Calgary To San. Francisco

[Tyke]

Here's an attempt at my first trip report, I'm not much of a writer so it'll mostly be captions to my pictures. but here they are anyway.

The first day we travelled from Calgary to Spokane a ride I've done on more than one occasion so never stopped to take any pictures, sorry, all I can say is it was HOT! the bike was showing 42C (low hundreds I think F) as I approached Spokane, which for you guys in the southern states may not be too bad, but for a limey living in Canada it was VERY hot, especially in full leather. Well finally got in to town, got a hotel and peeled of my leathers showered and felt a lot better, ate dinner and had a reasonably early night, lots of ridding ahead.

The next day as we headed accross Washington I was surprised how flat and boring the terrain was, it reminded me of the praires, I don't know why but I expected it to be more like B.C. seeing as it was just south of the border, anyway that's my excuse for not taking any photo's of it. Once we started to head south towards Hwy 12 (I think) and towards Mt. Saint Helens area things really started to improve and I got my first sighting of Mt. Ranier.

Mt Ranier Mt. Ranier taken from Hwy 12

Got to the junction of 12 and the forestry road you turn down to get to the windy ridge viewing area late afternoon, so decided to stay there the night and tackle Mt. St. Helens the next day, well the only motel in town was full so had backtrack a little ,luckily there was a place only a mile or so back that had a room, so up early the next morning ready to hit the views only to find low cloud cover CRAP! it had been clear all week according to everyone, tipical, never mind I'd heard the road was awesome if a little rough in parts, and it didn't dissapoint. Heres the best view of the volcano I got.

Mt. St. Helens The best view I got, the only day all week the peak wasn't clear.

From there it was south to the Columbia river and west to Portland, Nice views of the river as you follow it along the north side.

Columbia River from Washington View from just east of Vancouver Wash.

Made it to Lincoln City for the night, then headed down the coast, beautiful views all the way, it's difficult at times to concentrate on the road, Got lot's of photo's down here but wont post them as there's just too many and I'll post a couple from N.Cal. later, So as we're heading down the road, round a bend and suddenly spot the famous Paul Bunyan and Blue statue, well I had to stop and get a shot of that and the bike in front, got a couple of odd looks from the hoards of tourists too, but who cares,

Paul Bunyan & Blue Must have been cold for the poor bull.

From there we ended up staying in Eureka for the night, wasn't too impressed with it, but probably didn't see the best of it I'm sure, Then I'd heard a lot about the Avenue of Giants so had to ride down it, I was a little taken aback how long it was, I kind of expected it to be maybe a mile or two and I think it's closer to twenty or something like that. and I was blown away with the size of the trees, you see pictures but untill you see them in person I don't think you can really get a true idea of the sheer size of these things, Majestic was the only word I could think of to describe them.

Avenue of the Giants Man those trees are big

Made it to Mendecino (sp) for lunch, what a pretty little coastal town, I couldn't get over all the water towers in town, it was like every block had a least one, I'm sure there's a story to it but I don't know it sorry anyway so heres a picture of one.

Mendacino Nice little coastal town, I couldn't get over all the water towers.

I'm sure it must be a popular place for people who live in the bay area to weekend, and for good reason. We had a little walk around and then pushed on, made it to Point Arena that night, they had a nice Lighthouse up on the headland, unfortunatly it was closed for the day by the time we got there, so here's a picture of it for you. (noticing a pattern here)

Point Arena Lighthouse Nice looking lighthouse, but was closed when we were there.

So went down the road to the docks area to find a restaraunt we had been told about at the motel, nice little area with the docks and a couple of small biuldings, and came accross a rather odd bus down there too, look for yourself

Odd looking bus I guess they outgrew the VW bus.

looks like they may have outgrown the VW van I guess, anyway watched the sun go down from the dock, then headed back to the motel, S.F. tomorrow, oh yeah here's the sunset that night.

Nice sunset Nice sunset of the jetty at point Arena

Up at reasonable time and hit the road, stopped at some really nice log built hotel on one of the many headlands for breakfast, it was fantastic and a beautiful hotel, unfortunatly no pictures of it, left the camera in the tank bag by mistake, sorry. Then it was on to San. Francisco. I enjoyed it as much as any city I've been to in the U.S. but I'm not really a fan of big cities, but it was cool seeing all the famous sites, here's a couple of them.

Golden Gate bridge Finally arrive in SF and ride over the bridge

Arriving over THE bridge.

Coite tower Moi posing at the bottom of Coite tower

Alcatraz The obligatory Alcatraz shot

Then it was time to head home Thought we head inland and take in Crater lake, so we left the city and blasted up I5 for a while, man you can make good time on the interstates, but talk about boring, I was so glad when the turn off showed up, headed over to and stayed at Klamath Falls for the night, then the next day it was Crater Lake, I had been looking forward to see it after reading about it online, I couldn't believe it was almost 2000ft deep in parts, untill I saw it anyway, I was in awe. Here's my attempt at a pano.

Crator Lake My attempt at a Pano.

