'Merican Month at 40

This thread. Post 59. Take a good look.














And thanks again for the tape and zipties.

Chris

Sweet Trip Chris. Have a fun and safe ride!

Chris,
You & your Esposa look so Happy in all of these pics
Thats's priceless.
My wife WILL NOT ride, But I gotta get out there hopefully next year

After turning around on the Mosquito Pass road, I headed down to Buena Vista to the campground where WestFest was held last year.

There are some cool old vehicles in Buena Vista.



They prepared a special parking space for me in town.


I was going to take a campsite in the trees on the upper level of the campground, but I was offered a yurt for just a few dollars more. Since it was basically raining sideways while I was standing at the counter deciding, it was a pretty quick decision.

The yurt is pretty cool. It has a queen-size bed and a set of bunkbeds. I would not be surprised to find out that I was the first guest in this thing. It was that new.









Colorado weather can be very interesting.
These four photos were taken moments apart. I took one, turned 180 degrees and took another, turned to the side and took another, then another 180 for the final click.








I woke up from a restful night in the yurt, checked out and headed for Independence Pass.

I spied this on the way.


Up and over the pass.






I stopped in Aspen for lunch, then made a run out to an auto-parts store to get a test light because my lights had been acting up for a few days.

I saw this while I was out and about.


I got back to Aspen and ended up in a National Forest campground outside of town.








The next morning -- Saturday, July 10 -- I checked connections enough to satisfy myself pretty well that it wasn't the wiring. By this time, the lights, which had been coming on sometimes, were not coming on at all. No headlights, brake light, tail light, turn signals, instrument lights or horn. Obviously, it was something pretty early in the electrical flow to take out all of that.:eek1 What? (I posted a plea for help in GSpot here and got some responses that, at least, helped me muddle through what some potential issues it might be.) I decided to have a dealer's tech look at it.

I headed west -- with no lights.

Stay tuned,
Chris

Good luck with the lights.

And thanks for the pics of cool old iron - I love me some old wheels.
You got me drooling over the old Jeep that's for sale.

Stay safe and have fun!

With no lights, I headed out of Difficult Campground for the dealer in Grand Junction -- after I realized that there was a dealer in Grand Junction.

After a -- shall we say -- spirited run west on I-70, I rolled into the dealer's lot about 40 minutes before the Saturday closing time. I told the service writer what was going on and that I suspected a fuse or relay. A tech did some quick tests. No joy. They put it back together for me, and I got a motel room down the street. The tech would tackle it again Monday morning.

I cooled my heels for a hot Sunday. That was okay. I had been going pretty hard for a more than two weeks, so some down time was actually a good thing.

I parked the bike where I could keep an eye on it out the peephole and relaxed.


A little storm rolled in, and the sky looked pretty cool during and after.










Monday morning, I headed back to the dealer and -- long story short -- was on my way west again after they replaced the relay in the underseat fusebox.

Lunch was tasty.


The cheese.


I quickly tired of I-70 and turned onto a US highway. Since I had decided to check out the BMW Motorcycle Owners of America rally in Redmond, Oregon, I headed north.







While cruising along the interstate, I glanced down to check my speed. The GPS receiver displayed an interstatey speed , but the speedometer itself was parked on the goose egg. Oh, well. I'll fix that when I get home. I took a pic and made a note for maintenance/accurate records.

At a fuel stop, I noticed a display sign for Nine Mile Canyon. It sounded interesting, my tank was full and I had supper in the saddlebags. I headed up the canyon. (The name does not refer to its length, BTW.)

Rewind looks so clean in this shot. She's not, but she looks it.




The road turned into a hardpacked, fast dirt one.


It was getting late in the day, and I spied a little campground. I rented a spot from this gentleman, Ben, in his campground. He was repairing a fence when I rolled up.




I had the whole place to myself.

I hung my hammock and tarp, cooked some supper, and had a great night of sleep. (The tarp is still stowed in its mesh bag on the ridgeline string in this shot.)






In the night, I got up and staked out the tarp. It got a little chilly. It was a little under 7000 feet.


That brings this report to Tuesday, July 13. Next, we'll look at some of what Nine Mile Canyon has to offer.

Stay tuned,
Chris

Nine Mile Canyon is beautiful.

