Author Topic: Weekend Ride  (Read 1627 times)

Offline ShadowJack

  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Posts: 52
  • Country: us
  • Weirdo Freak
    • Motorcycle Touring
Weekend Ride
« on: June 06, 2016, 08:40:41 AM »
Jeanne and I took the Concours out for the weekend. Riding from my place down to 70 and then heading west over the mountains. I followed my checklist to have a full loadout and of course found I'd missed a couple of important things. The intent was to see how the bike worked for a multi-day ride, space wise and comfort wise.

Temps lowered as we climbed up towards Eisenhower tunnel reaching about 64F. The ride down to Vail was excellent of course, very fast, nice sweepers, limited traffic. Someone in a Porche 911 mostly kept up but I wasn't pushing it either. It gradually got warmer as we continued west. 70 started descending after leaving Rifle following the Colorado River down towards Grand Junction and the temps increased. At 95F we were both having to stop more often just to stay awake. We snagged a room in Grand Junction and tried to cool down (hotel ACs don't really work all that well :) ).

There were quite a few Harley riders out and a smaller number of Adventure, Touring, Sport-Touring, and Sport bikes out and about.

Sunday we headed back to Rifle and then north to Meeker and Craig. It's a 2 lane, 65mph road, except when following Harley riders who insisted on doing 45mph for some reason. Being spread out kept folks behind them from passing. At a moderately long passing area, I zipped up and past finally passing the first guy in the beginnings of the no passing area. It didn't happen a great deal but there were a few times where we were stuck behind slow Harleys and the ride up Cameron pass, stuck behind an RV and a guy towing a boat. None of these guys had the sense to pull over to let people by or pull into the slow vehicle pullouts.

Once we got past the slow Harleys, we went through Meeker and then made the right in Craig to head to Steamboat Springs for lunch. Big running event going on so the roads were filtering down to one lane in either direction slowing things down a bit.

Heading up Rabbit Ears pass was excellent. Nice sweepers and cooler temps. Coming down the other side and lots of snow on the sides of the road. Good stuff. Left towards Walden. Long straights, windy ride.

After Walden, we headed up Cameron Pass and then down the other side. Again, snow in the pass and on the eastern slopes. Still a lovely ride. Finally in Fort Collins and then south home.

Most of the issues were the same ones I've had in the past. I didn't wear my bicycle pants which I usually wear on longer rides so my butt was in some discomfort. I was able to bend over onto the tank bag to rest a bit now and then plus stand up to stretch. Foot pegs are still bleeding uncomfortable.

The bike definitely is a different ride than the Hayabusa when on trips. A bit more susceptible to the winds. A bit less certain in the curves. But some of that is just me I'm sure. I did some good curves in so it was still fun.

California and the PCH and Jasper/Banff will be interesting in a few weeks. :D

I have a couple of hours of Video from the GoPro I need to filter out and will need to make some adjustments for it so it has a better, more secure mount and so I have more capacity.