Day 2 - Roseburg to Willow Creek

We had a good night's rest, and had showers and coffee without too much haste.  We knew we'd have much more pleasant riding ahead of us in not too much time.  Under the light of sunshine, we got a better look at the motel itself.

Tastefully decorated, you say?

Tasteful if you enjoy a floral theme...

...and Franklin Mint cat plates (with a bare lightbulb for atmosphere).

It was quite an eyeful, and not normally the type of motel I'd voluntarily visit, but, the staff was friendly, the room was clean, and the price was right.  And it certainly had more personality than any Motel 6 or Super 8.

We got all our stuff together and got back on the road, and had about another hour of travel on I-5 before we could split off to more interesting roads.  

We stopped in Grants Pass for gas and a stretch, and couldn't ignore that everything was shrouded in haze.  There were wildfires nearby, fortunately in the opposite direction of where we were headed, but the smoke was inescapable nonetheless.

Before our trip, I'd petitioned the collective wisdom of the folks at ADVRider on what roads they might suggest for good motorcycling in Northern California.  We got some good recommendations, the first of which was Waldo Rd. which wasn't far outside of Grants Pass.  We rode for a while, certain we'd missed it somehow, but after pulling over to check where we were on my smartphone, we realized that our sense of scale was off, and we were just a few miles short of Waldo Rd.  Once we turned off on there, things got a lot more interesting.  Sadly it was so interesting I didn't get any pictures.

The pavement was in good condition, there were hardly any cars to share the road with, awesome scenery throughout, and there were twisties aplenty.  Unfortunately, a lot of the turns had rocks right in the middle of the apexes, ranging anywhere from gravel to softball size to football size, and in the case of one turn, beachball sized.  This meant we had to take the turns at a slower pace, or had to do some quick recalculating as we realized our intended line was compromised.

I still haven't gotten fully comfortable taking the Tiger at a fast pace, not as fast as I would take the SV at least.  Being tall, top heavy, with soft suspension and skinny, semi-knobby tires--not to mention costing several times more--I just haven't developed the same confidence I have in the little SV.  Through one turn, I came in a little hot, and saw dreaded rocks in the middle of it.  I tried to readjust my line as best I could, which ended up taking me off the asphalt and into the dirt and rocks at the inside of the turn.  I stood the bike up and stood myself up on the pegs as I did some inpromptu off roading to get myself back on the asphalt.  All ended well, but my heart rate definitely was elevated, and I think I'm still picking bits of my underwear out of my crack.  

The road led to Happy Camp, which would be more aptly named Melancholy Settlement.  We were getting hungry by this point, but nothing in Happy Camp really struck our fancy.  We decided to press on.  

We followed Hwy 96 south, which wasn't as twisty as Waldo Rd. had been, but it was plenty curvy and had lots of scenery to boot.  No fear-inducing rocks scattered along the way either, so it was pleasant riding all around.

You can see some of the haze from the fires here.

 We saw that the roads were getting wet and that we'd just missed what looked like a pretty good little spot of rain.  The temperature had also dropped significantly.  We pulled over at a rest area to secure our electronics, zip up vents on our jackets, and take a break.  It also happened to be the site of a nice little waterfall.

The Trinity River

A moment after we'd parked and pulled off our helmets, we noticed that the parking lot was moving.  Upon closer inspection, we saw that the rain had excited a bunch of baby toads.  There were literally hundreds, if not thousands of them hopping around the parking area.  It looked like the gravel was animated.  We did our best to not step on, or roll over any, but I can't be 100% certain we managed to avoid them all.

Just a couple of the little guys, these two were safe at least.

We got back to the road, and before long ended up in Willow Creek.  It was around 3:00 PM by this point, and we'd each only had an apple so far that day.  We got some gas and tried to decide where to eat.  There was a restaurant that looked OK from the outside, but only had one car in the lot, a crowded burger joint, and a Mexican restaurant, "Gonzalez."  We decided to try Gonzalez.  We chose...poorly.

I ordered a burrito and a beer (reliable, if a bit unimaginative) and Chuck got the chili verde plate and an iced tea.  My burrito was large, but otherwise unremarkable.  Chuck's chili verde, on the other hand, looked like green Dinty Moore with a side of rice and beans.  Real chili verde is slow cooked pork in a tomatillo sauce, but this looked like they'd just taken chunks of meat and poured green salsa over it, making it a weird, gloppy soup.  To make matters worse, our waiter was apparently the local dude-bro and began and ended every phrase with the word "man" or "bro," as in "Hey man, you need something? Some more water? Sure, bro."  And on top of it all, the food was overpriced--my burrito was not worth $10 and Chuck's mystery glop was definitely not worth $15.  

We paid our bill and went to the small grocery store next door for any supplies for camping that evening.  We were full, and it was late enough that we didn't feel that we'd need much of anything for dinner, so we just got a bottle of Bulleit for $22.  Gotta love California's inexpensive and easily accessible liquor. 

Among the roads that were recommended to us, one of the most highly lauded was the enigmatic "FS1."  Though a forest service road, it is apparently paved from beginning to end and links Hwy 299 to Hwy 36.  In the original route recommendations, we were told where to find it coming from the south, but we weren't really clear on where to find it if coming from the north (FS1 was not listed on our paper map, and forest service roads tend to go by different names on Google Maps).  I asked on ADVRider, and was told the entrance was just past a Cal-Trans building.  I thought I'd been able to spot said building when looking at the satellite view in Google Maps.  We figured we'd find the road and then camp somewhere along the way.

It turned out that the building I'd spotted on Google Maps was in fact, not a Cal-Trans building, but a house, but we turned up the road anyway.  After several miles, the road turned to dirt.  It was getting darker out, both due to the hour, and clouds rolling in, complete with ominous thunder.  We stopped at the end of the pavement and discussed what we should do.  This was obviously the wrong road, but we figured that it would at least head in the right direction, maybe even link up with FS1.  Or, we could head back out to 299 and see if we could find the right road.  Chuck voted to press on and follow the dirt road and I acceded.  This would turn out to be our second poor decision of the day.

The dirt road wasn't bad, just slow going, especially with Chuck being on a street bike.  He was in the lead since his was the less equipped machine and I had to keep stopping to give him a lead so that I wouldn't be choking on his dust.  After not too long, the thunder grew louder, and drops began to fall.  It got to be a full on thunderstorm, and we got wet.  We were in trees though, so most of the water was dispersed by the time it reached us, and at least the rain kept the dust down.  

Eventually, the dirt turned back into pavement and we felt we'd accomplished something.  Sure, we may have taken the wrong road and sure, it might have been slow going and we got a little wet, but we'd done it, we'd persevered and made it to the other side!  Feeling not too bad about ourselves, we were toodling along when we saw a cat skulking across the road.  A big cat.  A really big cat.  It didn't take long to realize that we'd caught a mountain lion by surprise.  It took a quick look at us, turned around, and disappeared back into the woods as we rode past.  I've been on a fair number of outdoor excursions, but to date that was my first and only glimpse of a mountain lion in the wild.  I would be fine with not coming any closer to another one.

Soon enough, our road intersected with the main highway.  Excitedly we turned onto it and then our hearts sank when we saw we were on Hwy 299.  Again.  We'd just spent an hour or two riding around in the woods to effectively cover about 5 miles of highway distance. 

Fortunately, there was a campground about a quarter mile up the road and we pulled in to get our bearings and discuss our options.  We considered going back out to find the real FS1, but soon decided that it was late and the campground would do nicely for our purposes. It didn't hurt that the fee was only $6 per night.

We set up camp, and with thunder looming in the distance, elected to put up the rain flies and stash our stuff as best as possible.  We foraged some fire wood and had peaceful night with our bourbon, and hoped for better progress tomorrow.

All the sites had these stoves installed. Never seen these before, and they don't look like
they've been used in ages, but still a neat concept.

Idyllic, no?

Day 1 - Seattle to Roseburg

Due to a change in my work schedule (working 4 10s), we were able to leave earlier than originally planned.  Chuck had gotten everything squared away at his old apartment early, and spent his last couple days in Seattle on our couch.  Since we had already seen much of Washington and Oregon on previous excursions, we wanted to make as much headway as possible towards California on Day 1, which would mean a long day of riding on I-5, the super slab.

After finishing work on Wednesday, I went home and prepared to do a mad dash to get everything packed and ready to go, so we could have an early departure Thursday morning. But, as it happened Chuck and Erica had been preparing a final farewell feast while I was still at work, and were about halfway done when I got home.  I tried to motivate, but was soon convinced that to do so would be fighting a losing battle.  So we had a relatively relaxed and gluttonous evening, and agreed that we might not be leaving as early as we'd hoped.

 We got up early the next morning and got everything put together, but like always, it took longer than expected, and we finally were on the road around 10:30.

Finally loaded and ready to roll

Though we were under way, we weren't fully done with responsibilities.  Chuck wanted to stop and say goodbye to his grandfather before leaving for good, so about 45 minutes later, we stopped in for a cup of coffee.  It was a nice little visit, Chuck's grandfather told some entertaining stories, some bad jokes, and not so subtly admonished us for being underachievers (to be fair, he was addressing Chuck, but the message applied to me as well.)

Soon enough, we were back on our way, with a quick stop at Subway to get something in our stomachs.  It had been a while since I'd eaten at a Subway, and the selection of $5 footlongs has apparently been drastically reduced. I misread the menu, and paid $6.50 for a turkey sub. It was not worth it, but it was at least something in my stomach. After our disappointing meal, we got back on the road, for real this time.

Somewhere along I-5

Most of the riding was unremarkable, as freeway riding tends to be.  We stopped in Kelso to gas up and take a break, but were back on the road soon enough.  We'd hoped that we'd be able to make it through Portland before rush hour hit, but it turned out that the vagaries of fate were not in our favor.  We made it across the bridge and into Portland without issue, but once we hit the area of the city center, it was stop and go.

We crept along at a snail's pace, the heat of the sun and our engines effectively baking us evenly on both sides.  Our clutch hands were sore, and the unrelenting nature of the traffic jam became less bearable as we inched our way forward.  We pulled off at a rest stop outside of Wilsonville, which is more or less the outskirts of the Portland metro area.  Fortunately, that also heralded the end of rush hour traffic, and after a nice break, we were able to go at highway speeds again.

Somewhere in the Willamette Valley

We weren't sure how far we would make it that night.  Our gung ho target was Grant's Pass, the juncture where we would leave the boredom of the interstate for the joys of scenic byways.  We may have been able to reach it had we left Seattle earlier, but that would have really been pushing it for our situation.  We instead chose Eugene as a more realistic goal.

By the time we were close to Eugene though, we both agreed that we could push on farther, and readjusted our sights on Roseburg, more or less halfway between Eugene and Grant's Pass.

The sun was getting low as we neared Roseburg

I like the way this shot turned out.

We rolled into Roseburg just as it was getting dusky.  Chuck gave in to the idea to get a motel room for this night.  Normally we'd look for a place to camp for have arrangements to stay at someone's house, but for after a day full of riding, with waning light, we didn't want to have to deal with finding a campsite and pitching camp.  So we took one of the first exits to Roseburg and started making phone calls to the different motels in the area.

