GRIN – The ExhaustNotes Blog

By Joe Gresh

I’m not against Moto Guzzis. I have nothing bad to say about the motorcycles. I just don’t have that burning desire to own one. Nevertheless, the Moto-gods seem to be intent on me owning a Moto Guzzi.

The original rally going on for some 30-odd years.

I had a close call this weekend at the GRIN (Guzzi Riders In New Mexico, I think). The GRIN rally is held annually in Datil, New Mexico. There’s not a whole lot in Datil: a gas station, small-but-clean motel, and a campground behind the store and motel.

The campground is rally headquarters and this year’s attendance was sparse because the rally split into two factions. The original rally was behind the gas station/motel and an offshoot was held about a mile away at the Datil Wells campground.

The rival rally, held on the same day a mile away.

With only 30-35 bikes in the best of times splitting the rally seemed like a dumb idea to me. I’m guessing some sort of rift caused a second rally to be held on the same exact days within walking distance of the original rally. Whatever happened its sort of chickenshit. I hope the two groups can stop the nonsense and get together.

The legendary Dan, hero of many Joe Berk epic rides. He sold his CSC and rides a Guzzi now.

Regardless of the low turnout, the original rally site had a solid core of Guzzi riders to chat with and the day flew by. I re-met Dan, one of the original Zongshen/CSC riders from Joe Berk’s CSC tour days. It took a while but he finally remembered me.

That memory thing isn’t a fluke: the youngest rider award went to a 62- year-old. The oldest was 83! If motorcycling doesn’t get some new blood we’ll be holding annual rallies at graveyards.

One GRIN was running a car tire. He spoke highly of it and claimed a 20,000-mile lifespan.

On that Guzzi ownership near miss: GRIN held a raffle with three Guzzis as prizes. There was a Jackal 1100, an Ambassador and (I think) an 850 Lemans.

$20 Guzzi. Won in the raffle by the leader of the Mudchuckers MC, Mike.

With only 15 people in the raffle the odds were good, but I missed the Jackal by one number. Instead, the Mudchucker now owns two Moto Guzzis. That was close. Too close.

I stole this photo off the internet. I didn’t shoot many photos at the rally; I was too busy gabbing with the Guzzi riders. A slightly beat up version of this bike was raffled. That was the one I wanted.

Moto Guzzi riders are always fun bunch to hang out with and now that they are old they no longer beat up Buell riders for sport. Several attendees clocked around 1000 miles to camp in Datil. I don’t know the situation or attendance at the rival rally but we saw two or three rogue Guzzis putting around Datil that were not at our camp.

My ride was only 400 miles round trip but the Buell still found time to rattle the key switch out of its bracket. Being loose and beating on the bracket, the fine threads on the switch were fairly well smooshed. A quick stop at tractor supply for some vise grips and I managed to force the nut back onto the boogered key switch. I don’t think it will fall off again as the threads are self-locking now.

There’s going to be another bike raffle at the 2027 GRIN rally. Same time, same place. I guess I’ll have to keep going back until I’m a Guzzi owner.

By Joe Gresh

Among the many crazy conspiracy theories masquerading as knowledge today are the Walmart tunnels. These tunnels supposedly crisscross the nation for the usual nefarious reasons: FEMA camps, New World Order population control and extraterrestrial alien smuggling (to steal your jobs and women). When you stop to think about it, this whole insane, Walmart-tunnel thing is no wackier for Datil than the nearby Very Large Array radio-astronomy telescope.

The VLA was used in a movie about the search for alien radio transmissions. Or was it just a movie? If that doesn’t fire up our odd American mix of gullible/skeptical idiocy nothing will. Like all good conspiracy theories there is a grain of truth to the Walmart-tunnel thing that feeds the plot. New Mexico is full of old mining tunnels so if you look hard enough you’ll find one. Just not the ones owned by Walmart. Those ones are top secret.

Naturally with all the weirdness going on near Datil, GRIN chose to hold its Guzzi motorcycle rally directly over a tunnel leading to Lake Como in Italy. I could hear the water rushing through the tunnels if I put my ear to a Quattro valvole rocker cover.

Finding Moto Guzzis in New Mexico is much harder than finding Walmart tunnels. I can’t recall seeing one on the road or parked up at a Starbucks. My buddy Robert rode his 850 Guzzi out to New Mexico one time but that doesn’t count. Guzzis aren’t super popular anywhere so a rally with 25-ish bikes is something to see. I forgot to add that GRIN stands for Guzzi Riders In New Mexico, the club that put on the show and rally.

Datil consists of an expensive gas station, a motel, a campground and a pretty good restaurant. I’m not sure you could call it a town, it’s more of a traveler’s rest. Behind the motel and gas station you’ll find the campground, and this is where the wrong-way, Italian V-Twins were situated.

The gang of Gizzard riders was an easygoing bunch. It took no time at all before I felt like one of the boys and damned if I didn’t start wanting one of these goofy motorcycles. An unusually high number of rally attendees told me that they had once owned a Kawasaki ZRX like the one I rode to the event. I did 410 miles round trip but there were riders from Texas and Colorado who had traveled much further.

I’m a sucker for high pipes on a street bike so this Scrambler was my favorite of the bunch. Later in the day we went to the Datil restaurant and had a good lunch that totally blew my diet. I had the southwest turkey sandwich and it was smothered in Hatch green chili.

GRIN hosted several dinners for the 3-day rally and there was a Guzzi bike show. Attendees judged the bikes in a people’s choice sort of deal. It was kind of hard to see the entry numbers that were on tiny round stickers applied the Guzzi headlight glass. I didn’t get to vote because I wasn’t actually a member of GRIN. I feel this should invalidate the whole election process and make GRIN a dictatorship.

Late in the afternoon I had to head back to the ranch as I don’t like riding at night. My night vision is much improved since I had cataract surgery but an elk running across the road in front of your 70mph motorcycle takes a lot of seeing.

The seasons are slowly changing here in New Mexico, so it wasn’t unbearably hot on the ride home. Cool, dry air on top of the higher passes made me worry less as the sun set behind me. I pulled into the ranch in full darkness with the ZRX running on all four cylinders. It was like riding in a tunnel.