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Summer Tour BBB 2010 - Solo Tour of the West Coast and Beyond (Complete Trip Report)


Olive

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I got out of my tent and packed it up for the last day of my trip. I consulted a map and considered my options. I could either head home through Glacier National Park (the short route) or go a wee bit further afield, run through the tip of Idaho and return through British Columbia. Since I wasn't eager for my trip to end any earlier than it needed to, I took the long road home. A good long day of riding seemed an appropriate way to end my trip.

Before I left Swan Lake Trading Post I went in for a cup of coffee – the friendly folk who ran the store included morning coffee with the campsite. The store had a very homey atmosphere, with a long wooden table at the back which was shared by those stopping for coffee. The coffee pot sat on a cupboard at the back and we were encouraged to help ourselves. Beside it a random collection of ceramic cups sat in a basket in an eclectic collection. One cup proclaimed #1 Mom, the one beside it sported a well washed image of a United States Flag, and yet another was an advertisement for a local business. It was the sort of thing that you would expect perhaps to find in the corner garage, but not in a coffee shop. It gave a lot of character to the place. I didn't linger long over my coffee as the bike was packed up and ready to roll, but while I was there I was the observer of the banter as regulars came in the door and greeted each other like long lost friends. An easy camaraderie was evident, and the presence of a few strangers in the mix seemed to be part of the normal flow of business.

Stepanie, the mountain biker that I had met the previous night was plugged in at the end of the table furiously typing and updating his blog on a small foldup keyboard attached to his smart phone. He was meeting a new friend that he had made in the coffee shop the previous day who was going to transport him and his bike to a trail head in the mountains. He seemed to take this in stride, almost as if he expected to make new friends and have them go to astonishing lengths for him. He had shared the story of the previous day spent out on Swan Lake with a family in their boat. It seemed incredible that a stranger would take him out for the day on the lake in their boat. He seemed to make friends wherever he traveled, and it seemed a throwback to earlier times. Perhaps it was his charisma or easy going attitude, but while he spoke of these events as being normal in his life, it still struck me as a little unusual. Sure, I talked to a lot of strangers along the road myself, but I didn't go so far as call them friend – they were just brief encounters along the road. A few of them on the trip seemed more notable than others – Guy and Guy from Quebec that I had encountered three times, as well as the Desert Doctor in Utah came to mind. But the curious questions of faceless people I had passed by at gas stations, who had commented on a lone female motorcyclist far from home had all but been forgotten, passed off as casual encounters all but devoid of meaning.

My route headed to the West, through a lot of forested territory. For a short while I wound up riding with a couple of other BMW riders. The usual meet up on the curves on the road, and travel as a small group for a while until roads diverge. Our roads actually both wound up at the same McDs for a coffee/breakfast stop. It was a father and son pair from Washington, both on matched GS bikes. They thought Alberta to Idaho was a long distance to ride alone, so I shared the route I had followed. I guess everything is relative.

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Encountering other bikers on the road is always an interesting experience. Because of the shared interest in riding, it seems that there is an assumed connection. You wave when you ride past, you greet each other as if an acquaintance has already been struck up. I would never get out of a car, nod at another driver with a smile and ask “How's it going?”, yet between bikers this seems to be an automatic reflex. I think a lot of it is because there are relatively few riders on the road. Sure, there are a lot of riders who seem to ignore other bikers on the road – perhaps the gulf between cruiser and sport bike, or Harley and everyone else, but on the whole the riding community is open and welcoming.

At times when riding in the States I felt as if I stuck out like a sore thumb. For starters, I was wearing a helmet. A lot of the states that I was riding through did not have helmet legislation and for whatever reason other riders felt the helmet an unnecessary infringement on their liberties. Similar in terms of gear – Tshirts, tank tops and shorts. Quite the contrast to the leather riding gear I've adopted for long trips.

I've ridden long enough to appreciate just how quickly something can go wrong on the road. It's clear that a rider can't predict when that accident is going to happen, after all, isn't that why they are called accidents? Yet a lot of riders still seem to take the attitude that it will not happen to them. I hope that they are right, because I shudder to consider the possible aftermath.

The entire crew at BBB was very good in this regard. Full gear, and a lot of people in leather. Visible colours and the classic attention getting Mohawk were also quite evident in the group. It seems to come down to a question of attitude towards riding. The mature knowledge that we are not invincible, and the willingness to take steps to protect ourselves as we engage in an activity with calculated risks.