I was still stopping. A lot. There was a lot to see.








I came to an intersection and, basically, took a wrong turn that took me out of Nine Mile Canyon itself. I had been descending in elevation as I traveled through Nine Mile Canyon. The turn had me clibing again, toward a cold desert environment. There was a relative lot of traffic -- trucks of various sizes headed to the petroleum-production sites, mostly. My route was ruggedly beautiful.




Nine Mile Canyon is on my list of places to visit again. I really only stopped at one ancient art site, so I'll be back to see the rest one of these years.
By the time I was leaving the Nine Mile Canyon area, I had a destination in mind. The BMW Motorcycle Owners of America rally was scheduled for the weekend, so I decided to head there.

I started working my way north and west.

This part of Utah is very different from areas down in the more southern part of the state.


I spent most of the afternoon blasting along on the interstate.


I moteled it just outside Boise.
The next morning I continued to work my way north and west, then more west.

I had been having some headaches from my muffler. It had it cut the rivets that hold it together twice on this trip, and I had popped new rivets in it. The problem was that the holes were wallowed out, and a 2"x4" section had blown out. I kept my eye out for a muffler shop after I got off the interstate. I figured that a chop saw and a drill would solve my problem. It did, at this little shop in Notus, Idaho.


About three inches chopped off of it allowed me to drill some fresh holes for the rivets.
With a quieter bike, I continued on.


I had a wet burrito in Vale, Oregon, a town with some Oregon Trail history.




I was happy to be off the interstate. US26 is a fun road with some interesting sights along the way.

I wonder how business is?:eek1


I think that old WDX-WM Power Wagons are incredibly cool, and it was interesting seeing this one still at work.






Time to check out of this little mom-n-pop motel in Montana and hit the road again.

Stay tuned,
Chris

One of my posts didn't make it -- bad Internet connection this morning -- so this one is a little out of order.

Rewind. (You're probably just looking at the pictures anyway. ) There's a little duplication. Sorry about that.

I woke up Tuesday morning after a great night of sleep. (I really think that I'm getting the hang of hanging this hammock.) I packed up and hit the road at about 7:30.


About an hour later, I had gone about 10 miles. I kept stopping to take photos.:laugh:




These carvings are from about 1,000 years ago.




A couple of years ago on another ride (there's a report on here ), I went up Thompson Canyon in Utah and saw some petroglyphs. It was cool. In among the carvings that spanned thousands of years was a name from the 1880s.


I wondered if the name under the 1884 was Gay Whipple with a G or Cay Whipple.
Since these sites aren't all that far apart, I wonder if I have my answer?

Anyway ...















Okay, I really need to get back on the road now.

Stay tuned,
Chris

Really enjoying this RR Chris.

This gent favors Chuck "from my cold dead hands" Heston.

https://land.smugmug.com/Motorcycles/2010-Summer-trip-gallery-2/DSC1103/936325311_qvguv-L.jpg



My Uncle has three of them that he uses for various jobs. Mostly hauling and plowing snow. He is always looking for another. Awesome trip.

Your report Chris, is the only reason why I turned on my computer this evening after a bad day at work, thanks for the up lift!

And I wonder if you had a GS-911 if you could have DX your relay problem yourself.

Thanks, Howard. That makes me feel great. I'm sorry that you had a rough day, though.

And that reminds me: Thanks to all of you for the feedback. It's nice to know that someone is getting something from all of this typing.

I wondered that, too. I think that I'll be hitting up a certain German feller that we know and love when I get back to run some sample failures with his GS-911.

Chris

He must be a cool uncle.

Chris

Chris,
You know you're always welcome to use the GS-911 any time - but I'm not the only one that has one...
I have the Professional version though, which means no worries about running out of VINs and I don't know if the other person has that.

Anyway, I which I would have remembered to offer it to you prior to your trip - but sorry brainfart on my end...

I do need to hang out with you more and get some of your outlook on life.
Why?
Well, when I was reading about about your lighting issues and the fact that the mechanic checked it out on Sat. and found no issues with fuses or relays; then has you stay over only to tell you that it was a fuse afterall you did NOT mention a "wasted" hotel stay...nope you mentioned how great it was to slow down. I need to be able to see the positive side of things more. So thanks for making me realize that I need to smell the flowers and not worry about getting somewhere now.

