This has been a busy week, and lots of good things are happening. We’re having rain all over, and even thunder, lightning, and hail, but things are happening!
For starters, our good buddies at Janus Motorcycles made the New York Times in yesterday’s edition. You can read the story here. Folks, from a public relations perspective, it just doesn’t get any better than getting a story in the New York Times. It’s a tremendous accomplishment, especially when considered in light of the fact that the story spoke so very well of Janus and their team. I enjoyed the Baja ride with Devin and Jordan tremendously, and it’s good to see these guys doing well. Wow. The New York Times. I am impressed!
Devin Biek and Richard Worsham, the Janus founders. I rode Baja with Devin. Richard rode a Janus across the United States.
Next up: The CSC guys are in the middle of their Moab get-together, and following the photos on Facebook, it looks like they are having a hell of a good time. Good for them! CSC does more rides with their customers than any motorcycle company I know, and that’s a good thing. They’re out there offering test rides on the new San Gabriel and the RX4, too. Cool stuff.
And a few more developments…we’ve now got a page indexing our more memorable adventure rides, and it’s appropriately titled Epic Motorcycle Rides. Click on the link to take a look. We’ve covered past rides on the ExNotes blog, and this new page provides a convenient index to all our rides in one easy spot. The Janus run, the Enfield run, the Three Flags Classic, the 150cc Mustang run down to Cabo, motorcycle racing in Baja, videos from the different rides, and more. It’s all on Epic Motorcycle Rides!
We’ve got a lot of new stuff coming your way, folks. I’ve been playing with some cast bullet loads in the 1903 Springfield and we’ll have a piece on it soon. We’ve got more motorcycle stories queued up, including one about running the KLRs through Baja. We’ve got two new Facebook groups launched…one is the Crappy Old Motorcycle Association (or COMA, for short), and the other is Guns and Ammo, each with a focus on just what their names imply. And of course, we have our Facebook ExhaustNotes page. We’d like you to sign up on all three…hey, we all could use more Facebook in our lives!
One more thing…please consider signing up for the blog’s email updates. You might win a copy of Destinations at the end of this quarter if you do!
When I retired from CSC, I was a bit nervous about walking away from the CSC blog. I need not have been…the CSC blog is doing well and the writing in it is first class. I think it’s better than when I wrote it, and the credit for that goes to Randy Reek (the blog’s author) and Steve Seidner (CSC’s President and CEO). CSC has an owner’s group riding event this weekend in Moab, and I’m looking forward to reading the CSC blog posts about it.
There’s a lot going on at CSC, not the least of which is the new line of electric motorcycles, the upcoming release of the new RX4, and the continuing success of the TT250 and San Gabriel lines. The new San Gabriels have a new headlight and instrument pod, a rear disk brake, and new colors (the black is stunning).
At $2195 for either the TT250 or the San Gabriel (and CSC’s warranty and tech support), these are unquestionably the best motorcycle values in America. CSC is bringing a new electric scooter to America, too…the Wiz.
Cool stuff. Stop by their site (www.CSCMotorcycles.com) and check out what CSC has to offer. It’s a cool place and you’ll like it.
Brrrrr. It was cold that day! That’s Devin Biek on the left, one of the two Janus founders (Richard Worsham is the other one). The guy on the right is Jordan Swartzendruber, the Janus video and photo guy.
Yep, you read it right. This is a blog about a blog about a blog. The blog I’m referring to is this one, which is on the Janus Motorcycles site…
With my permission, the good guys at Janus Motorcycles reprinted one of the blogs I did on the Baja trip. It’s cool. I especially like the way they selected and highlighted quotes throughout the piece…
Cool. So this blog? It’s about the Janus blog, which is about the ExNotes blog. A blog about a blog about a blog. I love it! Incidentally, if you want to get to the Janus blog, it’s right here.
And check out this latest video from Janus…it has more than a few scenes from the Baja ride…
I’ve got a few good buddies who are living legends, and you’ve heard me talk about some of them in the past: Guys like Jeff Beatty (US Army Ranger, Delta Force, FBI HRT, and CIA CTC), Steve Seidner (founder and president of CSC Motorcycles), and our very own Joe Gresh (purveyor of the human condition and writer extraordinaire). One of the guys you haven’t heard me mention yet is good buddy Chuck Johnson…
Good buddy Chuck Johnson, an all around great guy.
Chuck is a retired US Marine Corps senior NCO, and when he wrapped up his career with the Marines, he immediately joined the Sheriff’s Department and he had a stellar career there. I’ve known Chuck for a few years, but something I learned about him recently was a real surprise. Chuck and I were chatting at the rifle range a few weeks ago (he’s the Range Master there) and I commented that with the things he’s seen and done he could write a book.
