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Austin - Big Bend or Bust!!!

Joined
Mar 16, 2011
Messages
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Location
Austin, Tx
First Name
Michael
It's finally happening!!! Tomorrow morning at Oh-Dark-30, my friend Bill and me are trading our wives for two KLR's and the adventure of the back country. Ok, so we're only leaving them for 4 days... Our plan is to travel light, sleep where we can, and ride, ride, ride. The route has changed at least 5,000 times due to time restrictions. Our bosses just can't understand why we need 2 weeks to ride motorcycles, but we convinced them to let us go for 4 days, 2 days short of our original request. Many thanks to "Trail Boss" for the Ride Guides and advice. As fate would have it, Bill called last night to cancel!!! One of his employees had an emergency and Bill was going to have to cover. I told him he would feel really bad if I died alone in the desert. He got it fixed, not because of his conscience, but because he really wants to go. Anyway, all packed and ready to go. I will post on the trip as I can.
 

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Good luck on the trip, but I would have tried to get more than a KLR in trade for my wife. :rofl:
 
:welcome: and I look forward to the ride report because I hope to make the same trip in early June. :thumb: :clap:
 
Welcome and no comment on the wife trade...
Ahh, and ejoy the trip.
 
:welcome: and I look forward to the ride report because I hope to make the same trip in early June. :thumb: :clap:

That time of the year in Big Bend is quite hot. You might consider cooler alternatives like Cloudcroft or at least Carlsbad to Dell City on fun dirt roads.

RB
 
Copy trading up for the wives, but I did get a good deal :) Just kidding babe. Yes she read this post and yes I had to answer for that comment. So day one kicked off something like this:
Wife, "Do you hv ur phone?"
Me, "Yes"
Wife, "Where is it?"
Me, "Relax, I got everything covered"
And then she hands me my wallet. Love that woman. We decided to take I35-46-Bandera and hit 337-Camp Wood. Originally planned on connecting with the Enchanted Rock route from Marble Falls so we could cross the James River. Time didn't permit, but that worked out for the best. Bills' bike stalled on every water crossing. From Camp Wood we followed the ride guide for Cedar Creek in reverse to Rock Springs. Well, sort of... I didn't get lost, but I didn't know where the heck I was for a minute. Somehow we went south for an hour instead of north without noticing. Did I mention I teach land nav :( It was great tho. The water crossings were so much fun, even with the stalls. Cedar Creek road has so much to offer in the way of scenery and solitude. As a consolation to my loss of navigational pride, the unplanned route knocked at least an hour off our hard-ball time. No major incidents. Bill broke the rear brake lever in a really cool slide out. I did a slow roll from a complete stand still, but nobody was watching. Thanks to everybody who responded to my post. I'll keep updating as long as y'all are interested. More to come
 
Has Bill done the T-mod? Where you cut the vent line from the carb, insert a T, and while leaving the drain near ground level, route the vent up? Sounds like he's sucking water into his carb vent line.

Oh yeah - keep up the RR!
 
Thanks for the advise Andrew. We'll definitely add that mod and see what happens. Just got to Big Bend and don't see much water. Any advise on fixing a brake lever:( Local machine shop said they can fix it tomorrow on his day off. Post more later. Got business to tend to right now.
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Re: Brake lever

Try Ralph at CycleTek; he's the second house on Terlingua Ranch Gate 5 rd. Also try the GSMotorent guys; LtDan on here is the proprietor. They're set up at the gas station at the T in Study Butte and have some KLRs for rent - so it's likely they have a few parts. Hurry tho, tomorrow is their last day and they're heading back to Tennessee for the spring season. Best of luck.
 
Welcome to the Big Bend.

Stop by our adobe on 118 25 sMiles north of Study Butte and sign our guest book if you can find time ; )

Voni
sMiling
 
Welcome to the Big Bend.

Stop by our adobe on 118 25 sMiles north of Study Butte and sign our guest book if you can find time ; )

Voni
sMiling


....and the fridge
.........and grab the Texas Tag while you're at it!
 