Keep safe, have fun and keep posting.

Wednesday evening (July 14), I arrived at the Ochoco Divide Campground in the Ochoco National Forest in Oregon and picked a place to hang. The elevation there is about 4700 feet.




I cooked a very simple supper. Why is it, though, that a can of chili beans heated over a fire is such good eatin'?


Coming back from the necessary room the next morning, I was again impressed by how stealthy the SuperFly tarp is. See it?




Of course, that big yella motorsickle makes it hard to be truly stealthy.


Thursday afternoon, I arrived at Redmond, OR, at the big annual rally for the BMW Motorcycle Owners of America. The rally was at a fairgrounds, and there aren't a lot of trees from which to choose.:huh I found a nice little spot, though.


I set up my Warbonnet Blackbird hammock and SuperFly tarp for sleeping, and I also put up my ENO Doublenest hammock as a gear shelf/counter/lounging area.


There were 6,109 people at the rally:eek1 , and there were thousands of tents. There may have been another hammock, but I didn't see it.

Thursday evening and Friday morning, I visited the vendors and kind of soaked up the atmosphere since it was my first BMWMOA rally.


I really enjoyed the vintage motorcycle display.








https://land.smugmug.com/Motorcycles/2010-Summer-trip-gallery-2/BMW-
MOA-Rally-Redmond-OR-023/938186087_qER8R-M.jpg

Friday afternoon, I went for a nice ride of about 250 miles, then came back and watched the sun slip behind the Cascades.






There was good music Friday night. If you get a chance to catch a show by Paul Thorn, do it. Very entertaining.
My favorite song was "I Don't Like Half the Folks I Love."

Saturday morning, I entered my bike in an "anti-concours." The bikes were all GS bikes -- of all engine configurations, not just the R bikes. The idea was that the dirtier the bike and the more useful aftermarket stuff it had, the better. If the bike was too clean, it was supposed to get one of these stickers:


I stress "supposed to" because there were some really clean bikes that not only didn't get one of them, several of them won awards!

During the judging, I overheard one of the judges -- who I am pretty sure is an inmate here -- call my bike a street bike and say that "he bought it because he doesn't want to clean an RT." I called him on it -- or tried to, because the guy who I'm pretty sure said it made himself scarce when I spoke up.

Anyway, I didn't win anything , but all participants got a t-shirt and a hat, and that's what I was there for.

There were lots of entries. My bike is in there. I doubt that you can find it. I barely can, and I know where to look.


A judge who I do know is an inmate here, Striking Viking (he judged the Airheads with Helge Pedersen), posed for a photo with me.


It's a little easier to see my bike in this photo. Look a little beyond the bottle used to bribe the judges.


I also didn't win the 2010 BMW F800GS or any of the other huge prizes given away at the closing ceremonies , but I was delighted to learn that the oldest rider to the rally was 90. I love the idea of 50 more years of riding.

Stay tuned,
Chris

Sunday, July 18, I packed up the bike and hit the road again.

I was trying to contact a dear friend from college who lives in Vancouver, WA, with her husband and two kids. We played phone tag for a while, and while we were doing that, I did a little bit of exploring on some Oregon logging roads not too terribly far from Crater Lake.

The bike grew some fur on the seat and gained a few pounds at the rally. My bank account groaned.


Umm ...:eek1
















That last shot is from where I turned around. My fuel was getting low, and I didn't want to have to harness those huge mosquitos that were flying around me to pull me out to a gas station if I ran out -- but I don't doubt that they could do it!:eek1




I got back onto the ass-a-phalt, talked with my friend, tanked up and started heading to Vancouver, WA.

Stay tuned,
Chris

great report as always Chris

Looks like an ex-military M100 trailer to me that's been demilled (tailgate added, taillamps changed). THe M101 US was a bigger trailer and the M101-Canadian looked different. Most of the civilian trailers of the same era (witht eh full float axles and all) had stake pockets.

I've looked into the quarter ton trailers a lot, I own a Vietnam era M416.

You're correct, of course. I meant M100. And I have one, so I have no excuse! Or can I use the fact that I also have an M101 three-quarter ton as an excuse?

Thanks for reading the thread -- and for keeping me straight.

Chris

Thanks, Marshall.