Then we had to push on, I was starting to run a little short on time, so we stopped at Bend for dinner and I had the great idea we should push on for an hour or two, not realising there's not too much east of Bend, well we pushed on and ended up staying in a really small town, read one hotel one general store and a gas pump, oh and a pet bear, yep some guy who owns, I think the gas "station" has pet bear he keeps in the centre of town, Here's a picture (see, a pattern)

And the bear cage Yep right by the only gas pumps

and here's the bear

The Bear! And the town has a pet Bear

Actually I'm so glad we did stop there, the night we arrived the whole town was out at a pie auction they were having to help some local lady out who had just lost her husband, and they had live entertainment to boot, a mother and son singing, actually really well if you like country music ( I don't, but still enjoyed the atmosphere). it was just great to see such a sense of community, something I don't get to experience very often (if at all) living in a city of a million people. and I was treated to a brilliant sunset that night due to local forest fires, here it is.

Hotel in Oregon The view from our Hotel in Mitchell Oregon

Next day we made it to Lewiston, just inside of Idaho, but just south of there right on the Washington/Oregon border there's an awesome canyon that an awesome road cuts through, here's a shot of a little bit of it.

Oregon Roads Just south of Lewiston on the Oregon-Washington border

THe next day it was Lolo pass and home, I looked at the map and thought "yeah we can make it home from here", so we were up at 5.30am on the road at about 6.15 and hit Lolo pass by about 8, had to stop for the obligatory sign shot of course, and you guessed it, here it is.

Lolo pass And of course we've all seen this sign before

Had my son who was riding pillion that day take a shot or two as we rode it, I really liked this pass, the corners where all fast sweeping bends and most had good sight lines, at least the right hand ones anyway as you follow the river all the way up, here's one of the bends he tried to capture, difficult to really get a sense of it though.

Lolo Pass And one of the many bends

Then it was a blast through Montana and up the east side of Galcier N.P. there's several large fires burning just south of St. Mary's just outside the park at this point.

Fires near St. Mary's Large fires just south of St. Mary's Montana

Then home around 7pm, I've never been so happy to get off the bike, we'd covered about 1200 km that day in about 12 hours, too much on a stock seat with my 17 year old son on the back. Oh well at least we got to sleep in our own beds that night.

Thanks for reading and I hope I haven't bored you too much.

Paul.

Edited to add pano

[Guest]

Good job on the trip report mate. I love that part of the country. I live for these trip reports every summer.

Thanks for that !

Dad out.

[chonsey]

Okay I give up, what was the pattern that I must have missed?

[Guest]

Paul,

Great job on the ride report, love the comment about Babe and the cold day... good one!

You sure got some awesome pics and what great roads to ride on...

Awesome, thanks for the post. :beer:

[ianmont]

Great ride report, kept me glued to the monitor while I ate me breakfast!

Ian

[Tyke]

Okay I give up, what was the pattern that I must have missed?

Wasn't much, "so here's a picture" that's all, you were probably looking too "deep". :P

Thanks for the comments guys, it was an amazing trip and thinking I might have to repeat it for a USGP one of these years.

[Veefer800Canuck]

Then it was a blast through Montana and up the east side of Galcier N.P. there's several large fires burning just south of St. Mary's just outside the park at this point.

Fires near St. Mary's Large fires just south of St. Mary's Montana

So were there any fires burning at or near the G.T.S. highway?

It'd be a shame if that area burned.

[VFR4Lee]

Nice pics and write up. Makes me wanna go for a weeks long ride too. :D

[Guest DangerMonkey]

Tyke: Thanks for posting. Some excellent pics in there. I spent 7 days riding through Alberta, BC, Idaho and Montana last month. Trip started in Calgary. Great part of the world and very friendly people.

So were there any fires burning at or near the G.T.S. highway?

It'd be a shame if that area burned.

When I rode up G.T.S. Highway last month you could go all the way to Logan Pass and a little way down the other side but had to turn around. Smoke was visible at the pass and flames were visible just past it.

[Guest matt_c]

Awesome ride, looks like you had a blast. thanks for posting all the info and pics.

[Guest]

Thanks for posting this most excellent of threads. Nice camera work too.

As far as i am concerned, touring is where-it-is-at

(granola tie-die and love-beads slang for you young'ins out there)

[Brown81]

Cool report!

Those are actually the small Redwood trees!! You should see our BIG ones!!! They can be up to 30 feet in diameter!! :thumbsup:

[Hobie1dog]

Thanks for posting up great pictures of your trip. Very inspirational. You are a lucky man to get to enjoy that kind of a road trip.

[V-FORE]

Great pictures! Sounds like you had a blast, I am going to have to do a trip like that!!

[BOBINOTTAWA]

What I would give for some true mountain riding. Thanks for posting a great report Tyke.

Someday, maybe someday....

[Riot Grrrl]

*applauds*

There are some SENSATIONAL pictures in there, Tyke!

*jumps up and down* I WANNA GO ON TOUR!!

You have re-ignited the travel bug in me!

I'd love to tour the USA and Europe by motorcycle before I'm 30, but I'm seriously running out of time!

Has to be in the next 3 years. Who's comin'??

*does a little dance*

[SAFE-T]

Glad to see you got to take that trip after all :thumbsup:

I did Lolo Pass going the other way this summer - 1200 km would be too much for me in one day, though :unsure: