Well, it started out as a visit to Springhill Cemetary (Nashville) for visitation for the mother of a childhood friend of Faye's. Course, I'm always looking for roads I haven't ridden. So, we checked out Brick Church Pike north to Likton Pike, to to Union Hill road to Greer Road up to Ridgetop.
The out hwy 257 to Edgar Dillard, south to Whites Creek Pike, to I24 then on the the Funeral Home.
A great day to ride and then remembering a long and good life.
I've discovered that the front Battlewing evaporates in cold weather. 8K miles is the worst I've ever gotten with any front tire on any bike.
So, hello Michelin AnakeeII. Costs a little more, but, from what I read, gets a lot more miles.
Over to Phils this am to mount it and a set of tires on a friend's ST1300. That done, a big lunch of ribs and out for a scrub in run. We dodged rain all afternoon and finally, right at the very end, got rained on pretty good.
I really like the Anakee. Runs smooth, tracks nice, turns in easy. Does well in heavy rain.
Getting the tire on was the last thing the bike needed. Now, time to ride.
OK, winter was mild...but it was still winter. Fortunately, this winter I had a fun job and some "cash on had" so as to not have to lay around and be miserable. I rode the Strom to work a lot and took various short spins for fun.
Now, though, good temps are within sight, so more riding. With money, I finally got around to getting the valves set to the high side (won't check em again until 100Kmi) and iridium plugs installed. She runs great...better, I think, than new.
Mulling a trip to Colorado, maybe as far as Utah with Faye this summer.
Electrics make winter a great time to ride. Today was beautiful and I decided to run the gravel that I can get to pretty easily.
Cedars of Lebanon
Cedars of Lebanon 2
Wuz a good summer
I was expecting, after two days of cold, cold rain, to have to drive "Road Warrior" (my old Aerostar van) to work. Mid twenties over night, lots of moisture, heavy frost....
But when I went out to the van (I use a space heater to defrost the windshield and pre-warm it), the frost was melted. Hmm temperatures are within my commute range.
So, I rode to work this morning. Heavy fog, suspicious looking moisture on the road. No problems though.
When I got to work, a new experience for me: I had ice on my riding pants and jacket. Quite a bit of it actually.
Well, I arrived and was warm in the process and riding withdrawal was chased away.
A little north of town: a 50 car pileup and a fatality.
As old as I am, you'd think that there is no place in the state of TN that I haven't visited. Wrong. There are many places and limited time. What ya gonna do?
Go see something you haven't seen, that's what. New tire, gas money, time. Three planets align and I'm off to see the Obed River area. This is close to the prison road. Why haven't I been before? Dunno.
Did a little interstate (to make time) to Linwood to hit 141. Then 141 to 96, a little more interstate to Monterey and the 62 to Wartburg. This all went really nice. The Wee is running great, the weather perfect, no time pressure. Sweet.
I had intended to start at the Obed River and backtrack through the Catoosa Wildlife area, but the ranger at the Obed River visitor center told me that it was hunting season and the woods would be full of munitions and hair triggers. Well, I would have gone anyway (although I might have been turned away by Wildlife Rangers) except I didn't have blaze orange and I could be easily mistaken as game by a careless hunter.
So, another time for that. The area is remote, natural, and uncrowded. And the roads are sweet for motorcycles.
A great day, right at 300mi.PICS (start at 115)
I am thoroughly tickled to be going to work every morning. 90% of the time I'm riding the VStrom. One morning this week it had just rained. The roads were wet. The air was cool and the smells were sweet. I was practically singing in my helmet. Gotta get a new tire, take a week off to go to the gulf coast, and then scheme up some trips to the mountains.
Life is good!
It has been a long, hot, unemployed summer so riding has been limited by temperature and funds. Providence, however, has delivered a great job and a break in the heat, so I am somewhat giddy in anticipation of fun, profitable work as well as time and money for riding.
I ride just about every day, so its not like I haven't been out there. I discovered my radiator fan is unplugged when I got caught in a traffic jam (I was only on the interstate because of the construction closure of a road I generally take. So I encountered the condition for which I use synthetic oil. The Strom will go over "three" bars in hot, totally stopped traffic. It took about 15 min for it to hit all the bars and light the red light. At that point I angled off the road to the shoulder and (to the tune of some heckling) got some air flowing through the radiator. I cooled down to 4 bars in about a quarter mile. The bike never boiled, hiccuped, or did anything. It just ran like everything was normal.
Faye and I headed out for a short ride yesterday and I turned down the same ramp onto I40 west: traffic jam and bumper to bumper traffic. I angled to the side of the ramp, turned around and rode up the shoulder back to the road we had just turned off of. I was going to swap a traffic ticket for overheating the bike again. We motored cleanly away from that traffic jam.
Fall is on the way. Great riding in sight!
Short spin on the VStrom
I've been riding a good bit, just not writing it up here. A little at ADVRider:
Citico Creek Road
Wait, that's the crummy little retail job I just quit, not the ride. Citico Creek road is a ride I've wanted to take for a long time. Cherokee National Forest just across the river from hwy 129, the Dragon. I've ridden 129 and Cherohala Skyway many, many time but just never got around to this large area of the national forest.
Most of those years I had bikes that were not good at all in gravel, so that was part of it. With the Strom, a gravel road is no problem at all. Anyway, two good days were available so I grabbed my camp gear, threw some Vienna sausages and boiled eggs in a sack and headed east.
I fell back on a great route to Tellico Plains. I24 quick jump to 64 to 41 to 280 to McMinnville and wonderful hwy 30 to hwy 39 to Tellico. A great ride every time.
I got there around noon, set up camp and headed towards Indian Boundary just off the Cherohala. There had been a lot of rain a couple of days earlier, so I also stopped at Bald River falls: not disappointed.
Citico Creek road starts as gravel on this end. Some pretty good ups and downs, but the road is in good condition throughout. Some loose gravel here and there requires your attention, but, for the most part you can motor along at a good clip.
I guess there were 35 miles or so of gravel. All good in a beautiful area along a great mountain stream. There are a lot of good looking campsites in the national forest. The weather was just about perfect.
Next day I packed up and visited a few more spots in the area, ran the Cherohala some, an generally bummed around. I also ran down hwy 68 to hwy 64 and then back to the Ocoee area, to hwy 30 to Reliance, TN and then hwy 315 back to hwy 39 for the turn west.
739 mi total
Part 2: weekend of May 21: Farr gap off Citico; Forest Road 81 from Cherohala to Joyce Kilmer National Forest; Wayah road; Tellico road from hwy 28 to Wayah road. Plus a bunch of pavement with ST-Owners group. Camped at Hunts again.
974 mi total
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