A BC Buell goes South

I woke up early and the sun was shining through the hotel window. I went out to load the bike, and the sun was still shining, but there were lots of ominous looking clouds……. and it was cold out.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comfficeffice" /><o></o>
I was on the road by 6:30 AM, heading West. As I got close to Jasper, it was nice to see the hills that meant I was close to home.<o></o>
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I rode through Jasper National Park and into BC.<o></o>
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It was cloudy, so thanks Google<o></o>
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I stopped at the Mount Robson gas station to top up, but it was closed. I put fuel in from my spare gas can as a young couple from the NWT pulled in. They seemed quite frantic, and he kept on looking at his watch. The sign said they opened at 8, and he said it was 5 after 8. I asked him if he had changed his watch to BC time. I told him Valemount was only half an hour away, and he seemed less than happy about that. Turns out he was out of cigarettes…………<o></o>
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I rode into Prince George and stopped at the Harley Shop to see if they could order me a Throttle Position Sensor (I am getting a bit of surging and very occasional stumbling at low speed. TPS reset cures it for a while) but they were back ordered. About 4 week delivery. Oh well, it’s not a big deal….. yet……<o></o>
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Outside I met a couple of guys on BMW GS type bikes from Sacramento heading for Inuvik. I BS’d with them for a while, and headed the last 140 kms towards home. The Buell seemed to really eat up the last of the miles, but I guess after 25 plus thousand kilometers, distances are relative………..<o></o>
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We hadn’t told the kids I was close to home, and it was shortly after noon, so I stopped at their school hoping to catch them on their lunch break. I just missed them, so I headed to the house.<o></o>
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I pulled in the yard, and the dogs went nuts. My newfoundland dog nearly knocked me and the bike over. Wouldn’t that be great, not one get off the whole trip, and then get knocked over by my dog in my yard. But, I kept it up, got off the bike and played with the dogs for a bit, then hugged my wife for a while.<o></o>
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I was home.<o></o>

I had an awesome journey, and I would like to thank everyone for following along and thank all the people who commented on my Ride Report. Every day I looked forward to reading the comments you made.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comfficeffice" /><o></o>
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I tried to answer all comments, but if I missed any, I apologize. J <o></o>
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I would also like to thank the inmates I met along the way, the ones who gave me a hand, or invited me for a place to stay, or visit. I met a lot of great people on the way, inmates and others. Really, that’s what it’s all about.<o></o>
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I will soon start planning my fall adventure. I am not sure yet what that will look like, or if I will add to this RR or start another. I will post at the time to let you all know.<o></o>
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Again, thank you all<o></o>

Brian, i have followed you through this RR with great interest, partly as a Buell owner, partly as someone who has enjoyed every post with the way you write in a nice easy style. I will miss the daily read.

Glad you are home safe :)

Thanks, Neil

Great RR! Thanks for taking us along.
Bill.

Agreed. Thanks for the opportunity to ride along.

Trev.

I enjoyed every word and every picture.

Thanks

Congrats on an incredible and successful ride!!!

You've seen stuff that very few others have seen, and you looked like you were having a great time doing it!

As others have said, thanks for taking the time to post and thanks for taking the time to respond to all the comments!

I'm looking forward to your next adventure!

Glad you arrived home safe! Gotta watch out for those crazy dogs!

Like everyone else, I'm looking forward to reading about more of your adventures - this was a great ride report.

Your family gets a lot of cheers for all their work in this adventure too!

Enjoy the summer!

Great report Brian, thanks for taking the time.

Great RR Brian. I was another inmate enjoying your writing in silence. Looking forward to your next adventure!

Great ride and great ride report, Brian. I'm glad you are home safe and sound.

Brian, I really enjoyed your RR. I know it's time consuming, but being able to "ride" vicariously through others sure is enjoyable. I enjoyed your pics and commentary and always looked forward to the new posts. Glad you're home safe and look forward to more in the future.
Bob

Found your RR a few weeks ago on a rainy Sunday morning (been hav'n lots of those here on the coast). Took me a few hours of reading to catch up to you. Enjoyed every minute of it, great photos also. Glad to hear you made it home safe and sound.
Enjoy your Father's Day.
Looknig forward to your next RR.

Steve.

