All the good photos were taken by Peter, the rest were taken by me.
We are home - safe and sound. The bikes did great.
In contrast with last year's gonzo 8,000 miles in 20 days marathon on the major interstate roads, this trip was 12 days, 3,528 miles on mostly 2-lane roads following the spirit of the ancient glacial Lake Missoula. From the glaciers in southwestern Canada, we followed the edge of the eastern Washington state scablands, shadowing the course of the Columbia River, diverging to the east side of the Oregon Cascade mountains to Klamath Falls. Once over the California border, we paid homage to the super highway gods and flew home on Interstate 5. Great trip!
| Date | Destination | Route | Miles |
|---|---|---|---|
| starting from home, the San Francisco bay area, California | 0 | ||
| 8/19 | Elko, Nevada | 237 - 680 - 80E | 540 |
| 8/20 | Idaho Falls, Idaho | 84E | 311 |
| 8/21 | Columbia Falls | 15N - 90 - 93 - 2 | 470 |
| 8/22 | Mountain View, Alberta Canada | Logan Pass - 89 -17 - Customs - 6 - 5 | 132 |
| 8/23 | Golden, British Columbia, Canada | 5 - 2 - through Calgary - 1 | 338 |
| 8/24 | Jasper, Alberta Canada | 93 Icefield Highway | 188 |
| 8/25 | Golden, British Columbia, Canada | 93 -1 | 201 |
| 8/26 | Winfield, British Columbia, Canada | 1 - 97A | 211 |
| 8/27 | Grand Coulee, Washington | 97 - Customs - 155E | 188 |
| 8/28 | The Dalles, Oregon | 155E - 2W -17S - 395 - 82E - 84W | 293 |
| 8/29 | Alturas, California | 30 - 197S - 97 - 39 - 139 - 299 - 395 | 249 |
| 8/30 | San Francisco bay area - home! | 395 -299 - 5 - 505 -8- - 680 - 880 - 237 | 407 |
| Total trip mileage: | 3528 | ||
Photo Gallery
Click on the thumbnails to see the photos, use the Back button to return to this page.
Logan Pass across Glacier National Park, Montana - the 5-star" ride | ||||
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Icefield Highway between Jasper and Banff, British Columbia, Canada [ another "5-star" ride ] |
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Peter, my better half |
Critters along the way |
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Can you find the critter? |
This little guy was on duty. |
The Sentry |
Bronze Buck at the Super 8 |
Three bronze deer |
Lake Louise, Banff, British Columbia, Canada |
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| leftmost picture: The bird sitting on the fellow's hand was hoping for food. | |||
Eastern Washington Scablands - at Dry Falls |
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| The east side of the state is desert. | Dry Falls is a series of cliffs that were once waterfalls ranging from 300 to 450 feet in height. The holes were scoured in the ground by boulders during the ancient Missoula glacier flood. | |||
Oregon |
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 If you love the desert, eastern Oregon has plenty of it. That is Mount Hood (11,249 ft, or 3,429 meters) way in the background. Mount Hood is part of the scenic Cascade range in the western part of the state. |
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When is Ice not Cold?
The ride to Columbia Falls, Montana was so cold that we had to pull over and find something hot to drink in a cup that would warm up Peter's hands (my bike has heated grips). We added more layers of clothing and Peter switched to his cold weather gloves. Neither of us had brought our electric vests - we won't make that mistake on the next trip.
Several days later in Pasco, Washington it was 104 degrees in the shade. Once again I thought about acquiring those cooling vests (non-electric) - you soak the vest in water before you put it on under your skin-protecting jacket. The evaporation of the water cools you as you ride. There's a delightful panaderia (Mexican bakery) in Pasco called Viera's - delightful because they have espresso and they had ice. Normally Peter has a double shot and I have a single shot but I knew we still had many miles to go, so I ordered a double shot. Peter filled up on a bottle of water and offered me his espresso on ice - my first "quad shot". But what to do with the two cups of ice chips?
I didn't want to use up the bottle of water in my tank bag to soak my bra-top - that's the emergency bottle of water. Ice chips, ice chips, sure, why not. Peter's eyes bugged out as he watched me pour the first cup of ice chips down the front of my top. I offered him the second cup of ice chips, "Here, you can put these down your pants." He put both hands up, palms facing me, and backed up a few steps. "No thanks." "Okay." I squished the clump of ice chips out towards my ribs to make room and dumped the second cup of ice chips down my chest. The ice didn't feel all that cold. I put on my jacket, and we rode for another few hours to The Dalles in Oregon.