After calling most of the motels that came up on a Google search, it looked like Motel 6 would be our best bet.  They wanted ~$75 a night, which was more than we wanted to pay, but most everything else was coming up as $100-150.  I made one more call to a place called the Rose City Motel, and was quoted $60 for two people, including tax.  Sounded like a deal!

We made our way to the motel and then found out that they didn't actually have any double rooms available. Being that we were prepared for camping, we said that was fine, so long as the room was big enough to accommodate a sleeping pad on the floor. It turned out that the best candidate was the honeymoon suite, which was only slightly awkward.  It had a bed, a couch, a table and chairs, a kitchenette, air conditioning, wifi, and most importantly, a roof and a door.

So cozy...

There was a Safeway about half a mile away.  We contemplated taking the bikes, but it was a pleasant night and after being in the saddle all day, a walk sounded good.  When we got to the store, we wandered around thinking about what we wanted to eat.  There was a lady cleaning the deli and she apparently thought Chuck was cute so went ahead and made a sandwich for him even though the deli was technically closed.  She made it extra large, so that the one sandwich was plenty for the two of us.  Needless to say, it was a MUCH better experience than what Subway provided earlier.

The Safeway had a pretty good selection of beer so I got us a couple 22s and we headed back to the motel to eat our sandwiches, drink our beer, and figure out some of our route for the next day.  We passed out soon thereafter.

2013 Road Trip - Where to go this time?

Prologue:

This year's trip will have marked my third big motorcycle trip, and the longest yet to date.  After last year's trip to Glacier, I decided I wanted a different motorcycle for long range excursions, one that would offer better comfort over the duration and would also be able to handle light off-roading if I wanted.  But, I also wanted something that would have the right engine and gearbox to get up and go when I felt the urge.  My 1st Gen SV650S had served me well, but wasn't really the ideal machine for what I was looking for. So, after lots of research, and a deal that I convinced myself was too good to pass up, I bit and took possession of a 2012 Triumph Tiger 800 XC, as well as a fresh load of debt and expenses.  No bike is the perfect "do everything" machine, but it seemed that of the offerings, the Tiger would come closest to it for my needs.  I'd taken it out for a few day trips--some with better results than others (but that's another story)--and I was eager to take it out for the long haul.

After some discussions, Chuck and I decided we'd hit up California this year.  I'd been saving up my vacation time as best I could in preparation for a long trip.  I suggested we try to hit Santa Barbara, the town where we'd both previously lived before moving to Washington, though we'd only gotten to know each other after the fact.  Chuck wasn't opposed to the idea, but didn't think he'd be able to get enough time off from work to be able to do the trip properly.  We planned on a compromise to make it to the Bay Area instead and spend a few days there.

All seemed well and we were bookmarking the trip for some time in August.  But then we both had some life hiccups happen to us.  For me, my living situation got turned upside down when my landlady hit the greed button and effectively extorted me into a search for a new apartment.  For Chuck, he had some things go down in his personal life, the most significant of which was his job situation taking a severe turn for the worse.

After lots of stress, I ended up joining forces with my friend Erica, and we were able to find a place that we could afford, and would accommodate my bikes and her cat.  It was good to have my living situation squared away, but the whole ordeal really threw a wrench in my plans of a summer of motorcycle trips.

For Chuck, he finally got to a breaking point with his job, and quit.  Hearing some of the stuff that he had to deal with, I couldn't blame him for making the decision.  The major downside to that, at least from my perspective, was that he quit without any intention of finding a new job in the area.  It was about a month before his lease ended, and he'd concluded that his time in Seattle was done, and that he would pack up his bags and move to Texas to be closer to his family.

It was a major blow to me, but I could see the signs of something like this happening long before now.  On the  plus side, it meant that he had no work responsibilities any more, so Santa Barbara became a viable destination.  I quickly requested to have a couple weeks off at work, right around the time of Chuck's lease ending.  My request was approved, and we officially planned on SB as our destination.

Day 9 Goldendale to Home

We got up early in the morning and got packed up in record time.  We had the scent of home in our nostrils, so to speak, and didn't want to waste any time in getting there.  We let ourselves have coffee, but mostly, our morning consisted of waking up, packing our bags and breaking camp.  There was a mention of showers, but neither of us felt particularly compelled.

Our last campsite, I'd only remembered to take a pic as we were packing up.

In original plans, we wanted to hit a well known motorcycling road called Windy Ridge, which was back down by where we saw the wildfire the day before, and while we were at it, to hit a cool little stretch of road on the other side of the river, outside of The Dalles, OR.  As it was though, we wanted to get a move on, so saved those roads for another time, and instead just went on the 142, a road that Chuck had ridden on a previous trip and recommended.

Chuck guaranteed that I would like it, and had actually shown me footage of it before, but with all the road discussions we'd had, and my mind distracted by other things, I forgot exactly what this road was supposed to be.  It started out OK, but nothing particularly noteworthy--it was a farm road that was mostly straight, with a few turns thrown in every now and then.  Not bad, but pretty similar to what we'd seen the past couple days.

That soon changed though as we found ourselves winding down through a canyon, back towards the Gorge.  It not only was a scenic and twisty canyon road, but it also became sort of a one lane road.  The center line disappeared and a rider could easily imagine that he was on a fun one way road winding down through a canyon.  We had a car come the other way to remind us that it was indeed a two way road, and a damn narrow one at that.

It was a nice little ride, with a couple fun surprises, like a sharp turn that was so crowned it was basically a dome, with a person's front lawn directly on the other side.  We wondered how many errant drivers/riders have ended up in that yard.  

