Cool trip! From my benddualsport.com post:
Sweet weekend on the 610!
No mechanical problemos at all! And as a bonus, the morning of the ride the 610 instrument panel decided to work again! Sweet! Now I could tell how fast I was going. Handy.
It was my 1st ride that distance and back and my 1st solo trip to boot – so I brought a gas tank that I never used – um, I’ll never do that again – that tank was a pain in the ass on the way back – and at one point I had to stop cause it was hanging off the side – oops. (Yes I now acknowledge that was a dumbass move – carrying a tank? wtf?)
On the way to Tulelake I stuck to the east side of 97 taking the FS roads after LaPine, stopping on occasion to check the map – a good combination of dirt/street. No diggers, but at one point I slid off the trail – couldn’t make a downhill turn at about 40 – oops.
Some nice scenery – but the trails were a bit dry and super dusty – looking in the rearview mirror there was nothing but rootster dust. After about 5.5 hours hunger and fatigue set in, so I stopped at this kick ass Mexican hut in Merrill – Tacos a la Mexicana! (Once I download the pix from my phone I’ll post the location on el mapo – It was sooo tasty!) At the end of the day my friggin ars hurt. 6.5 hours on this bike will do that. ;^)
A good ride overall – but wished there was more trail than blacktop.
Here’s the trip from Bendo to Tulelake with pix and GPS stats:http://www.everytrail.com/view_trip.php?trip_id=47354.
The way back was grueling – 8.5 hours, aye caramba. It was mostly my fault for stopping so many frakin’ times and getting turned around. The blacktop was grueling and I longed for dirt – funny my ars didn’t seem to hurt when on the dirt/cinder/gravel trails.
Leaving Tulelake, I immediately hopped on the gravel through some massive powerlines – a couple of gated areas, but no big deal. Up and down some rocky terrain (where the extra tank decided to almost fall off) then through some mellow cinder roads. Stopped at a couple of gas stations – Bonanza – cool peeps, and one in Sprague River – cool old timer there. There was this dude there filling up his pick-up telling me all about the trails in that area (he had a CR) – and how he had a Husky chainsaw, lol. Cool dude though.
I popped on Lone Pine (missed that turn the 1st time) and headed toward Klamath Marsh.
Filled up in Chemult and headed into the Deschutes – fun ride on double track! This is the only part of the entire trip where I started seeing other peep on the trail – from this point on I would ride by the occasional truck/car/quad/ or thumper (no BMWs ;^)).
Had to cut my trip short and head through LaPine and cruise to the casa because the sun was setting fast, my rear tire had nothing left – I was slipping all over the trail, and I was getting tired – It had been about 7.5 hours.
Fun trip both ways check out my route back here with some pix of the ride, including one of Slippy, my rear tire: http://www.everytrail.com/view_trip.php?trip_id=47796.