Tiffany Ambling through America

The Bay area was as welcoming as ever.
I took to non-motorised two wheels, with a wild ride through the streets of downtown San Francisco on a borrowed push bike, wearing full bike gear except for my helmet.





these particular streets were fairly quiet, because guess where we were heading???





yep, a baseball game. actually I have been instructed that the correct terminology is Major League Ball Game

the streets were closed to allow for all the pedestrians, each corner carefully watched over by the entirely un-menacing presence of these funny vehicles



what I particularly liked about them was the slogan on the side



The SF Giants stadium has an amzing backdrop, gazing out at the water and all the ships.




However most people's attention/interest seemed more taken up by not the ball game but the food and drink opportunities
I weakened (any excuse to eat) and went in search of the local speciality which turned out to be garlic fries



I was with my friend Kevin and we settled down to eat the grease whilst he coached me in the rules, the jargon and all the funny stuff that happens during the game. I now feel quite at ease with the phrases "the bases are loaded" and "top of the 8th". No home runs but a good match as the Giants beat the Chicago Cubs. Someone asked where I had ridden from on my bike and I answered Chicago- which gave the impression that I was a hardcore Cubs fan.

The route home took us past some trams, I tried to grab a lift

Well folks, I just rolled into RockyDog's place last night, to be greeted by this



He assures me he tidied up and put stuff away in preparation for my visit.
I wonder what it looked like BEFORE he knew I was coming

This is Tom (whom some of you will know), he is one of the tallest people I know and happens to live on a boat with a low ceiling.


His boat is in Sausalito and so Tom took me out for a ride to show me the more scenic areas around Marin County. Tom was on his 1200GS, which I faled to get a picture of! We headed up Mount Tamalpais (I don't even attempt to pronounce that one). Lots of twisty roads and great veiws over the Pacific, inevitably, there was fog over the Golden Gate Bridge




The next day it was time to hit the road again, as Thelma and I headed north east, into some very pretty but very sparsely populated parts of California



Yep, that's right, a population of just 35



and that looks like it was pushing things a bit when I saw how few houses there were.

Up into the mountains where I camped and got a bit chilly, I had naively worn my shorts under my leather trousers assuming I would be in desert country, how wrong I was. That night as I lay in my tent trying to sleep, my knees were incredibly cold, I had lazily only taken my tank bag off Thelma and into the tent, which meant I didn't have my pannier to hand, I delved around inside the tank bag and the only clothing I could come up with was two pairs of clean knickers (female priorities in a woman's tank bag). I managed to wrap one around each knee and amazingly it worked, my knees warmed up and I fell asleep.

The morning brought more beautiful scenery



Seemingly devoid of traffic

Result!

We headed up Mount Tamalpais (I don't even attempt to pronounce that one).

It's pronounced "Tam ul pi ass ....

For the eagle-eyed amongst you, I know there will be some questions about that last picture of Thelma..just what is that "pink thing" on her??:eek1



I can explain...on my way north I dropped in at Ozzie's BMWs in Chico, California.

http://ozziesbmwcenter.com

Ozzie is a legend, a classic grumpy German, with a heart of gold, who knows everything about airheads. We'd originally met at the BMW MOA National Rally two years ago in Redmond. He'd wandered over to take a look at Thelma, we got chatting and then he said if I was ever passing to drop in and say hello, and to ask if I needed anything.
here I was two years later, and he remembered me, he was starting to wince as I casually said "Thelma needs something". But I think he was pleasantly surprised when all I pointed out was the missing panel on the side. Up to now there has been one in the pictures as I "nicked/borrowed" one off Bill's Dad's old bike in Bill Mayer's workshop...I must confess that Bill was not there at the time.
It was time to return the panel to Bill and I asked Ozzie for a replacement. He scratched his head and then led me into the room out the back. It was like an Aladdin's cave of old BMW parts- I'm kicking myself I didn't take a picture. He poked around on various shelves until finally he unearthed a panel for me. Not only was it not quite the right colour- it was pink:eek1 and it had the WRONG numbers on it:eek1
Ozzie assured me this was the only one he had, and so I said a grateful thank you, put it on and rode off.