“Well, I did write a book,” Chuck answered. You could have knocked me over with a feather. Folks who write books are not people I get to meet every day. Who knew? I immediately asked Chuck for the title and where I could buy a copy. Chuck told me, I ordered a copy that day, and I couldn’t put it down after Amazon delivered my copy of Target…Cop.
We’ve done “A Tale of Two Guns” pieces before here on the ExNotes blog, and we’ve specifically done a “Tale of Two .45s.” That earlier piece was on the Rock Island Compact 1911 and a Smith and Wesson Model 625. The Rock Island Compact has become my favorite handgun and it’s the one I shoot most often. I wondered: How much accuracy am I giving up by shooting a snubbie 1911?
When I call the Compact a snubbie, I’m referring to the fact that it has a shorter barrel. You know, a standard Government Model 1911 has a 5-inch barrel, and the Rock Island Compact has a 3.5-inch barrel. There’s nothing inherently more or less accurate about a shorter versus longer barrel. What could make an accuracy difference, though, is the sight radius (the distance between the front and rear sights). The longer barrel 1911 has a longer sight radius, and that theoretically should make it more accurate.
A Colt bright stainless steel full-sized 1911 Government Model, along with a box of reloaded .45 ACP ammo. The standard 1911 barrel length is 5 inches, and that’s what this handgun has. This particular 1911 has been extensively customized, with a view toward extreme reliability.The Rock Island Compact 1911. This inexpensive .45 auto has a 3.5-inch barrel. It’s become my favorite handgun.
I was taught to shoot the 1911 by one of the best. Command Sergeant Major Emory L. Hickman, a US Army Marksmanship Training Unit NCO, taught me the basics (you can read about that here). I’ve been shooting the .45 since 1973, and I’ve been reloading ammo for it about that long, too. I used to be pretty good, but I’ve slowed down a bit. Hey, speaking of that…here’s a video of me playing around at the range with the Colt bright stainless .45 auto…
The video above is real time…it’s not been modified from the video that came straight out of the camera. But I couldn’t leave it alone. My choices were to spend about a zillion hours on the range and maybe shoot up another zillion dollars of ammo to get really good, or to just use my video editing software to have a little fun. I went for Door No. 2…
Okay, enough goofing around. Let’s get serious, and get to the real topic of this blog. I went to the range with the two 1911s shown above with two objectives in mind. I wanted to test different loads to see which was the most accurate in each gun, and I wanted to see if there really was a difference in accuracy between a standard size 1911 and the Compact.
I brought along different loads with two different propellants (Unique and Bullseye) and several different bullets (a 230-grain moly-coated roundnose, a 230-grain plated roundnose, a 200-grain plated roundnose, and a 200-grain cast semi-wadcutter). I fired all groups at 50 feet from a two-hand-hold, bench-rest position. All groups were 5-shot groups. I then measured the groups and took the average group size for each load.
Different .45 ACP bullet configurations. From left to right: A 200-grain roundnose plated bullet, a 200-grain cast lead semi-wadcutter bullet, and a 230-grain moly coated cast bullet.
I know that using a hand-held approach as I did is not the way to eliminate all variability except that due to the gun and the load, and my inability to hold the gun completely steady was a significant contributor to the size of the groups I shot. A better approach would have been to use a machine rest (you know, the deal where you bolt the gun into a rigidly mounted support), but like my good buddy Rummy used to say, you go to war with the Army you have. I don’t have a machine rest, so all you get is me.
Because I introduced so much variability into this accuracy assessment, I thought I would throw out the largest group for each combination of load and gun, and take the average of the four best groups. I did that, and then I did it again by throwing out the two largest groups for each combination of load and gun. Doing so predictably made the averages smaller, but the relative ranking of the different loads from an accuracy perspective pretty much stayed the same. That’s good to know.
Before I get into the results, let me tell you a bit about the two handguns. The Compact 1911 is a stock handgun, as delivered from the factory, with the exception of a Klonimus extractor (which I installed because the factory extractor failed after about 1000 rounds). The Colt has been extensively customized by my gunsmith (TJ’s Custom Gunworks in Redondo Beach), with a view toward 100% reliability with any ammo. That handgun is probably worth $2500 as it sits now. The Compact 1911 can be had for a little over $400.
Okay, that’s enough background. Let’s get to the bottom line…
Interesting stuff, to be sure. Most of the variability you see in the above table (and you can see that there’s a lot) was me. A machine rest would have provided for better groups, but you get what you get, and what you get here is me.
As I expected, the 5-inch 1911 is a bit more accurate than the Compact. The best average group with the full size Colt 1911 was 2.018 inches. The best average group with the Compact was 2.851 inches. Okay, so at 50 feet that’s 8/10 of an inch difference, and as they say, that’s close enough for government work. What was surprising was how accurate the Compact is. You really don’t give up much in accuracy between the two guns. And, look at the last row of the above table. I fired one group with the Compact (and what is now my preferred load) that hung right in there with the Government Model. More on that in a second.
