If any of you have been out West of Marble Falls on CR 310/Click Rd., you know there is a LONG concrete crossing at Sandy Creek. Here are a few shots of it. You can see that the water runs across the entire crossing. As you might expect, there is also algae across the entire thing!
That is my fully loaded VFR 800 sitting at the start of the crossing. There is NO coasting across this crossing. You HAVE to use the throttle or you will NEVER make it across. It is simply too long.
This was my first ever water crossing...
The GS went first. I followed...
As soon as the back tire hit the edge of the water, it started spinning immediately. I was BARELY giving it any gas at all. I had both feet out just to try to keep the bike vertical regardless of which way it was pointing. Every time I tried to give a little gas, the bike slid and the rear tried to step out. To make matters worse, every time this happened, the force of the flowing water pushed the rear off line and pointed me the wrong direction
Each time, I managed to go a foot or two before the back end was getting out far enough that I had to stop and fight to keep the bike upright. My feet were sliding just as bad as the tire. My hamstrings were not happy about this... I was TENSE and worried. There really wasn't any going back and I still had a good way to go. I was also VERY concerned about the edge of the concrete that wasn't far from my back tire. I kept trying to move toward the upstream edge as I worked my way across inch by inch.
I lost track of time. It seemed like an eternity but was probably only about ten minutes or so. But I finally made it to the far side, cursing my riding buddy for dragging me into such nonsense on a street bike. But... deep down inside, something started stirring within me, and it wasn't lunch.
My buddy must have noticed the change in me as he offered to let me ride his GS for a while. I had been recently reading ride reports on Advrider.com and I think we all know what that causes to happen
So I accepted his offer.
Moments later I found myself blasting down a sandy dirt road laughing like a little kid and the rest as they say... is history! I had a GS a few months later
A few years later I found myself leading a group of intrepid adventure riders to Big Bend and the route out of Austin happened to include this same crossing. I stopped to warn everyone about how slick it was and how careful they would need to be. They all nodded their heads as if they understood. I walked across to get set up for pictures and just to check the conditions. I thought maybe this would drive home the seriousness of my warning...
They started across one by one...
"THAT'S EASY! STAND ASIDE BRIDGE KEEPER! I'M NOT AFRAID!"
Oh... carrying a LOT of speed...!!
Soooo close
Seeing the others wipe out, this one stopped to reconsider...
But then makes it across without any problems once the way is cleared
Once everyone was across, I walked back and got my bike, then rode across without any problems this time.
Checking bikes and underwear for hidden damage...
It was a BEAUTIFUL spring day!