I mused on this as I rode along. At this point in the trip the miles were beginning to blend in with each other. One tree looked the same as the next, and the curves were all looking rather familiar as well. After the time I had spent on the road this was to be expected. I was listening to music on the Ipod as I covered the miles, and it made for a nice pleasant escape from the realities of life. The trip was nearing its logical conclusion, and I was determined to take advantage of every last mile.

Finally I reached the border crossing at Kingsgate. I was exiting Idaho, and entering British Columbia. Just a little east from where I had crossed heading south a few weeks earlier. A long lineup stretched out in front of me. Slowly I inched my way up the lineup. A car length, followed by a lengthy wait until the line moved up again. The bike whined as the cooling fan kicked in, as I straddled it patiently waiting in neutral for the next opportunity to advance. I didn't want to turn off the bike at each pause because of the drain on the battery, and because of the engine design BMW advises against moving the bike without having the engine running. When the bike is not running oil does not circulate through the engine, and pushing the bike or letting it coast down a hill will cause unnecessary wear on the engine.

I crossed over the painted line on the pavement that marked the formal distinction between the USA and Canada – it felt no different than a moment before. The pavement was the same. The air was the same. The scenery was the same. It was a line drawn in the sand imbued with meaning, but really an arbitrary marker of property. Much like the fence that is erected between my neighbour's property and mine, it is an artificial construct.

Finally I reached the border guard. It was time to hand over my passport and remove my helmet to prove that I was who I said I was. The usual questions were asked and answered, and I was waved onwards. Restrapping my helmet I headed into British Columbia. Almost home territory for me.

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I headed up the 95 to Cranbrook, where once again the rain started to fall. It was time to stop for a coffee break and a small bite to eat, as my breakfast was long left behind. Once again I consulted the map – I had two choices. I could either head home south through the Crowsnest Pass, or I could head up through Radium and run through the mountains. Both good runs on the bike. After checking the weather quickly I opted to head north, as the weather was a lot more promising. Usually I don't make my riding decisions based on weather, but I am very familiar with the strong crosswinds that howl over the mountains and along the 22 having battled them a few times before. Usually if there is a wind warning for the area I will head a different direction, and the addition of heavy rain around Blairmore helped me make up my mind.

I left Cranbrook and headed up the 93 through Invermere heading for Radium and the Kootneys. Very familiar territory for me. I stopped at an overlook just before Radium to take out the camera for a few shots. The overcast skies were evident, but it made for very pleasant riding temperatures.

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When I reached Radium it was time to top up the gas tank. There was a long lineup for the pump, and the truck behind me was very impatient when I finished filling up and was on the horn the instant I hung up the hose and picked up my helmet. I had the audacity to actually stop to put on my gloves and strap on my helmet before I started riding. I always find it frustrating when people start honking and waving at me with their special finger in an effort to get me to hurry up. If anything it just makes me want to slow right down to reward their impatience. Ahhh.... welcome back to Canada? And I thought we were known for being polite compared to our US cousins. But the attitude towards motorbikes can be a little different up here.

Leaving Radium the road wound through some mountainous twisties, and then settled out through a valley of nice sweepers that I was very familiar with. The treeline was far enough from the road to give lots of notice of suicidal deer, and traffic was fairly light. I had been riding cautiously all trip, and getting close to home I decided it was time to have a bit of fun. I passed a few cars and left my right hand in the “fun” position. I was right in the zone, enjoying the curves. Everything about it felt just right. I no longer felt the same caution as I had in Utah riding with the group on unknown roads where I was aware that I needed both the bike and myself to be in good shape to finish the trip, and I had a lot of miles left to travel.

Like most other riders, I tend to be highly optimistic about the speed limit, and tend to ignore a lot of the yellow slow-for-the-curve-ahead warning signs, especially when I am familiar with the road. But I make sure that I am riding within my own limits and have that reserve to call on if something unexpected happens on the road. Given my roads I have come to expect the unexpected, and a ride without having to evade a tree across the road, a suicidal deer or treating a wee chipmunk as a speedbump seems to be unusual for me. I consider it all to be part of the adventure.

The bike swept through the gentle curves, leaning in a rush of wind and racing down the road everything felt just right.

Well, make that everything felt just right until I went charging up a hill. Just before I crested it an oncoming car sympathetic to motorcyclists flashed his highs at me. OhhhhChit! I immediately cut the throttle, came over the hill and NONONONONONONONO! (Actually, I think I said something a bit stronger than that, but this forum is family friendly so I have to censor my language a wee bit unless I want others to censor it for me).