In the Rock Island 1911, the 230-grain moly bullet was the most accurate load I tested. After I did the five groups to get an average group size, I fired one more group with this load in the Compact and it was a scant 2.083 inches. Yeah, this gun is accurate enough.
In the Colt, the most accurate load was with the 200-grain semi-wadcutter bullets over 6.0 grains of Unique. This load fed flawlessly in both the Rock Island Compact and the Colt. My Colt has been throated to feed semi-wadcutter bullets; the Rock Island has not been (usually, a 1911 requires that the feed ramp be opened up and polished, or throated as we say, to feed semi-wadcutter bullets). But the 200-grain semi-wadcutter load failed to eject twice in the Compact. The Compact is fussy about ejection, and the two failures convinced me that this load won’t work reliably in the Rock Island without additional work. For now, I’m sticking with the 230-grain roundnose load. It’s completely reliable for both feeding and ejection.
You’ll notice that one of the Government Model five-shot groups with the 230-grain moly coated bullet and 5.8 grains of Unique was a tight 0.960 inches. The bottom line is that this load is a good one. Yeah, the other groups with that load were larger: It’s that shooter variability thing again. Both the Compact and the Colt are capable of greater accuracy than what I could do.
The moly-coated 230-grain bullets shot tighter groups in the Colt than did the plated 230-grain Extreme plated bullets. That’s consistent with my observations over the years. Cast bullets seem to be more accurate than plated bullets in any of the .45 autos I’ve shot. But, the 200-grain roundnose plated bullet did pretty well in the Government Model, too. I didn’t test that load in the Compact.
The bottom line to all of the above: My standard .45 Auto load is going to be 5.8 gr of Unique with the 230-grain moly coated cast roundnose bullet. It fired the best overall group (at 0.960 inches) in the Colt, and it was the best load for the Compact. This load functions well in both guns, with no anomalies in feed or ejection, and it’s accurate. The only problem I may have is that moly coating fell out of favor some time ago, and I don’t know if any one is still offering moly-coated bullets. I have a stash of the 230-grain moly bullets, so I’m good for a little while. After that, it’s back to the loading bench and the range to find the next favorite load.
Regarding the two handguns, I love them both. That bright stainless Colt Government Model has had a lot of work done to it (a Les Baer barrel, custom fitting, porting and polishing, engine turning, and Millet Hi-Viz sights). The Rock Island Compact can be had new for something a little north of $400. It’s a phenomenal value. The Compact is a lot more concealable, and surprisingly the recoil is only very slightly more than the bigger Colt. And, as I showed above, it’s accurate. The Rock Island is a hell of a 1911 at any price, but at it’s current price, the Rock Island is an absolute steal. I like the look of the Compact, too. The Parkerized finish, simple wood grips, and low profile fixed GI sights remind me a lot of the 1911s I carried when I was in the Army, and I like that.
Check out our other Tales of the Gun stories here!
As the title implies, there’s nothing quite like the plaintive wail of a high performance motorcycle. If you’re good enough, you can identify specific bikes just by (dare we say it) their ExhaustNotes. Harleys have their distinctive rumble, a ’60s Triumph Bonneville sounds like raw power, the Ducati dry clutch rattle, you get the idea. Do you think you know motors? Hey, see if you can identify this one before you see it…
Two cool videos are making waves this week. One is a recent release by my good buddy Buffalo Bonker about his recent ride across Iowa on his RX3…
I met Buffalo on one of the CSC Baja rides, and the guy is a hoot. He bought the RX3 to go on the Baja ride (he had never ridden a motorcycle before), and since then he’s completed a number of great adventures, including a ride through Vietnam. Most impressive, and thanks for allowing us to share your video here on the ExNotes blog, Buffalo!
The other video of note is good buddy Joe Gresh’s review of the Royal Enfield Interceptor, which continues to rack up the views…
Joe Gresh has a number of outstanding videos, and it you’d like to see more, just drift on over to our YouTubby page! We’ve just updated our video page, with more videos and better organization to make things easier to find. We have shooting videos, riding videos, motorcycle reviews, and more. Enjoy!
Hey, you know what? We think you should sign up for our email updates, and you can do so by adding your email address to the widget on this page. We’ll never give your email address to anyone else, and you’ll automatically be entered to win a copy of Destinations, our latest moto adventure book!
I started writing this bit thinking that I had a good idea for a series of men’s colognes. Then I realized: In my entire 68+ years on this planet, I’ve never used cologne, and I can’t remember hanging around any guys who ever did. So I started thinking…my thoughts for this blog hovered around aromas I enjoy, so maybe these should be women’s colognes. Whatever. There’s a request at the end: We’d like to know your thoughts, too. Got any suggestions?
