Finally rode the Three Sisters

[poser]

I feel legit now, because I finally made it out to the Three Sister [Hwy 335, 336, and 337]. I definately see what all the hype is about, and I don't know what took me so long to get out there.

The pastor of my church rides, and organizes a guys trip every October [this was yr 5 or 6]. He has some close family friends with extra beds so lodgin in Leakey is free. This year I was finally able to tag along and enjoyed every minute of it.

The plan: Ride out on back roads in Thursday, and get settles in. Get up Friday and do the Sisters loop a few times. Saturday ride to Leukenbauch for lunch. Sunday Head home. Well you know what they say about plans. I ended up having to work a little more than a half day Thursday so i couldn't head out with the rest of the group. So I loaded the FZ up in the truck and hauled her out. Riding in a new place with twisty road after dark with that much wildlife didn't sound like a good idea.

Thursday we got up and got ready to ride. I though I was going to be the only "npn-cruiser", but a pair of GS's showed up. Those dudes were both fast, but the guy on the yellow one was WAY FAST, and I'm certain certifiably insane.
The pace we were staying is just off 337, about a mile east of 83, and since we were waiting on one more rider coming from that direction we went that way first. We rode 337 east almot until it Tees when we saw our other rider. Pulled over and took some pics, talked a little and headed west.

"If you ain't first, yer last.... know what I mean..... That phrase is trade marked and not to be used outside the permission of Ricky Bobby Inc."

Once we got back to Leakey, we continued west to Camp Wood. Being that we got a later start than desired, it was about lunch time so we stopped and ate.

I'm just realizing that I didn't take one pic of food on the trip. Next year I will not make that mistake.

 

[M38A1]

...but a pair of GS's showed up. Those dudes were both fast, but the guy on the yellow one was WAY FAST

Glad you finally made the sisters run. Fun place, isn't it?

And yes, those GS's are like a wolf in sheeps clothing. As a side note, the Mandarin Orange ones are the fastest of the colors so I can vouch for your buddy.

.

 

[TWTim]

Congrats! You conquered the Sisters. Great pics. Thanks for taking us along.

 

[poser]

From there we rode 55 north to Barkesdale and connected with 335, then east on 41 and back down to Leakey on 336.
We fueled up and rode the same loop backwards. I didn't really get into my groove until the second loop, but I prefer the way went the second time better, and I think 335 was my favorite.
We rode a brisk pace, sometimes WAY too fast, but never over my head. I really appreciated the lack of LEO precence, though I don't know if that was normal.

I tell you, there were times I couldn't believe I was still in Texas. Great veiws, great curves, mad elevation change, sharp blind corners, fast wide open sweepers, I was in HEAVEN. It felt like a really big race track, and I was thankful I had done a few track days to up the fun and safety factors. Watch out for those blind corners, saw some rocks in the road in a few spots, and I remember at least two blind decreasing radius right handers, that had the guy in front of me in the on coming lane and me leaning a lot.

We pretty much had the roads to ourselves on Friday, it was perfect.

this is a sticker I designed. I'm thinking about "launching" my own gear brand: t-shirts, hats, stickers, etc... and this would be my logo. Right now I'm thinking about calling it: Concussion Racing

 

[poser]

Glad you finally made the sisters run. Fun place, isn't it?

And yes, those GS's are like a wolf in sheeps clothing. As a side note, the Mandarin Orange ones are the fastest of the colors so I can vouch for your buddy.

.

That dude was on knobbies and he was scraping the pegs on every turn, there was no way I could hope to keep up once things got really twisty. Though he didn't respect [read: fear ] the blind turns like I was.

I will say, I'm convinced the guys at Yamaha rode the R1 on the sisters and asked themselves: "what can we do the the R1 to make this type of riding more enjoyable?" I know lets loose the clip-ons and plastic and throw on some bars". The FZ1 was way too much fun out there, and between: you, me and the fence post I should probably be in jail

more pics to come......

 

[gixxerjasen]

I'm going to be an "I told you so."

You wouldn't have had anywhere near as much fun on a boring slow old Uly.

Good looking bike and that's a great sticker, I like it. Glad you had a good time. I'd like to get down there, it's just that it's almost as far to go to Arkansas. You planning any trips up there soon? Spring maybe? Gotta get our FZ1's up there.

 

[poser]

Abandoned gas station in Barksdale IIRC...

A look over spot on 337

 

[poser]

You know what they say about "the best laid plans of men"...
Saturday the "plan" was to have lunch in Luekenbach, apparently there is a place with a killer pulled pork sammich. Well one of the GS guys wore is tire to the cords all the way around [they were hitting some dirt roads], and was in desperate need of a new tire. So they called ahead and the suzuki/Yamaha shop in Kerrville had his tire in stock [we were all pleasently surprised].

Once I hit my groove I hung with the GS guys and we'd wait on the reat of the group somewhere in the shade

Getting the tire at the shop took a much bigger chunk out of the day than anyone thought, so we nixed Luekenbach and headed back to Leakey via Bandera and eventually 173. Not superb, but still an enjoyable ride. The reason for heading back was to hit the sisters one more time before the sun had time to set.

The GS's and myself get back to Leakey and fuel up. One of the other riders showed up [my pastor who rides that shadow surprisingly fast], rolled up a little later and said he'd wait for the rest of the group if we wanted to take off. So we did.
We went up 336, over on 41, back down 335 [my fav] and 337 back into Leakey at unlawful speeds. The other rides went the oposite direction and we passed them north of Barksdale. So we decided we had time to run 337 east till it ended and back, and we did, again at unlawful speeds. We barely squeazed that one in, as the sun was making it very dificult in some spot to see.