The only picture I took of the Columbia, doesn't come close to justice.

Soon enough, we were back on the 14, riding along the banks of the Columbia.  We were hungry and our bikes were thirsty, so we stopped in White Salmon for breakfast and gas.  White Salmon didn't have a whole lot to offer, but we did find a cafe that looked nice enough, and had breakfast out on the sidewalk.  Our server was mighty pleasant and the food was good.

I look lost in thought. Probably thinking about a shower.

In looking at the map, there were really only two options for us if we wanted to head north and west, either go over towards Portland and head north from there, or head north earlier to take us up past Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Rainier.  I'd done the road by the mountains on my trip last year, and while I remembered a few good views along most of the road I recalled as being not so remarkable in terms of scenery and horribly damaged in places.  I told Chuck about my recollection, and he said he'd rather brave those roads than be stuck on I-5 or other major highways.  Fair enough.  So we took the mountain route.

At first, I thought I may have been thinking of the wrong road, or that the WA DOT had actually been on the ball and done some serious work in the span of a year.  The road was in great condition and we got to have some fun in some well sculpted turns.  But as we went farther north, the road conditions deteriorated, especially on the northbound lane.  The asphalt was filled with all sorts of ruts, holes, dips, lumps, ridges, whathaveyou, from all the snow and ice that's in the area in the winter months.  Going fast on this road was not an option, it was more of a mental exercise in finding the path that would be the least jarring.  

That aspect of the ride was fairly taxing.  You had to keep your wits about you, because it felt like an obstacle course.  And on top of that, you had to keep standing and sitting to help the suspension with all the bouncing that was going on.  At least, that's what I was doing.  I have no idea if Chuck was doing the same--I was too busy wrestling with my bike to see what Chuck was up to.

Eventually, we got to the end of that road and after a little rest break in Randle, we were due to be on somewhat major roads for the rest of the day.  This was Labor Day weekend, and it was Saturday, so we soon felt the congestion of civilization making its presence known.  We would be stuck behind cars, and there was no sense in trying to pass them, because there would just be more cars ahead of them.

I guess I'd been expecting that and had resigned myself to it.  I knew it wouldn't be fast paced, but so long as we were moving at a steady speed, I wasn't too worried about it.  Chuck, on the other hand, felt differently.

He got increasingly more irritable as we were stuck in traffic.  We weren't talking a whole lot on the intercom, but I could tell by his riding that he was getting pissy.  We stopped for one more gas up in Eatonville where Chuck confessed his agitation.  He said that he needed to get something to eat, but I wasn't really hungry myself.  I was more in a mood to just get home.  Chuck agreed that he pretty much felt the same and that we should just push on.

In retrospect, we should have planned our route a little better at that point.  The road we took north was the worst stretch of the trip, in my opinion.  It was like any semi-urban road in America--straight with a stoplight at least every quarter mile, with an array of run down businesses and newer big box stores.  We were probably on that stretch for half an hour or so, but it felt like an eon of monotony.

We'd meant to get on I-5 from there, just so we could make time, but instead ended up on 167, another boring, straight road.  At least 167 is a highway though, no stoplights to deal with, only holiday traffic.  We rode in the HOV lane and made decent time and before too long, were in spitting distance of Seattle.  

167 connects with 405, and once we hit 405, Chuck was out of there.  All the pent up aggression manifested itself in his right wrist and he was zipping along, weaving in between cars, pulling maneuvers that would leave Vanilla Ice chagrined.  I did my best to keep up with him while not further pissing off the drivers he left in his wake.

We had to cross Lake Washington to get to my place, so took I-90 to cross over.  Chuck had been going pretty fast on 405, but once we hit I-90, which had the express lanes open in our direction, Chuck let loose and opened up the throttle.  I followed suit, if I didn't, Chuck would have disappeared into the distance.  We flew by cars like they were standing still and my SV was definitely working hard with the weight and drag of the luggage and long days of riding in its recent history--I felt a bit like Rooster Cogburn pushing Li'l Blackie for all he was worth.  I was also apprehensive of any police, my first speeding ticket in many years still fresh in my memory.  

But, fortunately for us, no police were patrolling that stretch of I-90 that day, and we made it into Seattle proper where there was some expected traffic.  It was nothing major though, and 15 minutes later, we pulled into my driveway.  

Road weary, and in a bit of a daze, we relaxed with a couple ceremonial tumblers of Knob Creek and reflected on the past 9 days.  We had had a few hiccups on the way, but no major breakdowns or disasters.  We'd managed to stay in good spirits most of the time, and had managed to not get sick of each other over the span.  The prospect of hot showers, plumbing, refrigeration, electricity, relaxation, video games, and soft beds were beckoning to us, but there was no denying it:  this had been a fantastic trip.

Day 8 St. Maries, ID to Goldendale, WA

[Author's note: Unfortunately, the pictures are few and far between at this point in the trip, we were apparently more set on getting home than taking pictures.]


With the promise of home in the not-too-distant future, we were motivated  to break camp earlier than usual.  We got all packed up and Chuck insisted on bringing the leftover firewood, since it was good wood, and we'd paid good money for it.  I agreed, plus it would come in handy later when we camped that night.

Chuck doing his impression of "Bear Grylls finds a honeycomb"

Our route took us through Idaho and eastern Washington farmland which as far as farmland goes, was actually not bad riding.  There were small hills, so most of the roads had some decent curves scattered around, though they were all slightly sketchy without much banking, slick tarry spots, or scattered gravel at driveways.  Still, it was all in all pleasant riding.