In-N-Out. I can’t drive by an In-N-Out Burger during business hours without inhaling that delightfully inviting aroma of grilled onions, beef, French fries, and the other good things the In-N-Out folks have assembled into what is unquestionably the best meal in town. And every time I do, I have to fight the temptation to pull in and get an Animal Style burger. A perfume capturing this fragrance might be the best advertising for In-N-Out ever. It would drive me nuts. Here’s my vote for the name: Oil of In-N-Out. Or maybe Eau de In-N-Out. Whaddaya think?
WD-40. Ah, another great fragrance. It actually stands for Water Displacement No. 40, and that’s because it’s the 40th formulation the WD-40 company tried before they arrived at the perfect compound for displacing water, acting as a lubricant (no emails, please; I know it’s not a replacement for gun oil), a cleaner, and Lord only knows what else. WD-40 is the kiss of death around any kind of epoxy bonding, soldering, or welding operation (in fact, many of my failure analysis activities centered on getting WD-40 out of high-tech cleanroom environments), but it’s perfect for just about anything else. And, as is the point of this blog, it smells good. It would make a great perfume, I think. WD-40 is a silicone-based lubricant, so somehow silicone has to figure into the name. Help me out here, folks!
Sausage and Peppers. This has got to be another classic aroma. Who has ever smelled sausage and peppers (maybe with a little onion thrown in) on the grill without getting hungry? I love that smell and I find it inviting. As a cologne? Yeah, it would work. I don’t know that I could get Sue to use it, but ladies, take my word on this….that aroma works. The only problem might be finding the right name. Maybe we could go Italian and call it Salcicci y Peperoni, you know, to give it a Continental flair. Yeah, that could work. Salcicci y Peperoni, sold in fine stores everywhere.
Hoppes No. 9. I love that smell. I would probably have become a gun nut even if I wasn’t fascinated by guns just to have a reason to use Hoppes No. 9. It hints of good times past and present, and it’s an aroma that reaches back decades. If there are any perfume or cologne companies out there reading this, pay attention to this one, folks. You don’t need to spend big bucks on market studies or focus groups…I’m telling you, this is the one. All I ask is that if you bring a Hoppes cologne to market, tell me about it a few weeks before you do. I’ll buy as many shares of your stock as I can. Eau de Hoppes. That’s great. Oh, yeah, I’ve used the Eau de thing already for In-N-Out. Here’s one that’s even better: Love Potion No. 9. I can hear the advertising jingle already.
Fresh Cut Grass and Gasoline. This is a weird one, but it works. I’m remembering east coast summer evenings when I had to mow the grass back on the ranch. The smell of gasoline and fresh cut grass somehow just works. Maybe it’s because of the memories I have of those pleasant New Jersey summer evenings, fireflies, and mowing the lawn. The trick was to wait until well after dinner when things cooled off, and to start early enough to get the whole thing done before it got too dark. To twist a phrase from Robert Duvall, I love the smell of gasoline and fresh cut grass in the evening. I’m having a bit of a problem coming up with a catchy name, though. Any suggestions?
Two Stroke Exhaust. I already have the perfect name for this one: Blue Smoke. I think it’s perfect. Admittedly, it would have to be an acquired taste; folks either love that smell or they hate it. I’m in the former camp. I’ve only ever had one ring-dinger my entire life, but I remember going to the half-mile dirt track races when the 250s were running, and in those days, the 250s were all ring-dingers. You could smell the exhaust as soon as you entered the parking lot outside the stadium back then, and it was exciting. It promised good things to come. Yeah, this could work.
Bacon. Hey, who doesn’t like bacon? The challenge here is a name that doesn’t make the person wearing it sound like a porker. Hmmm. The Italian word for bacon is, well, bacon. And the Italian word for lard is lardo. Nope, neither one of those will work. Ah, but the Spanish. Bacon becomes tocino. I can hear it now. Adorn yourself with the gentle yet intoxicating and inviting fragrance of Tocino. Indeed, that works well.
Chili. This one is a maybe. Personally, I love the aroma of a well-seasoned chili, especially if it’s done in a slow cooker and the flavor fills the house. It could be beef, venison, a decent cut of wild boar, elk, whatever. The meat is almost secondary to making a great chili. Red chili flakes, tomatoes, onions, Anaheim chili peppers, and cumin. Cumin’s the thing that makes a good chili great. Maybe that could be the name. Cumin. Yeah, I like it. Cumin. Put a little spice in your life. What do you think?
Coffee. The best coffee in the world comes from Puerto Rico. If you don’t believe me on this, I don’t care. I know. Two Popes ago, Pope John (that’s right, the guy in the Vatican) used to send his jet to Puerto Rico regularly to pick up coffee. I’ve been in Colombia, and while their coffee is good, it’s not Puerto Rican coffee (no offense, Juan Valdez). But any coffee will do first thing in the morning (even Gresh’s powdered Nescafe), and I think everyone can agree (regardless of where you fall on the political or geographic spectrum) that a strong coffee fragrance early in the morning has to be one of the best aromas on the planet. They wouldn’t make coffee-flavored ice cream if coffee wasn’t a good idea. And (get this) if you came out with a coffee perfume, the distribution network is already in place. It’s called Starbucks.
So there you have it. Did I miss any? Hey, let me know in the comments section below. Operators are standing by…
This is a blog I wrote maybe 15 years ago for a friend who dropped a very expensive motorcycle while putting it on the sidestand. He was really upset with himself and I thought he might enjoy hearing about the times I dropped my bikes. I stopped writing after the fifth or sixth memory because I was laughing so hard I thought I might hurt myself. This particular blog has made the rounds…it’s been on my original photosite (motofoto.cc, which went by the wayside a long time ago), and the CSC Motorcycles blog, and now this one.
So, here goes….
Drop Number 1 – Impromptu Stargazing
My friend Louie and I were wrapping up a hard 500-mile day through Arizona back in the 1990s. I know what you are thinking….500 miles is not that much for a solid day’s riding, but it was brutally hot in the way that only Arizona can be in the summertime. I was on my vintage Honda CBX and Lou was on his Gold Wing. We stopped for gas and Louis filled up first. While I was filling up the CBX, Lou rode over to the air hose to top off his tires. I filled my tank, fired up the CBX, and rode over to Lou, paralleling the sidewalk. I put my kickstand down and started to lean the CBX over.
The next thing I knew I was staring at the stars. I had no idea what happened for a few seconds, and then I realized: I had fallen off my motorcycle, and I was laying on my back looking up at the evening sky!
The first thought that went through my mind was: “Did anyone see me do this?”
I hadn’t even been drinking! How could that have happened?
Well, what happened was this: When I extended the sidestand, the sidestand hit the curb before it fully extended and it didn’t go all the way forward. And then, when I leaned the CBX over, it just kept on going.
Total damage? One turn signal lens cover, one scratched fairing, and lots of lost pride.
Drop Number 2 – Lock-to-Lock Has Meaning
This time, I was easing into my own driveway on my 2-week-old Suzuki TL1000S. Gorgeous bike. Bright red. A real rocketship. As I made the sharp turn into the driveway, I turned the forks to keep my balance. Lock-to-lock turning (you know, how far you can push the bars from one side to the other) on the Suzuki is waaaay less than any motorcycle I had ever ridden. And as it turns out (pardon the pun), that really makes a difference when you’re trying to balance a bike at low speeds.
The bottom line? I couldn’t turn the bars far enough to keep my balance at low speed.
The results? BAM! Suddenly, the TL and I were both on our sides in my own driveway!
The first thought that went through my mind was “Did anyone see me do this?”
Total damage? One scratched fairing and lots of lost pride. Lots and lots of lost pride.
Drop Number 3 – Them Darn Sidestands Again
A couple of weeks after Drop Number 2, I was letting my now 4-week-old, slightly-scratched TL1000S warm up in the driveway. The bike was on its sidestand, facing south. Just past my garage door, the driveway slopes down ever so slightly. Really slightly. I mean, hardly any slope at all. Out of the corner of my eye, I thought I saw the Suzuki move forward a bit. Nah, I thought, it’s gotta be an optical illusion.
Two seconds later: BAM! The Suzuki was on its side!
Wow, I thought, this thing sure likes laying down in my driveway.
My next thought: “Did anyone see me do this?”
The results? I couldn’t tell. The fairing was scratched, but maybe it was the same scratch from 2 weeks ago. No lost pride this time, but lots of cussing about Suzuki engineering and lousy sidestands.
Drop Number 4 – Dismounting As An Olympic Event
This time I was winding out my 4-month old TL1000S on the road from my brother-in-law’s place. Wowee, I thought, this thing is fast. I must have hit 80 miles an hour when I realized I gotta slow down. That Suzuki slipper clutch works great, I thought…. just keep downshifting and it’s almost like an ABS system on the rear wheel. Hmmh, that curve is coming up awful fast. Maybe I’ll just give it a touch of front brake.
Uh oh, I thought as I unloaded the rear wheel when I got on the front brake. That corner is really coming up fast now, and the back end is fishtailing all over the place. I almost had that sucker stopped when the front wheel just touched the curb. Down we both went, again. I executed a precision somersault as I departed controlled flight and rolled up into a sitting position.
The first thought that went through my mind was “Did anyone see me?”
This time, the answer was yes. There was a lady in a station wagon, who stopped and asked “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, lady, I did that on purpose.” I didn’t know what else to say.
The results? I couldn’t tell. Maybe it was just the same scratched fairing. Again, lots and lots of lost pride. No injuries, though. My lucky day.
Drop Number 5 – The Prize Winner
This time I was changing the front tire on the CBX in my garage. I put the bike on the center stand and removed the front wheel. Bikes with center stands are great, I thought. Once I had the front wheel off I started thinking about the replacement tire. I used Bridgestone Spitfires on that bike and they were great. I decided I would get the raised white letter Spitfire tires this time. That would really look cool.
Well, I thought, if I do that I have to get the back tire to match. So, I thought, I might as well take the back wheel off, too. I’ll just get them both changed at the same time.
This is the point at which things took a decided turn for the worse. And, I’ll admit to having already had a few beers. What could I have possibly been thinking?
Well, I guess I was still thinking about how cool raised white letter tires would look on my pearl white CBX, and I started to remove the rear wheel. The rear axle bolt was on really tight. I decided I needed to get a bigger wrench, you know, more leverage, that sort of thing. I thought I might as well get another beer while I was up, too. I grabbed another beer, got the longer wrench, found the leverage I was looking for…and…..and…
Uh, oh, the CBX started to roll forward off the center stand, and, whoa, there was no front wheel there….funny how everything seemed to be happening in slow motion at that point.
The moral of this one? If you’re gonna screw up, screw up big time. Why just drop a bike when can find a way to drop it so that it falls over into your wife’s brand new car? Yep, that’s what it did. Creased it nicely. “That won’t polish out,” I remember thinking.
The bottom line? One dinged-up sports sedan, one thoroughly upset wife, one busted and cracked CBX oil pan (an item no longer made by Honda), oil all over the garage floor, and the certain knowledge that while center stands are good, they are not that good….
So, if you’ve ever dropped your bike, don’t feel too bad. It happens to all of us. Sometimes more than once.
If you’ve got a story about dropping your bike, please add it to the comments section. We’d love to hear from you!
So there we were in Calgary. Wow. And we’d ridden there on our motorcycles through all three countries (Mexico, the United States, and Canada). It had been a grand ride, but it was only half the trip. Now, it was time after a fun two days in Calgary for the ride home.
Before diving into our ride home, though, you might want to catch up on the ride to Calgary. Here are the first seven installments of our story on the 2005 Three Flags Classic…
The plan after the events in Calgary was to select our own route home and ride it at our own pace. The official portion of the 2005 Three Flags Classic was over. It had been a blast. On the run home we would decide where to go, how to get there, and how long to take doing it. Our plan was to head west across Canada from Calgary toward British Columbia, turn left somewhere above Washington, meander over to the coast somewhere after Portland, and follow the Pacific coast home. It was to be another grand adventure, and wow, we were having fun!
On the first morning out of Calgary, we stopped in Banff and had a great breakfast. Smoked salmon and eggs, as I recall. It was delicious.
The road through Banff. It was a crisp morning and the riding was great.We walked around in Banff a bit after breakfast. This bear skull was for sale in a store window.Good buddy Marty posing with the 1200 Daytona in Banff.
The ride that morning was beyond glorious. Crisp, clean air, cool temperatures, and all was well with the world. The big 1200 Daytona was running superbly well and the scenery was magnificent. Every scene was a picture postcard, and I caught a lot of them. Incidentally, all of the photos you see in this story were shot with film. I had my Nikon N70 with me and just two lenses (the 24-120 Nikon, and a 17-35 Sigma). Great scenery, great photo gear, a great motorcycle, and great photo ops. Life was good. It still is.
After that great breakfast in Banff and a bit of walking around, were back on the road headed west across Canada. Our next stop was Lake Louise.
The Lake Louise Hotel.The Lake Louise Hotel lobby, courtesy of the 17-35 Sigma lens. This place looked very expensive. In our dead-bug-encrusted road gear, we looked out of place.A statue near Lake Louise, erected by the Canadian Pacific Railway, honoring the Swiss Mountain guides. When building the railroad through the Rockies, the Canadian Pacific Railroad needed guys who knew how to find their way around in this kind of terrain. They bought mountain guides in from Switzerland.Lake Louise. It gets its greenish hue from glacial silt.The road crew in front of Lake Louise.There were signs around Lake Louise advising us to be on the lookout for grizzlies. Wow!
We continued heading west and then south through Canada, and we spent the night in Penticton, about an hour north of the border. Penticton is an interesting resort town, complete with a large lake and a casino. I had a smoked salmon pizza for dinner. Love that smoked salmon.