At the bottom of the hill was a pullout. In the pullout was not one but two RCMP cars parked leaving plenty of space for other cars to park beside them. One of the officers was standing at a tripod, and I thought it highly unlikely that he was out for a Sunday drive and had stopped to mount a camera on it to snap a few casual photos. Sure enough, he had the laser setup trained at the top of the hill – directly at my bike. He strode meaningfully out to the center of my lane to give me the dreaded hand signal, the upraised flat hand, and the arm directing me to the desired parking spot. Well, crap. This was a very bad sign, and certainly not the way I wanted to end my trip.

I allowed the bike to slow without touching the brakes and coasted down the hill, cursing myself roundly. I debated how to answer the inevitable question of how fast I was going, as I honestly didn't know how fast I was going as I crested the hill, but a moment before I was comfortably traveling *cough *cough *cough a wee bit over the limit – assuming, of course, that you consider almost double the posted limit to be a wee bit. Timing is everything, and mine seemed to leave a little to be desired. I had only wicked up the speed a few minutes previous, and it seemed that I ought to have waited five or six more kilometers before having my fun. It is a given that my speedometer doesn't always work properly and should have been replaced by BMW over 14,000 kilometers ago. Each time I had taken the bike into the dealership I had expected them to replace it, and each time they came up with some excuse and advised me that they would take care of it next time. I was beginning to wonder if they thought that I enjoyed dropping off the bike for service. But, faulty speedometer or no, I could judge my speed by the feel of the engine, knowing what gear I was in, and, perhaps most importantly, at the pace the landscape was passing me by, and the pace I had been passing other vehicles on the road. Whatever was waiting for me at the bottom of the hill had indeed been earned, as I had made a conscious decision to wick it up a little.

With visions of a hefty ticket and likely mandatory court appearance floating through my head, I pulled in where indicated. I flipped the bike into neutral, put down the kickstand and turned off the engine, as I expected that I would be parked for some time, and didn't need to do anything else to irritate the officer who had a frown on his face. The unsmiling visage did not seem to bode well for me. I took a deep breath, opened up my helmet, forced a smile on my face and said “Good afternoon officer”, and waited for the inevitable question. The officer's response, however, surprised me. “Do you have a laser jammer on this bike?” *blink* *blink* *blink*. Surprised I answered “A laser jammer? Uhhh.... No sir. Not that I know of.”

He walked around my bike and took inventory of my dash. He peered down to take a look under the front fairing. He looked at my luggage and bike from all angles. He took a look at my wheels and walked around the back of my bike. I sat on the bike half holding my breath not daring to believe my luck. Was it possible that he hadn't actually nailed my speed as I crested the hill? Had I made my luck roll?

Even if he had not caught my actual speed on radar, police have a lot of leeway. He could estimate my speed and write me up a ticket. I thought this a likely outcome, but perhaps more fortunate than if he had actually registered my actual speed.

After he inspected my bike closely, I was in for the next pleasant surprise of the encounter. He wished me a good day and reminded me of the speed limit. I think we both knew that I had been traveling a *cough* little on the generous side of the limit, although since he had already admitted that he hadn't actually registered my speed on the laser I probably would have had an argument in court. But my luck held and I got out of there without a performance award.

Earlier in the day I had been thinking that we had been very fortunate that nobody on the entire trip had been pulled over at BBB, either this year or the previous year. A few of the guys at BBB had been taking a few liberties with the posted limits and enjoying all that the roads had to offer. Backdraft was equipped with a radar detector and was usually in the lead, but even that is not insurance against a ticket, especially if he had been caught by laser, or conditions were not optimal to pick up radar. While mine was the trip to and from BBB, I still considered my long commute to be part of the BBB itself. Here, close to my own home territory in a 90 zone in a national park less than 200km from home I had almost gone and ruined that perfect record.

I started off my bike with a huge grin, thankful that the irregular surfaces on the front of my bike had refracted the laser, and continued towards the Transcanada at a more subdued pace. It proved to be a good plan as I saw a number of other RCMP officers manning roadside stops and they looked to have quite the voluntary revenue stream.

The next stop I made was voluntary, at a pullout for photos. Mountains, trees, rivers, lakes and more trees. I appreciate the wonderful scenery that I have available to me a few hours from home in Kananaskis and the mountains, but it has nothing on the Ocean or Utah's rock formations. I think part of that is a question of familiarity. Others visiting my riding territory might look on what it has to offer with fresh eyes and a new appreciation.