Before too long, my gas light came on, and after the experience outside of Glacier where I was basically riding on fumes, I expressed my concern to Chuck.  He wasn't too worried about it, as according to the map, we'd be hitting small towns every 10 miles or so.  Well, the map was right, we did hit small towns along the way, but calling them towns might be an exaggeration.  Usually when people talk of small towns, they mean it might have a couple stores, a gas station, and maybe a post office.  Well, the “towns” we went through didn't even have gas stations.

We eventually came to one though, that had a commercial gas place, and had a small garage with a couple gas pumps out front.  We cruised through the "town" to see if there was some part that we were missing, and no, it didn't appear that we were.  We decided to give the garage a try since our fuel situation was getting more desperate with every passing moment.

We pulled into the garage, and immediately an older fellow came out to greet us.  I asked him if their pumps were indeed operational, and he said one was, so long as I was OK with regular gas.  I was, and was glad to fill up my tank.  The dials on the pump weren't functional, at least as far as I could tell, and the guy was cash only.  I don't know about the quality of the gas, or how much it was per gallon, I was just thankful to be safe for riding again.  

Chuck put in a little gas in his bike too, until we could get to a bigger town with a proper gas station.  The next town, as it would turn out, was Colfax, WA where we gassed up again (I only put in like .3 of a gallon) and Chuck got some unsolicited advice for roads from some Harley guys.  We were ready for lunch, and agreed on a Mexican place, Sol Vallarta.

The clientele was all white in there, but the staff was brown, so while they may have catered to gringos, the food was still pretty good.  I had some chipotle enchiladas with shredded beef, and they hit the spot.

In looking at the map, there was a promising sounding road called "Snake River Canyon" but the drawback was that it would take us ultimately south and east, the opposite direction of where we wanted to go.  Earlier in the trip we would have been OK with the diversion, but the name of the game now was making miles.  There was a road that looked nearly as interesting as the Snake River Canyon road, but took us in the right direction, so we decided to give that a try.  According to the map, we'd cross over a dam and then head north and west from there.

We found the road without much trouble, and it was indeed a cool, twisty road, though it wasn't in the greatest condition, so we kept our speed in check.  When we got to the bottom of the canyon though, and got to the dam, we were thrown for a loop.  

The dam was all blocked off with chain link fence and signs about authorized personnel only and ID checks and such.  We were immediately disheartened and stopped to look at the map to see if there were alternate routes.  The only options were to backtrack to either Colfax or a junction that would take us on Snake River Canyon Rd.  We both agreed that we'd seen enough of Colfax, and decided that the Snake River Rd. diversion would be the lesser of the two evils.  As we were turning around though, we noticed that a car we'd passed earlier was waiting at the gate to the dam.

The driver was elderly and didn't look like he was an employee there, so we turned around and waited at the gate behind him.  A white truck pulled up with a security officer behind the wheel.  He waved the old man through and then asked us for our IDs.  As it turned out, the dam road was still available to the public, but you had to give your ID at the entrance so that they would know you weren't some terrorist or something.

The guy checked our IDs and gave us the rundown of crossing the dam: go slow, don't stop, and since we were on motorcycles, to be careful of the tracks that we had to cross (basically like train tracks.)  Crossing was an interesting experience, instead of a straight road across, we had to take a serpentine route with all sorts of big industrial looking machinery around us.  Chuck said that it felt very similar to the dry docks from when he was in the Navy.  

We made it to the other side without incident, and were relieved to not have had to do a bunch of back tracking.  We followed a twisty road out of the canyon and made our way towards the Columbia River.  We hit Walla Walla along the way (the town so nice they named it twice) and pulled off for a break.  I suggested trying to find the disc golf course there, as I recalled it being a nice park to have a stretch in.  The signs left something to be desired and we ended up taking a couple wrong turns and not finding the park, and getting lost in the town, even though it's not very big.  We got our bearings with my phone eventually, and ended up riding through the campus of Whitman College.  I'd never heard of the school before, but like all colleges, it proved to be a haven of cute girls walking around in summer garb, enjoying the last of their summer.

Purty windmills

We eventually got back on track and hit the highway, which would follow along the Columbia River Gorge, and actually lead us into Oregon before hitting Washington again.  This part of the ride, we weren't especially looking forward to.  It would be one of the more major highways of our trip, not a lot of exciting riding to be had.

Taking a break before tackling the Gorge

The first leg of the section wasn't anything special, just a lot of brown, semi-arid land like you see in much of eastern Oregon and Washington, but once we got to the actual Gorge, it was beautiful.  The only thing I can think of to compare it to is the Grand Canyon.  Now, it's nowhere near as epic as the Grand Canyon, but it is very much impressive in it's own right, with cliff faces being a couple hundred feet high (I would guess).  As beautiful as it was though, it was ridiculously windy.  We were fighting the wind the whole time we were next to the water.  Although my rpm's were basically the same as normal conditions, I could tell my engine was working harder to maintain the 80 mph we were travelling (we were trying to make miles, after all).  I tucked in as best I could and tried to slipstream through it, but still, I was getting blown all over the place.

At 130 miles on my trip odometer, my gas light came on.  I have never seen it come on that early before, and as seemed to be a theme in this part of the trip, we were in a pretty uninhabited area.  Neither of us had any idea how far the next gas station was, but it had been a while since we'd seen one.

Our original, tentative plan, was to try to camp at Maryhill State Park, which was right next to the Columbia.  As it happened though, we were riding along, keeping our eyes peeled for a gas station, and we saw a big cloud of smoke on the horizon.  Soon enough, we realized that it was a wildfire, right at Maryhill.  We must have just gotten there shortly after it started, because we saw all sorts of emergency vehicles headed that way.  We stopped to take a couple pictures and figure out what we wanted to do next.

