Salem/Keizer/Albany/Jefferson Meet-ups

For sure need to get some rides planned, while the weather is still great.
As far as gear goes basically wear the level of protection that makes you comfortable. I wear tourmaster brand touring type gear. Textile pants and a textile Transition 3 jacket, with some cheap leather gloves and a pair of my old army boots. I took a little fall this last weekend up around the Tillamook state Forest area going downhill on a deep gravel road. I just ended up with a sore shoulder, bruised foot and a bruised hand. So I went out and got some gloves with knuckle protection, still debating real off road boots, oh and my helmet got some gouges so I bought a new one of those.
The way I look at it, it's not if your going to go down it's when. But there were dudes with a lot more off-road experience than me just wearing jeans and a jacket this last weekend.

Btw, I'm still pretty new to off road riding myself. All of my 15 years or so of riding experience was road race and on the track with a sport bike. I'm slowly but surely realizing the difference in skill sets between the two, road and off road, types of riding are almost exactly opposite from each other.

I am basically trying to prepare for the when - I dont have any stiff over the ankle boots but I do have some thicker pants similar to carhartts. Plus I know for myself having the right gear is more motivation and does make me more comfortable in trying new things. Not crazy things, just new.

Awesome! I have only had one chance to explore offroad so far and its a blast. Seems they would be very different. Letting the bike wobble and wiggle off road and then maintaining precise control on the track.

Edgy & I did an all day venture last Saturday, ignoring the threatening prediction for extreme thunderstorms, torrential downpours, & quarter sized hail. Trailered the bikes over to Sisters & rode into Three creek lake, then took unimproved USFS road 370 to Todd lake (just off Century drive near Mt Bachelor). Headed South on Century drive to Cultus lake for fuel, as Edgy's new ride has a minimal 2 gallon tank. After a quick lunch of healthy fries & beer we motored from Cultus to Little Cultus lake & then took the sweet unimproved road 800 past Irish & Taylor lakes. No rain, but we could hear thunder in the distance.......
At the intersection of 800 & 514, we turned right onto 514 to Taylor burn campground. About a mile in, we noticed some odd large white discs on the ground. Stopped to investigate & found this -
Edgy instantly identified them as "alien spores", but on closer examination it was hail. BIG, quarter sized hail. Now in other parts of the country this may be miniscule, but it's the largest I have ever seen in Oregon. Thankfully it hit before we arrived.
Continuing on to Taylor burn CG, we stopped to check it out, then retraced our ride to the intersection of 800 & 514. Turned right onto 514 to Waldo lake. Made our way back to Century drive & stopped @ Elk lake for more fuel (don't bother, they only sell gas for boats there, much to Edgy's dismay). the guy at the lodge said that about 10 min before we arrived there was a HUGE downpour & they had a 6" deep river of water running past the lodge. We saw none of it.
Hopped back onto Century drive & slabbed it into Bend for gas & dinner, then back to the car in Sisters.. Very slight drizzle for a few miles, but we never did get really wet the entire day. Lucky.

Love that 370 old road. Another Wilderness Border favorite.
Howdooya like those BIG-ASS sandy waterbars ?
Try 'em onna loaded 990

But 800? Must now find ....although mighta been part of OBDR Route 3?
BTW, are you sure somebody didn't just dump their cooler before you got there?

Anybody up for a day ride this coming up Sunday? I was thinking of heading up around the Detroit area or Snow Peak, basically just some exploring and trail riding.

What time are you thinking about going?

Probably 10 or 11 AM. Just planning on a few hour ride nothing crazy.

Possibly in for Sunday, assuming I don't have too many left over pieces when I am finished with my carburetor overhaul......

A group of us from the Salem area did a 2-day adventure recently... We travel to Astoria and avoided pavement as much as possible. Then travelled Hwy 101 home. It was a blast. Here's the video. Hope you enjoy.

http://youtu.be/QbVZeJCaGp0

Spent Labor day weekend riding around the pennisula. Rode around Cushman Lake and up to Franklin Pass...no pics...On the second day I went to Port Gamble...




Then went to Clallam Bay, no pics...Forks, no vampires or werewolves...or pics. Then went to the Hoh rain forest...again no pics. Stopped for fuel at Kalaloch Lodge near Queets...




After that had to check out the "Worlds Largest Spruce Tree" along the shores of Lake Quinault...



I spent about 2 hours looking for "Mossquatch," at this point it too is more legend than fact...Google it, it's a thing.


Spent the night at Ocean Shores...no food pics...The next day blasted down 101 to Cathlamet saw the Mississippi Queen....




It was a fun 3 day mostly pavement ride, lots of little detours and hit highway 112 from Port Angeles to Clallam Bay....twisty road...a must do...


dasvis and I are thinking of doing the duel sport event later this month at Diamond Lake...anyone else up for?

I wanted to get in another long ride before monsoon season set in, so decided to go to Steens MTN in SE Oregon. After a slabbing it to Burns for the night, and gorging on 7.95 steak and eggs at the Apple Peddler, headed out. The road out of Frenchglen is thick gravel, no fun, but when you get to BLM land the road is high speed hard dirt.




Heres a shot of Krieger Gorge...


I could not do the "loop" due to the road being washed out five miles past this sign...




Looking east from near the summit...




Looking down from the same vantage point...




This is from the closest you can get to the summit...at least without hiking



And finally near the same place...when I stopped, it was to snap a picture of a antelope, but it bounded away before that happened.

Some of you may already know this, but the very end of the dirt road branching right off Evans Mtn. Road (Little North Fork of the Santiam) has been tank-trapped with a vengeance at the top and is not passable.
It may still be possible to enter the area via the Rhody Lake, Panther Rock direction, but have not tried that yet......

Any update on this? That little secret bypass was a favorite connector of mine... We've ridden through there numorous times and out past Rhody Lake towards Scotts Mills or Molalla.
Any chance a single track route could be created to keep that link there? I guess I need to ride up there and check it out...

For what it's worth, a small group of us are going to ride up to Monument Peak this Saturday (1-25-14)... and explore from there. We'll be meeting where the gravel starts near the horse staging area, probably around 10-1030am... I think it's where Gates School Rd and Monument Peak Road meet.

Just rode south from Mill City up to Tom Rock, then High Rock (over looking Thomas Creek) today on March 13th. We rode through a couple of minor slush patches. Last year, we couldn't get up to High Rock until May 2, and I considered that to be a light snow year..............

Great news for early riding this year!

Does this mean your up for a ride tomorrow?

Can't tomorrow.

This is kinda cool - last week while we were at High Rock looking down into the Thomas Creek drainage my riding buddy spotted movement on a logging road about 2,000 ft away.
All we could see were small dots, so I put my point'n'shoot on full optical telephoto and took a shot.
We thought they were deer until I got home and looked at the photo on my laptop - a cougar female and 3 kits !!

Just traded in my '08 WR250R for an '04 plated KTM 200EXC, and got some cash back too :)
It turned out that I was doing very little slabbing (0 - 8 miles), and spent most of my time on gravel & trails. So, I thought I'd give this bad boy a try - it's 60 lbs lighter than my WR :)

Sweet little ride, I just downsized myself. I went from a '06 KLR to a '14 CRF250L. I haven't even managed to get the tires muddy yet due to being gone on vacation.