We crossed the border early and re-entered the U.S. into Washington. We were honking along pretty good, not 30 minutes into the U.S., when a Washington State Patrol officer pulled us over for speeding. It was early, maybe 6:30 in the morning, and the officer was heading north when we were heading south. He lit us up as he passed by, I saw him do a “Smokey and the Bandit” u turn in my rear view mirror, and we pulled over immediately. The officer pulled up behind us. When we took our helmets off, he looked at us and said, “Ah, old guys,” while shaking his head. He told us to slow down. The trooper was an old guy, too. I think he felt a connection. No citation. We chatted a bit. We were lucky. Yeah, I’m an old guy, but riding that Triumph always made me feel like I was 18 years old. “I don’t know why you boys aren’t getting tickets today,” the trooper said and then he told us to ride safely. His strategy worked. We rode across Washington at a sedate 60 mph for the rest of the day. It took forever.
Somewhere north of Yakima, Washington.
We stopped in Goldendale, Washington, for a cup of coffee in a local bar, chatted with the locals for a while, and then we had one of the most scenic rides I’ve ever taken. It was to be one of the best parts of the ride, and it was through the Columbia River Gorge. The roads and the scenery were incredible. It was the first time I’d ever seen it, and I’ve been back there several times since. It was an area I knew I had to include when we hosted the Chinese for the ride through the American West, and I wrote a piece about the region for Motorcycle Classics magazine. The Colombia River Gorge is one of my favorite places in the world.
Marty, headed into the Columbia River Gorge.
We rode along the north side of the Columbia River for about half the length of Washington, and then we crossed into Oregon on the Bridge of the Gods. It was probably 300 feet above the river, and it was one of those iron mesh bridges that you can look down and see all the way to the river. It looked and felt like I was flying, and it was unnerving. I looked down once and that was enough for me. We then found our way into Portland, and checked into a hotel I knew from a previous business trip.
Portland, looking out over the Willamette River.
Portland is a very cool town. Marty and I had fun exploring it, and in particular, stopping for lunch at the Olympian. I later did a story on the Olympian, too, for Motorcycle Classics. The Olympian has a fantastic vintage motorcycle collection.
Kelly’s Olympian Bar. This is a cool place to have a drink.Inside the Olympian. It’s a “must see” spot on any ride through Portland.
We left Portland before sunrise early the next morning and headed southeast toward the coast. Oregon is a wet state. We had a lot of mist in the morning riding through the rain forest, and it was eerie. I half expected to see Sasquatch jump out and grab me every time I wiped my face shield. Then, we arrived at the Oregon Coast Highway, and yep, that ultimately became a story gracing the pages of Motorcycle Classics, too.
Sasquatch is down there somewhere.Hippy Bob, who we met on Oregon’s Pacific Coast Highway.
The people you meet are the best part of any motorcycle ride, and on the Oregon Coast Highway, we met a guy who introduced himself as Hippy Bob. Hippy Bob had hit the Oregon lottery for $5,000 and he immediately bought a Harley basket case for $4,500. Bob was taking his time working his way down the coast from Portland on that motorcycle (Bob had been on the road for two days when we met him, and he had only traveled about 200 miles south of Portland in that time). I was really interested in Hippy Bob’s motorcycle, as I hadn’t seen a Shovelhead Harley on the road in years. His was a 1981 model. I used to own a 1979 Electra-Glide (with the Shovelhead motor), and I called it an optical illusion because it only looked like a motorcycle. Things were constantly breaking on my Harley. I asked Bob if he had any problems with his Shovelhead, and that opened the floodgates. Bob just went on and on about the nonstop challenges he had faced keeping his Harley running. He was still talking about it when we left.
We rode the Coast Highway all the way south to Highway 138, and someone told us to watch for the elk further east. We did, and wow, were we ever impressed.
Wow.Wow again!A bambino.
We spent the next night in Roseburg. The hotel was literally next door to the Roseburg Harley-Davidson dealer. We looked at the new 2006 Harleys (it was the first time I had seen them, and they looked good). I bought a Roseburg Harley T-shirt. There’s that old joke…you know, for a T-shirt company, they make a pretty good motorcycle…
Our destination the next morning was Crater Lake. Was it ever cold that morning! We rode through more beautiful scenery, but the temperatures were damn near debilitating. I need to tell you that we had been seeing signs warning of elk crossings for much of our time through Washington in Oregon, but the only elk was had seen so far were the ones off Highway 138. I had mentally dismissed the elk warning signs until what happened that morning. We saw another elk warning sign, I was trying to stay warm with my electric vest cranked up all the way, and then all of a sudden about 300 yards further up the road, the largest elk I ever saw stepped in front of us. I stopped, Marty stopped, and the elk stood broadside, just staring at us. He was daring us to proceed. That bull owned the road. He knew it, and he wanted to make sure we knew it, too.
