water is up to my knees while sitting on the bike. Not a ton of fun. After coming to the realization that we might forego the second night, but still do a day trip, Fred had an accident.



That’s going to be hard to shift with.

We plodded on for about 15 minutes to get to a place where we (he) could assess the shifter, and see if we (he) could fix it, otherwise we (he) would have to ride all the way home like that…I was a big help. I walked around the New France townsite and took some pics!



Kind of hard to see here, but the old granite block foundations the buildings once stood on are still there. It’s very grown in:





I think he’s making headway…

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<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <wunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:Compatibility> <w:BreakWrappedTables/> <w:SnapToGridInCell/> <w:WrapTextWithPunct/> <w:UseAsianBreakRules/> <wontGrowAutofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--> Now we get to some of my frustrations with New France. Some measures have been taken to preserve the history, which is admirable since the area is now owned by a large lumber conglomerate. Unfortunately, they were all half-measures and there has been no follow-through or maintenance in about 14 years.

Here a building once stood, the lumber is just a visual aid for historical reasons.


Wonder which building it was? Every one of these has a sign…


Sigh…

The guest book holder and map are toast too.


This was an old well I suppose, how should I know, there’s nothing on the sign


There’s a little picnic area where (I think) the chapel once stood, and it comes complete with rotten picnic tables and garbage cans with the same garbage we left there a year ago.


“hey Fred, do you need a hand? Oh good, you fixed it”


Apparently Fred caught a frog in one of those water holes. Neat.


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We rode out towards Bear river where we’d have a hot meal and then after a bit further part ways.
This is the Sissiboo river (LOL – it’s just fun to say)




Crap, I got my KLR dirty…I guess it will stay this way until it rains again, as everyone knows you aren’t supposed to wash a KLR.







In bear river fred had a pizza, and I had a falafel. No pics, as I don’t really think about much more than driving the food in to me when presented with food.

After a short jaunt down a nice gravel road, We tried to spread the word about ADV via hand gestures…when around a blind corner an oncoming car was totally on our side to avoid a puddle. Dumbass.

Fred and I parted ways and I headed towards my camp at the lake the next county over.

Ahhh. Beer time.


(we’re not really gypsies, we just camp like we are)

The wife was at our camp with the dogs, so I just joined her for the second night, and to be honest, I was glad I did. I slept great, and had a great rest of the weekend which turned out to be spectacular weather.

I took the opportunity to dry out everything I had. One pair of underoos is the only thing in my gear that was dry…and I was glad to have them…


Everything else went on the line





And nothing says a good weekend like MX boots outside your camper


So that’s my short trip. I’m going to keep updating this thread as a repository for all my short trips.

Thanks for reading.

Nate. (don’t ride with him)
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Good job, Nate! I'm beginning to realize that rides with you and BMW Shifters don't mix. How long did the BMW Rescue Chopper with piping hot latte take to reach Fred? I guess if he'd really been in a pickle, I could have ran to his house and grabbed the Ural Rescue Unit (URU) and brought his tool roll.

I'm sorry that we didn't get a chance to jump in the truck and head down, but given the amount of rain you saw, perhaps that was a good thing.

Stop up for a visit, will ya?

Cool ride report. I hope to do a few ghost towns here in my area of New Mexico (there are a LOT) early next month or at least one late this month.

Neat.

I thought so

That's right. I'm hell on bmw's that ride in proximity to me...lol. last time we went out with phil and yellow I had to produce tools for the big grey pig...

Fred was here!

wouldn't be the same without ya, bud!

Finally got my Tankbag today - should facilitate more picture taking from here on in, if all I have to do is unzip a bag and my camera is right there! I'll even start bringing the DSLR again.



May be another installment on Sunday - have a fundraiser with the fire dept on Saturday...Halibut Supper anyone? Fred? YellaKnife? Slowphil? eh?


*note - all photos in this thread so far were taken with my smartypants phone.

Enjoyed the report thanks for sharing

Gonna be entertaining guests at the camp on Saturday night, telling Booger stories. You'll be larger than life, a regular Nate Bunyan!

As long as they all start with "so there I was..."

Got my days screwed up. Saturday is a ride, sunday is the FD supper. I have a lever here for your sherpa. It might be waiting for you when you get back from camp...

if you are coming via the number 8, stop in at the camp!

Maybe. not sure. Yellaknife might be able to do a ride. Might go check out the roads/trails around Squirreltown - look on google earf, it's a maze of roads back there! Tried to Ping Slowphil, but he won't answer his texts - he's too hollywood now.

Well going for a ride tomorrow.

Changed the oil, and changed the brake fluid on the bike. I've also been constantly messing with the carb, and I think I've got it this time. I've had 6 different main jets in it, and this should be the last one I try - 138 main Dynojet, KLX needle, 2nd clip, and fuel screw out 2 turns...we'll see.

route logged in to OruxMaps for android. Have the backcountry mapbook, bike is half loaded up, just have to throw the little cooler in, some water, and maybe swimtrunks and a towel.

Meeting SlowPhil at the fourth reich, New Germany. Seriously.

from there we will ride up to Squirreltown. Seriously...these are real places.

We'll meet Yellowknife and the big grey pig at squirreltown, and we're going to do a loop around a few lakes on some roads I've mapped out.

We plan to cook lunch over a fire, and just enjoy the day. Hopefully get a swim in somewhere back there too.

I thought they were supposed to start with, "You're not going to believe a word of this, but I swear its all true..."