So the ride is complete and I am delinquent on my report. So here goes. We planned on camping at lake Amistad the first night, but didn't find a good place. Motel 6 left the light on for us though. Just across the bridge out of Del Rio on day 2, we found the perfect camping spot. Go figure.
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We promised to stay there next time and cruised on to the Pecos River for a couple of quick photos.
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These pics don't do it justice. On to Langtry for the obligatory pics of Roy Bean museum.
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If you didn't know, Roy Bean was known as the Hanging Judge. As you can see, Bill has no tact. I would never do something like that... Anyway, nice place to stop for a minute and then on to Big Bend. Again we had planned on camping, but Deena at the El Dorado in Terlingua cut us a pretty good deal on a room. Let me talk about Terlingua for a minute. We ran across a couple of bikers in Marathon who told us not to waste our time going there. They apparently didn't bother to stop in. We had a blast on the front porch and met some really great people! Just to name a few, I met Uncle, Waldo, and Ralph from Cycle Tek, who fixed Bill's brake lever the next day. I might mention it was his day off and I didn't notice any charges reflecting that on the bill. Many thanks Ralph. By the way, he says sorry about your bike Trail Boss. You might want to call him...
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Everybody was a friend on the porch and Terlingua is a great place to hang out.
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Part of me wanted to stay another night, but the real reason for the trip was to hit the dirt. Day three and it was time. First we had to stop by Ralph's Cycle Tek for the brake repair. He has a really cool place and offers camping as well. Its about 5 miles north of town and secluded from the sounds of society. I might stay there next time I'm through. It was 1pm by the time we hit the park. River Road had been our original plan, but the sand conditions were reported to be pretty bad, so we adjusted our route. Call me a wimp, but I wanted to see as much as I could, and this was the last day to do it. We took Maverick down to Santa Elena Canyon. The pics don't show the true size of this canyon. It's 1500 feet high.
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Quick stop at Castolon
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From there it was all pavement to Old Ore Road, but Ross Maxwell was very scenic with some good twisties.
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We got our back country camping permit and headed up 385 to Old Ore Road. Finally, a real dual sport road! It was already 4pm, but the road is only 26 miles. 15 miles of pavement to Glenn Springs Road and another 10 miles to our camp just south of Black Gap Road. Should be a good 3 hour ride, if that, and we can watch the sunset from our campsite while eating MRE's. Does anybody remember the Gilligan's Island theme song? "A 3 hour tour..." The road was great. Good climbs and descents, not too much sand or deep gravel. I was having a blast!!! So much fun that I didn't check my mirror for about 2 miles. Guess who wasn't there. I backtracked and was relieved to see Bill upright and not bleeding. His bike had died. 600 miles of riding and it wants to quit 5 miles into the first challenge I've had? Forget that, I'm fixing it! And I did. And then I fixed it again 3 miles later. And finally fixed it right 5 miles after that. It turned out to be the float. How does that happen? By now it's dark, but I'm determined to finish this route and make it to the camp. Riding that route at night was one of the coolest experiences of my life. Bill agrees that it was an experience... We made it to the pavement and headed to Glenn springs road. I might had forgotten to mention to Bill that Glenn Springs was not paved and that it was a 10 mile ride from the pavement to our camp. I knew all was well with him when we made the turn though. Even over the sounds of the engine, I could hear his exclamations of joy when he realized we were going back into the dirt. I didn't actually hear what he was shouting, but I assume it was shouts of praise to me for planning such an adventurous day... We made it to the camp and ate MRE's by chemlight. It was 1am. "A 3 hour tour..."
Old Gap Road
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Glenn Springs Campsite
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The sun came up way too early, but we had a long ride ahead. 500 miles to Austin, and no time for scenery. We both had to work the next day. But we did take the longer route via 90 rather than I10. It was worth it. Thanks to all for the replies, the help and the friendship. Sorry I couldn't make it to the Adobe Voni, but thanks for the invite. Promise I'll sign in next time.
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Haha!! When you said it was 4 PM and you were just starting Old Ore, I was like :eek2: :giveup: :trust:.

Very cool, I'll bet that was an "experience" all right :clap:
 
I'll save myself the embarrassment and go to the light. Voni's BMW would just laugh my wanna be off the road:(
 
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