Now, you have to picture this scene. We were the only ones out there, having a staring contest with this elk that was the size of a house, on a bright sunny freezing morning. Steam was coming out of the elk’s nostrils, and mine, too. I flipped my visor up because it was fogging over. The elk stared at me. I stared at it, wondering if I could get the bike turned around if the elk charged. I could see the headlines: Motorcyclist Gored to Death By Enraged Elk.
After what seemed to be an eternity, the elk looked away from us, crossed the highway, and disappeared into the forest on the other side. I started to let my clutch out, and then a female bounded out of the forest on the right and followed the bull into the forest on the left. I stopped and waited a second, and then started to roll forward. Then another female elk appeared. We stopped again. They just kept coming. Big ones, little ones, more big ones, more little ones, and well, you get the idea. I realized: Those elk crossing signs are for real.
Then it was on up to Crater Lake. It was beautiful, and it would become yet another Motorcycle Classics article.
My Daytona parked along the road circling Crater Lake.Yep, that’s snow. It was cold up there!
The area around Crater Lake was downright scary. There are steep drops on the side of the road, no shoulder to speak of, and no guard rails. There are lots of signs warning that you could get seriously hurt or killed up here. On the way down, we encountered ice on the road. I love riding; I hate riding on ice. I was concentrating intensely when out of the corner of my eye I saw a yellow motorcycle closing in on my right rear and I remember wondering who else would be nutty enough to be up here riding on the ice, and who in the world would try passing under these conditions? Then I realized: It wasn’t another motorcycle. It was my motorcycle, and the ass end was sliding around. The back end of my Triumph wasn’t going in the same direction as the front end. That was a close one.
After Crater Lake, we buzzed down to the California border, almost got stopped for speeding again (the CHP cruiser going the other way hit us with the lights but didn’t come after us), and we made it to Davis, California. We had dinner with Marty’s son, and then headed home the next day.
A trip like this is one of life’s grand events. It’s hard to say what part of it I liked best: The camaraderie, the people we met along the way, the scenery, the riding, the wildlife, the memories, the photo opportunities, the sense of adventure, or just the sheer pleasure of being alive and out in the world.
Here’s a summary of the miles that Marty assembled:
• 9/1/05 Upland, CA to Tijuana, BC: 139
• 9/2/05 Tijuana, BC to Gallup, NM: 657
• 9/3/05 Gallup, NM to Grand Junction, CO: 419
• 9/4/05 Grand Junction, CO to Driggs, ID: 569
• 9/5/05 Driggs, ID to Whitefish, MT: 526
• 9/6/05 Whitefish, MT to Calgary, AB: 366
• Total for Three Flags: 2,676
• Miles ridden within Calgary, AB: 6
• 9/8/05 Calgary, AB to Penticton, BC: 430
• 9/9/05 Penticton, BC to Portland, OR: 468
• 9/10/05 Portland, OR to Roseburg, OR: 288
• 9/11/05 Roseburg, OR to Davis, CA: 469
• 9/12/05 Davis, CA to Upland, CA: 427
• Total for return trip: 2,082
• Total for round trip: 4,764
The Three Flags Classic Rally is one of the world’s great motorcycle rides, and if you’ve never experienced it, you might consider signing up for one of these rides. You can get more information on the Three Flags Classic on the Southern California Motorcycle Association website. I’ve done some great rides in my life; the Three Flags Classic was one of the best.
Cool stuff. Stop by their site (
Interesting stuff, to be sure. Most of the variability you see in the above table (and you can see that there’s a lot) was me. A machine rest would have provided for better groups, but you get what you get, and what you get here is me.
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In-N-Out
WD-40
Sausage and Peppers
Hoppes No. 9
Fresh Cut Grass and Gasoline
Two Stroke Exhaust
Bacon
Chili
Coffee
My friend Louie and I were wrapping up a hard 500-mile day through Arizona back in the 1990s. I know what you are thinking….500 miles is not that much for a solid day’s riding, but it was brutally hot in the way that only Arizona can be in the summertime. I was on my vintage Honda CBX and Lou was on his Gold Wing. We stopped for gas and Louis filled up first. While I was filling up the CBX, Lou rode over to the air hose to top off his tires. I filled my tank, fired up the CBX, and rode over to Lou, paralleling the sidewalk. I put my kickstand down and started to lean the CBX over.
This time, I was easing into my own driveway on my 2-week-old Suzuki TL1000S. Gorgeous bike. Bright red. A real rocketship. As I made the sharp turn into the driveway, I turned the forks to keep my balance. Lock-to-lock turning (you know, how far you can push the bars from one side to the other) on the Suzuki is waaaay less than any motorcycle I had ever ridden. And as it turns out (pardon the pun), that really makes a difference when you’re trying to balance a bike at low speeds.
