Plucky Aussie Rides Heck, Visits Pope

[Swapeti]

Aussie David J. from Adelaide returned to Oklahoma for another ride with us in November. He wanted to do one of our Mexico adventure rides and so did I but Roger Padactor and Fast Roy were hesitant about it. Their thoughts were that Mexico was not a good choice right now so we decided on Moab, Utah. Salida Bob had ridden there a few weeks before and knew some of the loops.



There is a lot of riding on sandstone that is known as Slickrock. In reality tire traction is near 100% on the stuff. The Slickrock name came about because grip for horse hooves is much less.



Some of the loops and locations are named ****’s Revenge, Devils Garden, H*ll Roaring Rim presumably because of the difficulty or because of how hot it is in summer. The next group of pics give a good cross section of the areas we rode. Some are single track but most are 2 track.











































Somewhat cool at the end of this day but beach loving DJ prefers to be barefoot. His finger like toes were somewhat intimidating.

























If anyone is interested in the cost of the trip, it is hard to figure because we elected Roger Padactor as the drunken sailor holder of the kitty dollars. At the start we put in $100 each for fuel. This normally is a good system that has served us well except RP began paying out for stuff other than fuel. I lost track of how many times he pained us with the most irritating sound to signal the kitty was hungry again. When questioned, RP produced receipts for fuel and every unauthorized purchase. He stated we had no binding contract that explicitly directed his actions and since all contributors benefited equally our inquiries would be summarily dismissed as invalid. Convinced or confused by the legal logic we agreed it was all good, no charges were filed.





We had a really nice condo that Salida Bob booked through an agency he had used on his earlier trip. It had 5 beds, 2 baths and a garage for $170. Way better accommodations than most moto trips.



After we returned from Utah we did a day ride at Waynoka with son Ryan.







Ryan found out you have to ride these small bowls both directions to be able to prevent dizziness.





The 1,800 acre State Park strangely requires a flag but not a helmet. The day before our dune ride, with limited flag mount options, the crafty David J. used his considerable skills with a hacksaw, drill and file to quickly fabricate mounting brackets.



Despite the colder weather here, DJ still preferred to expose his prehensile toestracities.



David J. also enjoyed a visit to the Seaba Station motorcycle museum in Warwick.





The unrestored 1913 Pope board track racer is the first bike on display.



These last pics are weird rock formation pics from Arches National Park about a mile North from Moab.





Fun trip. Lots of sand in some of the valleys. Not very hard riding but some of the rock ledges going up or down took some extra effort.