Thanks for all the “congratulations on finding home” type comments.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comfficeffice" /><o></o>
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I would answer each and every one of them……..<o></o>
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but……<o></o>
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well……..<o></o>
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you know……. J<o></o>
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I think I said in one of my early posts that I was keeping a spreadsheet of costs.<o></o>
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Here is a breakdown of costs etc. I am not an accountant , or very anal, so everything is relatively close. I kept track of what I spent every day, rounding off to the closest dollar, peso, quetzal, whatever. Then converted to Canadian dollars with about what the conversion was, then rounded that to the nearest dollar (eg if supper was 63.50 pesos, and the conversion was 13.25, I would divide 63 by 13 to get $4.85, then mark down $5 in my book) Not exact, but close enough for what I wanted.<o></o>
The costs I tracked are living costs. Fuel, food, hotels etc. day to day expenses. Not included are maintenance costs, duties, import fees ,ferries, purchases that are not daily expenses (I bought a jacket, a new computer, tires etc)<o></o>
With every bank withdrawal or Visa transaction, there were bank fees associated with them. I did not track theses, so actual cost would be a bit more with these fees taken into consideration. <o></o>
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Total kilometers 25,488<o></o>
Days travelling 109<o></o>
Canadian $$ spent $6,868<o></o>
Cost per day $63.01<o></o>
Cost per 100 kms $26.95<o></o>
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Gas $1,478<o></o>
Food $1,230 <o></o>
Cigarettes $496 (Yes I smoked. I quit when I got back to Canada . Too expensive!<o></o>
Hotels $2,715<o></o>
Camping $165<o></o>
Laundry $30 I took advantage of free laundry when possible. I stunk lots, too.<o></o>
Misc $755 Includes museums, tolls, bribes, having fun, language school etc. <o></o>
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I broke it down by Country<o></o>
USA<o></o>
Total kilometers 8,650<o></o>
Days 26<o></o>
Canadian $$ spent $2,183<o></o>
Cost per day $83.98<o></o>
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Cost per 100 kms $25.24<o></o>
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Mexico/Guatemala<o></o>
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Total kilometers 7,637<o></o>
Days 63<o></o>
Canadian $$ spent $2,941<o></o>
Cost per day $46.68<o></o>
Cost per 100 kms $38.51<o></o>
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Canada<o></o>
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Total kilometers 9,201<o></o>
Days 20<o></o>
Canadian $$ spent $1744<o></o>
Cost per day $87<o></o>
Cost per 100 kms $18.95<o></o>
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I am not much of a drinker anymore, so I spent very little on that. (the most I spent on beer was in Texas at the rally)<o></o>
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I believe I could have done it quite a bit cheaper. You can’t do much with gas prices, but, in Mexico, once I found a room in my price range, I stopped looking. There were cheaper hotels out there, and not hard to find. I could have camped more, especially in the US and Canada where hotel prices were a lot higher. Once I got to Canada the weather was a lot cooler and wetter. I have never been accused of being a “fair weather rider” but I may fall into the “fair weather camper” category. J<o></o>
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I ate at a lot of taco stand type places, and restaurants, but could have bought more food to prepare and saved money.<o></o>
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I wasn’t out to do this trip as cheap as I could, just to do it affordably.<o></o>
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As you can see, once I got to the USA and started to put on more miles, my per day costs went up, but dollars per kilometer went down, even though hotels (and in Canada, gas)cost more<o></o>
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I do have more detail by country and costs of ferries, tires and other stuff. <o></o>
Anyone wanting more detail, feel free to ask on here or PM me.<o></o>
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I did not track MPG or liters per 100 kilometer, but it went down once I got to the land of good highways and could go faster J<o></o>
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I was in 4 countries, 10 provinces, 16 US States (I counted Illinois, but was only there for about 2 minutes) and 12 Mexican States<o></o>

Nice ride Brian. Good to hear you are back.

The cost breakdown is more than excellent, Brian. It will be very helpful to me when I begin my trip.
Thankyou ever so much! Excellent RR
Toad

I have been having a great time being home, playing with the kids, the dogs, the wife (hehe)

I have been busier than heck with having fun, built the kids a minibike/quad track. the boy is rocking the minibike and it looks like he is about ready for somethng bigger.The girls are rocking the miniquad and building confidence on the minibike.

I finally got some time to spend some time online, catch up on the RRs I have been following, and get back to the people who have been good enough to comment on my RR (OK, I can't sleep and there is nothing on TV)

Thanks for reading and I am glad you enjoyed what I had to say.
I dunno about my writing style.... people who know me say I write like I talk, which I guess is a good thing. My High School english teacher didn't seem to think so, but what does she know LOL

Thanks Bill. I am glad you followed along, and I hope you keep on reading in the fall for the next chapter.

And, again, thanks for following. I had lots of fun doing it, and I am glad you enjoyed it

Thanks Hoppalong.
I took about a bazillion pictures and shared the ones I liked the most. I am glad I bought a decent (for a beginner like me) camera. It was money well spent.