On the trip home, roasting our tires at high speed on Highway 5, we stopped at the Chevron gas station in Willows, home of my favorite track, Thunder Hill. Standing under a tree, I shared my cup of ice chips with a soon-to-be commissioned guide dog, Lucy, a lovely female white golden lab. The ice chips were going down my top again, a little dog slobber wasn't going to change the cooling effect of the ice. Without giving it a second thought, I poured the ice into my bra top and oh my heavens that ice was cold! Freezing! "It's not 104 degrees! It's not 104 degrees!" I shouted at Peter. Jumping up and down didn't help. There was nothing left to do but put on the jacket, grit my teeth, get on the bike and ride. Ten degrees (estimated) of ambient air temperature makes a difference. A big difference.
No, this entry isn't about the trip. I've had no time to work on that. This is just a collection of random thoughts from recent morning commute rides.
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There's section of Highway 101 north, just north of Candlestick (aka 3Com, Monster) Park, where the surface of the highway is so rippled that the first time I rode over it several years ago, I thought my rear tire had blown. Depending on traffic, when approaching that section, I'll switch lanes to avoid the bumps. This morning, being in an ornery mood, I deliberately rode the rumbles, singing the tag line from Iron Butterfly's "In-a-godda-da-vida" in the lowest growly voice I could muster. The road surface did a fine job of emulating the distortion normally provided by the distortion bar on an electrical guitar.
When I first starting riding I dreaded coming home on highway 101 South just north of Menlo Park where the road surface bumps are perfect for causing you to bite the inside of your cheek, not once, but several times, until you figure out the right amount of slack in the jaw muscles. Too tight and your teeth chatter, too loose and you'll draw blood from somewhere in your mouth.
"In-a-gadda-da-vida, honey
Don't you know that I'm lovin' you
In-a-gadda-da-vida, baby
Don't you know that I'll always be true"
I just recently learned that the guys were trying to sing, "In the
Garden of Eden, Baby" but they were laboring under the influence
of some intoxicant and were unable to enunciate their own lyrics. Hence,
"In a gadda da vita, baby." [Thank you, Dennis]
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As of today I have received three separate inquiries about lowering the GS. One from a fellow who did buy one and lower it, one from a 60-year female rider who is thinking about selling her Gold Wing to get a GS, and one inquiry from another female rider age unknown but her email text made her sound younger than 60. BMW Motorrad as a organization is very supportive of women riders in every way except for building bikes that can be ridden by shorter riders without major modifications.
* * *
On Saturday, about one third into my normal morning ride to the dojo, I glanced at my bike's clock and merde alors! it was much later than I thought. I hate being late for anything, especially class! The baby hooligan that lurks within manifested fully. Already riding in the "fast lane" I got on the rear end of the car in front of me who was not driving at the customary 80 mph tolerated by the cops. That car moved out the of way. I worked my way up the highway aggressively clearing the lane either with my high beam flashing, riding tail, putting out "Move that heap!" energy, or by passing. My racing friends would have been proud of a couple of my moves - well-timed, efficient, take-no-prisoners passes although I still signaled each and every time.
I've kept my bad karma cache pretty clean for the years I've been riding, one or two accidental rudenesses, but otherwise I've been a polite, patient rider. This morning, I sullied my reputation. And for what? To not be tardy? Habits we form as small children are hard to break. I sucked my thumb for years beyond what is considered "normal", and had teeth that were going to knocked out of my head by a tether ball if something wasn't done. My parents, bless them, put me in the care of an orthodontist who put braces on my teeth. He ran his business by the clock. Mothers were encouraged to be "on time" for appointment with a simple mechanism - billing for every 10-minute increment that the patient was late. My father must have paid a few of those "late fees" over the years. The family joke was that people who were speeding were late for an orthodontia appointment.
I arrived at the dojo in one piece with no memory of car horns or middle-finger salutes - hopefully they truly didn't happen. As I was walking briskly to the dojo I saw another student, one who is never late, coming towards me. utt ohh. "The fact that you aren't already on the mat gives me the impression that I'm not late." "You're not late, you've got ten minutes." Hmm, that's cutting it tight, but I wasn't going to be late.
After class I compared the bike's clock to the time on my cell phone and sure enough, my bike's clock was eight minutes fast. Isn't German engineering supposed to be completely trustworthy? Apparently not for motorcycle clocks. Maybe I should swap in a Swiss clock. And for the rest of the year, I have to be a good girl but even so, I doubt I'll ever really clean up my riding karma from the morning's hooligan stain. Worse, every jerk rider that I see in the future has to be given the consideration, "Maybe he's late for his orthodontia appointment."