Well that's about it. It was great riding, and I'm already getting excited for next years trip out there.

The rest of the pics can be found here...
http://thebohacpage.smugmug.com/Mot...ide-Leakey-TX/14195281_s7Sej#1048219349_bbA6f

 

[poser]

I'm going to be an "I told you so."

You wouldn't have had anywhere near as much fun on a boring slow old Uly.

Good looking bike and that's a great sticker, I like it. Glad you had a good time. I'd like to get down there, it's just that it's almost as far to go to Arkansas. You planning any trips up there soon? Spring maybe? Gotta get our FZ1's up there.

yeah, yeah, yeah, you were right, and I'm glad. As much as I love the Uly, there were many times on this trip I was glad i got the fizzy instead.

 

[Mer]

Outstanding! I hope to head down that way and ride those roads in the near future. Thanks for showing me what I've been missing. Great pictures!

 

[bamspringtx]

I do believe I saw your group. It was My first time to do the three sisters! Such unbelievable riding! Can't wait until next year!

 

[StarSapphire]

I told J he needs to head out that way too... Maybe you all should have an FZ-Sisters ride???

 

[MCRyder]

Congrats on successfully completing the 3 Sisters route.

My son and I rode the 3 Sisters (that just sounds so....suggestive ) Saturday. This was as part of my annual group who have been riding the area for a number of years. It was Cameron's 2nd time, both on his FZ1

We also had the roads pretty much to oursevles also, except for the bicycle event going on. I have a great deal of respect for cyclists and always give them plenty of room But some of their group were't excercising good positional control and were veering into ours and the oncoming lane. We had to slow way down and swerve a few times to avoid near collisions, very distracting.

If you didn't this time, stop in at the Lone Star Motorcycle Museum. Always worth a stop.

 

[gixxerjasen]

I told J he needs to head out that way too... Maybe you all should have an FZ-Sisters ride???

Hmmmm.....

 

[poser]

I told J he needs to head out that way too... Maybe you all should have an FZ-Sisters ride???

that might could be arranged

Congrats on successfully completing the 3 Sisters route.

My son and I rode the 3 Sisters (that just sounds so....suggestive ) Saturday. This was as part of my annual group who have been riding the area for a number of years. It was Cameron's 2nd time, both on his FZ1

We also had the roads pretty much to oursevles also, except for the bicycle event going on. I have a great deal of respect for cyclists and always give them plenty of room But some of their group were't excercising good positional control and were veering into ours and the oncoming lane. We had to slow way down and swerve a few times to avoid near collisions, very distracting.

If you didn't this time, stop in at the Lone Star Motorcycle Museum. Always worth a stop.

We rode past it, and I meant to try and get back over there to check it out. Next year I'll make sure and stop.

 

[Tourmeister]

The fun thing about the GS's is that you can pretty much put it in one gear and go. It has so much torque that shifting is optional most of the time. Of course the last time I was out on the Sisters was on my 1150GS...

It came apart at the top of the climb heading out of Leakey to Campwood while leaned over in a corner running about 70mph...

My first on the road encounter with the R1150GS was in Colorado. We met these two old guys on massively loaded GS's and had a good visit with them. I was on my VFR 800 at the time and had never even seen a GS. They took off and we left a few minutes later. I was convinced we'd be overtaking them in short order because we were running a "brisk" pace... There was only one road out from where we were so I know they did not turn off anywhere, but we never caught up to them! That kind of got my attention.... hehe.

Some years after that I had my own GS and soon learned that it was a bike that is VERY easy to ride fast in the twisties Even on knobbies...

I was leading a group ride in Arkansas and Missouri in the above shot. All the other riders were on sport bikes of various makes. I had no trouble running a pace that kept them on their toes, shod with knobbies.

So what did you think of the cattle guards?

Also, next time you get out there, run up Hwy 55 toward Rocksprings from Barksdale. The first 16 miles are a real blast. Fast four lane sweepers. Just be warned though... if you run real fast you can get in trouble. It is patrolled and it was posted an absurdly low 55mph last time I was out there.

 

[zombierider]

My Dad and a couple friends rode the sisters this past weekend. My Dad and I showed up on wed. and rode 337,335,336 thur, fri,and sat. I love those roads. Instead of B.J.'s everyone should eat at "Two Fat Boys BBQ" in camp wood that place was AMAZING!

 

[poser]

After the first few the cattle guards didn't bother me. I just tried to be a little upright and maybe slow down a little for them. Had it been wet, I would have exercised much more caution.

Two Fat Boys BBQ, I'll have to mention that to the group for our next trip.

Speaking of food, we ate at The Lodge [corner of 337 and 83 next to the hotel] there in Leakey Friday and Saturday night. Its apparently been taken over in the last few months and the owner turned the restaurant over to some chef from NY. Super nice guy, and a total character, he is DEFINITELY from NY. The first night we got the rib-eyes, and they were very good. Some o the guys got the "thick cut", let me tell you those steaks were at least 2" thick if not more. Great place, we sat outside, the chef would come out and hang with us. It was BYOB so some of the guys bought a bottle of wine and a few brews and we had a good time just hanging out. Super nice folks. Oh an their pecan cobbler and blackberry cobbler was very tasty!