We saw that there was another state park about 20 miles away, directly north of us.  That was more or less the direction we were headed anyway, so decided that we'd hit that up for camping.

Fortunately, we hit a gas station almost as soon as we headed north and filled up.  I got something like 39 mpg on that leg, which was by far the worst gas mileage I've ever had on the SV.  We went to the park and had no trouble finding a spot.  

It was mostly RVs there, and people were giving us strange looks as we rode in, but fortunately, there were a number of tent sites that were inaccessible to people with trailers.  When we went to the fee kiosk, we were dismayed to see that it cost $22 and that no campfires were allowed.  After seeing the wildfire, we could understand the fire ban, so we didn't complain too much about that.  Still, the price was high, considering that the park wasn't much to brag about.  Heyburn had seemed like a much better kept park, and had showers included in the price.  This place, Brooks, had showers, but you had to pay quarters to use them.  And to add insult to it, the place was super dry and dusty, the kind of dust that manages to stick to you, even if you don't touch it.

We pitched camp quickly, and headed towards Goldendale to get dinner.  It was nearing dusk when we were leaving, so we made sure to put our clear visors on--the first and only time we used them the whole trip.  It felt good to use them, it was a way to reassure ourselves that they hadn't been a complete waste of space.

Chuck briefly toyed with the idea of eating at this roadhouse we passed, a derelict old building with stringed lights on the porch and a confederate flag flying from the roof.  But when we rode by and saw that we would be the only patrons there, we decided to keep going.  We ended up at a bar and grill place in downtown Goldendale, one of the few places that was open.  Enticingly, they had a sign for Rogue beer out front, so we knew it couldn't be all bad.

For whatever reason, the owner thought it was a good idea to play his jukebox at full volume, which was annoying.  We just wanted to have a nice meal and a refreshing beer, but it was like we'd stepped into a hopping club.  The owner/bartender was the only server working, and though the place wasn't busy, there were a decent number of people there and it took us a while to actually get service.

Eventually we did though, and the food wasn't bad.  We did have to kind of shout at each other, but the music actually wasn't that bad either.  It was just obnoxiously loud.  I had a fried porkchop sandwich, something I've never had before, and it was pretty good.  It went along well with my 22 oz. IPA.

We finished our meal, and headed back to camp, wary of deer.  We didn't see any, thankfully and made it back without issue.  We had an after dinner drink, to the sound of mariachi music in a nearby camp, and soon hit the sack, the promise of home in our near future.

Day 7 Glacier to St. Maries, ID

We got up the next morning and had coffee.  Since this was a primitive campground, there was no potable water onsite.  There was, however, a creek running by our site.  Chuck suggested we could just use that water to make coffee, and I expressed concern about there being cows wading in it and such.  He made coffee with it anyway, and assured me that he'd let the water boil for at least 5 minutes beforehand.  It was all good, as it turned out, my digestive tract was unharmed--that is to say, nothing was any worse than usual.

It was now Thursday, and we wanted to be back home by Saturday so we could have a couple days to recoup before going back to work (Monday was Labor Day).  That meant we had 3 days to make it from Glacier to Seattle.  Not an impossible task at all, but we had an unspoken pact to avoid major highways unless it was necessary.  So we mentally prepared for the power trek we had ahead of us.

We really wanted to see the scenery of the Going-to-the-Sun road again, but we really did not want to deal with the crazy work zones and traffic, so we instead went around the long way, from East Glacier to West Glacier, which turned out to be a lot longer and more desolate than we'd anticipated.

Heading away from our campsite

There was still fantastic scenery to be had and we pulled off at a scenic overlook for a pit stop.  Chuck also had a task to perform.  I don't want to delve too much into Chuck's personal life here, but he'd recently gone through a divorce. Obviously, it's not an easy thing for anyone, and this being about the easternmost point of the trip, we had a ceremony of letting go of the past, and getting it as far away as possible. I can't speak for him, but I think it did him well.

I think Going-to-the-Sun Road is on the other side of that ridge.

The only picture where I managed to get both of us in frame

We left from there and made our way towards West Glacier, what would be the next bastion of civilization.  As we were making our way, my gas light came on, which is never a comforting sign.  We kept going, looking for gas at any point.  After a little while longer, my gas light went solid.  I had never let it get to that point before, but from what I'd read on the forums, blinking means "Yeah, you'd better think about getting gas some time soon" whereas solid means "Why are you still riding, you fool? Stop and fill up NOW!"  But, being as there was no option but to keep going, we did exactly that.  I did manage to make it to West Glacier with 180+ miles on the trip odometer (the light usually comes on around 150 or so). It was the happiest I've been to buy overpriced gas to date.

We both filled up, and decided to get lunch at the cafe attached to the store.  I had a bison burger, and Chuck had some other sort of burger.  We both felt that the meal was worthy of a "meh."  It wasn't horrible, but it wasn't much more than sustenance.  There was a souvenir shop attached, and I got a couple coasters, one for myself and one for a friend.  I had wanted to get shot glasses, but the Glacier glasses were lame...just a silhouette of a bear that said Glacier National Park underneath.  So I went for slightly less lame stone coasters with pictures of animals on them.

From then on out, we had some steady riding ahead of us as we made our way into Idaho.  We hit a lot of really cool roads along the way, though most of it is a blur

A break somewhere along the way. Is that a pile of mud in front of my bike?

No, no it's not.