Looking on the positive side I see it as a way for Thelma to get in touch with her feminine side, but the numbers,,,well they are something else.

Almost daily I have had "enlightening" discussions with Yanks who are swearing blind that my bike is an R100GS and who refuse to listen when I say she's an R80GS. I know many of them walk away still not believing me. Just because it wasn't introduced into the States, it doesn't mean they don't exist. Everyone knows they kept the best BMWs for the European market

And now, to aid them in their arguments, the bloody bike has the characters R100 on it.

can't you peel those decals off. Such blasphemy 100 decals on a R80

Not a good look, don't worry, coming up is the "sorting it out" post

We'd reached cowboy country






and apparently it's cougar country too. When the bloke in the garage heard that I'd been wild camping, he told me I was mad (and no, I had NOT mentioned the knickers on knees scenario to him). He said there are lots of cougars around and that they will attack, particularly people on their own.
Oh great I thought, I'll be keeping a careful eye open for them, apparently there's not a lot you can do to protect yourself from them. I'm just hoping my helmet and jacket would be up to the job. I asked the guys at Rukka how well they think my Rukka kevlar jacket would stand up to cougar claws, they said that was a test that hadn't been tried out yet, but that they would appreciate any first hand reports back about the jacket's performance under those circumstances

Ha! I don't know if you've heard that "Cougar" could mean something totally different around here. I don't think you have to worry about that kind though!

Mudclod- I've had it explained to me, I'd heard of the TV Show but hadn't realised that was what it referred to

I've made it to Austin (as you can see the RR is still catching me up)

I popped in to see the guys at Horsepower Farm who are hosting me tomorrow, they're billing it as lunch with Tiffany Coates and are promising a big Texan Barbecue, maybe I should remind them that I'm vegetarian.
Winslow Mankin (great name) is the owner and was there to greet me when I visited, they've got a cool poster about the event which we posed next to.



I hope to see some of you tomorrow.

'Gonna be around on the 14th?

A bunch of Two Wheeled Texans are getting together for BBQ at casa Tricepilot in San Antonio (i'm sure there will be veggies around, guacomole, corn, etc), LINK.

Last year's event LINK.

It looks great, but unfortunately I won't be able to make it, as I'll be in Louisiana by then, riding and socialising with the Swamp Scooteer Boys!

Welcome to TEXAS. Austin has plenty of Veg. places to eat. Do not miss swimming at Barton Springs......

Hi FotoTex,
You'll be pleased to hear that I'd already noted about Barton Springs from your earlier post about it...and yes, I went and yes, it was great, a really refreshing dip on a hot day.
and here is the proof



For once, I had resisted the temptation to go in wearing my bike gear.

I was travelling north through small town, cougar-filled mountainous California then Oregon and into Boise Idaho because Thelma was heading for some TLC at Happy Trail at Boise, Idaho.
Here she is in the workshop with Jeff taking a close look



Her front end has never been the same since the Mongolian Episode...

stripped down



does that look straight now???



calling in the reinforcements



and hey, presto, Thelma was so much straighter (and easier to ride) than before. Huge thanks to Jeff at Happy Trail.
Meanwhile, I was upstairs, giving a talk and presentation about my travels which was a lot of fun. Thank you to Tim Bernard at Happy Trail for inviting me to give my presentation and for arranging for giving Thelma so much workshop time and parts, a big hi to all the busy people at Happy Trail and hello to Nevil from Plymouth/Canada whowas also presenting about his upcoming 2013 charity ride from my house (I kid you not) and around the world with his brother.
And also a big thanks to Tim's wife Sherri as well as they put me up at their house for a couple of days.

take a look at what Happy Trail has to offer for adventure riders

http://www.happy-trail.com/

Great ride reports. Brings back wonderful memories of my solo travels through the US, Aust, England & NZ (my homeland). Good on ya, all the best.

Neil.

Tiffany rocks, pure and simple.

Was a pleasure meeting you at Horsepower Farms in Austin! You're presentation was great. Thank you for sharing your travels with all of us!