Tuesday dawned bright and clear, the mountain air was a crisp 50º as I started down the Taylor Canyon on my 75 mile journey to Salida. Originally, Mollie and I had made arrangements for the kids to spend the day in activities at the ranch, but one of the crumb-crunchers wasn't feeling well the night before, and Mollie made the decision that I should go ride with Duke and Tami while she stayed with the kids. I protested that she should go instead, but she insisted. I felt a little guilty about going alone and leaving her on kid duty, but she said I could make up for it later in the week by letting her have a day to ride. Deal!
Is Mollie a cool wife or what!
I had some great tunes dialed up on the iPod and it was a simply perfect Rocky Mountain morning as I made my way east on U.S. 50 over Monarch Pass and into Salida. At the top of the pass, a road crew had traffic stopped for about 5 - 10 minutes while they moved some heavy equipment about down the road a ways. When they finally let us through, the flagman was kind enough to signal to me that there was gravel on the roadway as I went past. I'm thinking of one of those beer commercials: we salute you, Colorado road crew flagman guy!
I rolled up at Duke and Tami's house at 9:15 after an exilherating ride to Salida. Tami ran out of the house, looked at me, then looked down the road for Mollie, and was crestfallen when I told her we had a sick child and that she elected to stay at the ranch. We exchange introductions and pleasantries, then mounted up and headed over to West End Cafe in Salida for breakfast. Very cool old auto garage converted to a restaurant, and great food.
Well fed and burping delightedly, we headed out of town, Tami leading with Duke riding sweep.
The plan was to head east a ways, and hit the dirt roads and jeep trails and make our way up to Buena Vista where we would grab some lunch and then see what to do next. A few miles out of town, we turned off on a dirt road that wound it's way along the north bank of the Arkansas river. As we turned off, Duke and Tami paused to discuss whether we would be able to get through or not, due to the high water in the river. I soon saw whey they were concerned...
Duke thought that the water was about 2 - 3 feet over the road and it was swift, although flowing along our path and not across it. Tami was a little hesitant as was I, so we decided to go back to the highway and ride further east where we could hit another dirt road. That proved to be a great decision and we were soon heading up into the high country.
photo by Hayduke
We were all impressed that these cowboys were using horses instead of ATVs to drive the herd...
The rest is mostly just a blur of incredible scenery and fun dirt riding. As a fairly novice dirt rider, I asked Duke for some pointers and his instruction was very helpful. I was also amazed at how much my old mountain biking skills played into riding the GS on dirt, especially on the steep, rocky climbs. It required a lot of concentration and a lot of letting the bike do its thing, but I tried to keep my head still and stay smooth and everything seemed to work well. I was actually a little surprised at how well things went with such a big bike...
The photo doesn't quite convey how steep this was.
photos by Hayduke
So we were riding along and I was leading at this point. Things were going good and I was feeling confident cruising along at 15 - 20 MPH when I came upon a little run-off ditch cutting across the jeep trail. No problem, roll on the throttle and lighten the front wheel and across you go - simple, right? That is, it's simple if you give it enough gas, which I did not. I slammed the front wheel into the ditch at about 20 MPH and the bike completely bottomed out. It was a hard hit, a very hard hit, but I stayed on and rode through it. Suddenly I felt something strange in the vicinity of the rear wheel. "Oh, now you've done it Sparky, you stupid ****, you've got a flat." I said to myself as I slowed to a stop. Much to my relief, I looked down to see my topbox lying on the ground next to the bike. Oh, that was what I felt, not so bad I thought.
I got off the bike and looked back to see Duke and Tami slowing to a stop beside me. I could see through their helmets a stunned look on both their faces. "What?" I asked.
Excitedly, they told me that when I bottomed out, the topbox launched straight up and forward a little, catching at least 10 feet of air before starting it's descent.
Tami said she was yelling "Don't stop!" inside her helmet because it looked like the topbox was going to land on my head! I was stunned. "You're joking, right?" I asked. They both shook their heads and we all started laughing at how ludicrous this was. I inspected the topbox and it seemed OK, so I remounted it and off we went.
Later in the ride I'm humming along a jeep trail following Tami, Duke had ridden ahead to take photos of us coming down the hill. At the bottom of the hill there was a little dip, and I rode through it fairly smoothly I thought, but I felt something weird and looked back to see the topbox lying on the ground again. This time the event was captured on film thanks to Duke...
Photo by Hayduke
I remounted the box and bungied it down this time so it wouldn't come off again. After I got back to the ranch that afternoon, I had a chance to do a more careful inspection and found that one of the mounts had cracked, probably on the first launch. I'm guessing that's why it came off so easily the second time. Since it's less than a year old, I'm going to see BMW about a warranty replacement. I'll let you know what I find out.
The rest of the ride was uneventful. The scenery was simply amazing, and I was in awe of the views from up in the high country. This is why I bought a dual-sport bike.
Photo by Hayduke
Photo by Hayduke
We hit a little rain on the descent into Buena Vista, and saw some amazing lightning strikes as we descended into town. The rain didn't last long, and had stopped by the time we sat down to burgers at K's.
It was getting late, and I only had a short hour-and-a-half ride across Cottonwood Pass to get back to the ranch. Tami and Duke decided to go to the top with me. The east side of the pass is paved, with lots of switch-backs - some peg-draggin' good fun.
We stopped at the top, and discussed the possibility of them following me down to the ranch to meet Mollie. Tami was already tired, so they decided against it since it would put them very late getting home. They did say that they were planning to come over this way the next day, and would Mollie be interested in joining them. "Heck yeah!" I said, and we agreed that they would come over the next day and go out for a ride with Mollie. I'll let her tell that story.
Tami, Duke, you guys ROCK! Thank you so much for helping make this one of my most memorable vacations ever! Oh, and thanks Duke for letting me share your photos! Feel free to post up any additions you have along with any other photos of yours I didn't use here. Thanks again guys!!!
Stay tuned, more to come...