We made it to St. Marie, ID where we would camp at Heyburn State Park.  Before going to the park though, we stopped at the local grocery store and got some supplies for hobo packs.  As we pulled up, a couple guys pulled up next to us and asked questions about our bikes and such.  Chuck was particularly impressed that the guy recognized that his bike was an FZ6R and was asking specific questions about it.  He was also somewhat familiar with the SV, though it was more along the lines of "Oh yeah, I think that's what my buddy's girlfriend rides."  Sigh.

While shopping, Chuck got hit on by a nasty girl--his words, not mine, though I saw the woman he was talking about and I can't really disagree.  Ahh well, its still nice to be noticed, right?

We rode to Heyburn on what would be a great twisty road, but it was late in the day so we had the sun right in our eyes.   A lot of turns we had to take slowly, and even then, had to just hope that we weren't about to run into a pothole or deer.

We didn't know what the camping situation would be like at Heyburn, so followed signs to the park HQ to find out what the deal was.  As it turned out, there were campsites right behind the HQ.  As we rode through the sites, I noticed that most, if not all of them, had reservation tags on their signposts.  I was getting a little dismayed, being tired and not in the mood to hunt for camping elsewhere. But then Chuck took a closer look and saw that most of the reservations were for future dates. This place was apparently a pretty popular campground, especially with Labor Day right around the corner. We got a nice somewhat private site on a hill and set up camp.

The fees were weird, amounting to something like $16.97.  We only had 20s, so went to the camp hosts to ask about change.  They were confused about what we were asking, but eventually we found out that we could pay at the HQ in the morning.  We got a couple bundles of firewood from the hosts for $10 and headed back to camp.

Dinner that night was to be hobo packs, similar to what we had at Farragut but without me spilling boiling sauce all over my feet.  The good news was that this time around, my feet remained unburnt and the sauce stayed in its container.  The bad part was that after Chuck had wrapped up the food in the foil packets, he had four lumps of aluminum foil that were more or less indistinguishable from each other.  When it came time to eat, we realized that the packs had gotten mixed up and had gotten either undercooked or overcooked.  I think I found the situation a lot more humorous than Chuck did.  

We'd done a lot of riding that day so were pretty beat and went to bed somewhat early.  As it turned out, we really would have been fine with only one bundle of wood and had four good pieces left over.

Day 6 - Olny to Glacier

I woke up early the next morning--who am I kidding, I woke up early every morning while camping.  But I woke up early again, and had my muffler on my mind again.  The sky had clouded up overnight, partly why it was so warm the previous night.  As I was laying there thinking about the muffler, I heard a couple taps outside that could have been leaves or twigs falling, but in not too long, I felt moisture on my face and knew that it had started raining.

Chuck and I hadn't been using our rainflys because the weather was nice and we wanted to see stars when possible.  And also, a rainfly is just another thing you have to deal with when you're pitching or breaking camp.  So we hadn't set them up this evening either.  After a few attempts of calling out his name, Chuck woke up and I told him it had started raining.  

We both got out of our tents and went about securing our gear and throwing on our rainflys as quickly as possible.  It was a bit of a Chinese fire drill exercise, but we got all the important stuff covered in the early morning twilight.  As soon as we got back in our tents, the sprinkle tapered off, and that was that.

A little while later, we both got up and had coffee, and while I headed into the woods to take care of business, Chuck took a look at my muffler.  By the time I came back, he had it disassembled and showed me the fresh ding in the bottom of the midpipe.  Sigh. I got it attached and put back together and hoped that that would be the last we had to deal with that.  I'm not sure if it's on there quite right, but it sounds mostly like it should.  While I was working on the muffler, I took a look at my oil since the sight glass was right in front of me, and I was way low, even though I'd done an oil change right before the trip.  I remembered reading that the SV (at least the first gen) likes to burn a little oil on long trips.  It wasn't what I wanted to see, but I wasn't too terribly concerned

Back on the road, bikes intact.

We got out of there with minimal drama, but much like our first camping spot, I was nervous until my bike was sitting safely on the main road.  Our next stop was Whitefish, MT where we gassed up and I got a quart of oil.  Chuck talked to one of the guys at the gas station recommended the Buffalo Cafe, which turned out to be an excellent call. Chuck maintains that it was the best breakfast we had on the whole trip. I preferred Connie's in Sand Point, but either way, if you can't go wrong with either one if you happen to be in the area.

Whitefish was similar to Sandpoint in that it had restaurants with great breakfast food, and an abundance of attractive ladies.  I don't know what they're putting in the water in this part of the country, but I'd like to see it more widely distributed.

We set off towards Glacier, and before the trip, Chuck had mentioned he wanted to stop at a roadside attraction or two, which I was more than fine with.  One place he'd specifically mentioned was the Mystery House of Montana, outside of Columbia Falls.  We found it and stopped there.  We'd hoped to be able to just pay our admission and stroll around at our leisure, but no, we had to be on a guided tour.  

What mysteries lie behind cash register?

Well apparently this time of year is the slow season, and they were pulling some sort of shift where only one guide was present and was taking care of two tours at once.  Our guide was Robert, a short man with a tourist appropriate silly hat, and he sounded like we caught him in between morning cocktails.

I don't know what we were expecting from the mystery house, really.  We certainly weren't expecting to be convinced of mystical vortex powers, but we were expecting at least some sort of kitsch entertainment.  Chuck and I are both smart people, and we both have skeptical dispositions, so as Robert was hurrying through his disjointed and rehearsed spiel, anyone able to read minds would have seen that we were both thinking "bullshit!"  What was especially annoying about Robert's tour was that rather than trying to come up with some vaguely plausible pseudoscientific explanation, his default statement was always "Don't ask me how it happens!  I don't even pretend to know!"  One of the ladies on the tour took a couple pictures of us, where we're standing there, awkwardly wishing we could just leave.

Dude, do you smell something?

Yup, I smell it over here too.

Eventually Robert left us alone to go guide another tour, and we walked around looking at a couple things, such as a random golden door, with cheap spray paint flaking off of it, that led to a bench.  No explanation or optical illusion, just a cheesy gold door.  There was also the "fountain of youth," a cheapo plastic garden fountain, with a piece of paper taped to it that proclaimed it as such.

If only Ponce de Leon knew....

Chuck went to the bathroom before we made our escape, and told me I had to go use it.  I didn't really have to go, but I made myself on Chuck's recommendation.  I immediately saw what he was talking about.  Inside the urinal on the little scented mat thing, was a plastic goalpost with a football suspended in the middle.  As you peed on it, the football would spin on the string.  It was by far the most entertaining part of the mystery house experience.

I did my best John Madden illustration.

From there, we were on to Glacier, which would be the high water mark of our route.  We got there pretty quickly, and everyone we'd talked to about Glacier recommended the Going-to-the-Sun road.  As it turns out, there's really only one road that goes through the park, and that's the road, so we didn't have much trouble finding it.

The informational sign was about a wildfire that destroyed the trees on the other side of the lake.  They're still working on coming back.

The road brought a mixture of emotions.  On the one hand, it's design was awesome, lots of great twists and turns.  And the scenery is simply unparalleled.  I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that it is one of the most beautiful roads in the world.  It covers the breadth of the eponymous glacial canyon and though it's a cliche description, the view is breathtaking.  

If you look closely, you can see where the road leads on the left hillside

The downfall is that since it's such a famous road, and the only road through there, it is heavily used by photographing and slow moving tourists, most of whom have no concept of the etiquette of pulling over to let faster moving traffic through.  And as it turns out, they didn't need the etiquette anyway, as significant portions of the road are under construction now.  There were several spots where it was down to one lane and we had to wait for flaggers, but the worst was a large section under construction that required a pace car to lead the procession through.

We had to wait a while for the other direction of traffic to come through before we could go, and when we did, it was a slog of never exceeding 10 mph, uphill on varying levels of paving.  Needless to say our engines were running hot, and our clutch hands were getting tired.  And by the time the pace car finally pulled away to let us speed up, we were, of course, behind all the traffic that had accumulated, most of which only sped up to about 20 mph.

Eventually, we passed the scenic part and found a picnic area to pull over in and take a breather.  There were several campgrounds scattered around the park, and we both agreed that we wanted to avoid the RV crowd, like we'd experienced at Farragut.  Our best option, we decided, was to go to one of the primitive campgrounds that was first come, first serve.

A nice spot for a break

We stopped at a grocery store to get some supplies for the evening--some canned soup and rolls, and some beer, Pig's Ass Porter (yes, I was sold on the name).  The campsite we were most drawn to was about half an hour away from the park proper, and had about five mile gravel road to get to it.  As we were riding towards it, and having no way of knowing if it was full or not, we both were scoping out potential guerrilla camping opportunities if it came down to it, because we didn't feel like riding back down that road, especially since it was getting late by then.

Nice splatter on a freshly cleaned visor

The road to the campground...would there be a site for us?

As it turned out, our fears were unfounded. There were something like 19 sites total at the campground, and only a few of them had residents.  We picked a spot and I went to the registration board to get an envelope and saw that there was a notice that gathering firewood was illegal in the park except for designated areas (which we weren't in).  

I told Chuck the bad news and neither of us were stoked, because we'd heard that Glacier gets cold at night, no matter the season, and the closest place we knew to buy firewood was half an hour away.  There was a ranger in the campground doing rangerly things, and Chuck asked him about the firewood situation.  The guy was younger than we were, and seemed to be pretty cool.  He informed us that yes, gathering firewood in the park was indeed illegal.  However, the area outside of the campground, about a mile back up the road, was not national park land, so therefore outside of his jurisdiction.  Wink wink.

With that in mind, after Chuck and I had set up camp and relaxed a bit, we set off up the road, equipped with The Choppah.  We found a spot outside the gates and quickly made our way to the fringe of the woods to find some dead wood that wasn't too rotten for burning, and that could fit on Chuck's bike.

As it happened, there was a bunch of wood for the grabbing, but a lot of it came equipped with stabbers.  Not thorns, really, but little spiky nubs that didn't feel too good when you grabbed them.  Somehow in his haste, Chuck got a little too rough with one, and the next thing he knew he was bleeding.  It wasn't anything that justified stitches, but it was enough to look at it and say "Holy shit, dude!"

Holy shit, dude!

In not too long, we had a good haul of wood, plenty enough for the evening for the two of us.  We strapped it to Chuck's bike and it worked surprisingly well.  Chuck had his tie down straps, and the wood bundle, while precarious and a little bouncy, was secure.  I don't think we even lost a twig en route.

Our successful plunder

We got our fire going back at camp, and dined on some Dinty Moore and Campbell's Chunky, fortified with chunks of bread and canned corn.  It actually wasn't too bad at all.  It was hot and hearty, and I wasn't complaining.

Glacier is in bear country, and all the sites had bear boxes where we were supposed to put any food items, in case a bear wandered into camp.  As it turned out, we saw no bears, but plenty of cows.  The neighboring land, where we pilfered our firewood, was free range cattle land, and the cattle had wandered into the park.  So while we didn't see any bears or elk, we did get to listen to some moos here and there.

As predicted, Glacier got cold, but we were prepared for it, and we both slept without issue that night.