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A bit of rain fell on me as I continued riding in familiar territory and pulled onto the Transcanada highway. Traffic was fairly light for a Sunday, and traffic flow was unhampered by construction. At the sides of the road construction was evident. Wildlife overpasses. Road widening and straightening. Those provincial projects that seemed to be a regular part of the roads through the mountains. I moved into the passing lane and smoothly ran past traffic that was running just under the speed limit. It was a comfortable pace, and since I had already verified that the RCMP were out in force, I didn't want to push it too far. The benefit, however, of riding the Transcanada was that I was very aware of where the police like to park and ask their new friends to pull off the road. Everyone is familiar with their own riding territory and the local revenue locations.

I continued riding past Banff and stopped in Canmore for a brief break before the last leg of my trip home. A message on my phone warned that I ought to check the weather forecast as servere thunderstorm warnings had been out earlier in the day. Dark ominous storm clouds were evident ahead, and the weather forecast for Calgary was for thunderstorms, although the severe weather warning had been lifted, which meant that it was unlikely that I would hit heavy torrential rains or hail. My favourite riding weather... (well, not really). After a quick bite, the clouds didn't look quite as foreboding and I continued traveling east.

As it was getting late in the day I opted to run the Transcanada rather than my usual 1A route which is usually well populated with wildlife. The road is a lot less interesting and has heavier traffic, but the towering cloud formations gave it a different look, almost ominious. I had been on the road for seventeen days, and at this point it didn't seem to matter if I ran a little bit of slab on the final leg towards home.

Entering Calgary I knew I was home as soon as I needed to dodge a few potholes. It had been a bad winter for our roads, and quite obviously the City's roads department hadn't gotten around to their spring repairs yet, despite the fact that we were well into July. The major sinkholes and potholes had been patched, but a lot of roads still had sizable holes in the pavement that would be enough to unsettle the bike and damage the rim if I was not paying attention to the road.

I headed through the city, right past the turnoff that would take me home and continued south towards a friend's house. It wasn't quite time to go home yet, there were still a few errands that needed to be run. Leaving Canmore I had sent a quick text with my ETA so my arrival was expected.

Ringing the doorbell, my friend M opened the door holding Tycho, my African Grey Parrot. Tycho wasted no time in expressing his opinion. He has never really liked the big yellow leather suit but decided he could make an exception this time. After spending a few weeks at “summer camp” he felt he was well overdue for some attention and a detailed head preening. It was a definite message of welcome home as M passed him to me.

After Tycho was satisfied, I headed downstairs for a brief visit with my Cockatoos. This year my large Moluccan, Max, had made friends with M. She had been brave enough to let him out of his cage, and handle him. M is no stranger to parrots, owning one herself, but Max is in a class by himself. For starters, he is one of the larger parrots around. To put it into context his beak fits comfortably around my wrist, and his feet are almost the size of my hands. When I had first adopted him, he was a very different bird. Very aggressive, screaming non-stop and biting. Quite different from the well mannered cuddly bundle of feathers that he had developed into. (Pink and fluffy with sharp black point bits). M had met Max when he was still a “problem child”, and had been understandably shy about handling him. During my trip last year, he received a lot of attention through cage bars. The largest danger with Max is that he is very willful. At least once a year he tries to re-establish the pecking order with me. And certainly with a new person it was fairly likely that he would try to dominate.

After having paid suitable homage to the parrots, I picked up my car keys and registration, which had been the purpose of the visit. A mutual friend of ours had moved while I was out of town, and I had loaned M the use of my car to help facilitate the process. The Matrix with a spacious hatchback is a lot more useful than a passenger sedan. Apparently due to a mixup with a rental truck my car had come in very useful for that move. With keys in hand I hopped back on the bike and headed home. I hadn't yet replaced the headlight on the bike, so I had to make the dark drive home running my highbeams. It was only another ten minutes, but after having spent two weeks on the road, it was time to sleep once again under my own roof.

I pulled onto my road and turned the bike up the driveway and then came to a sudden stop on the steep slope realizing that when M had borrowed my car she had parked it in the center of the driveway not realizing that I usually park it to the side to allow enough room to ride the bike up the steep driveway past the car and park in front of the car. I hadn't even considered the possibility when I had turned up the dark driveway, and it wasn't until my headlight illuminated the driveway ahead that I realized there was not enough space for me to squeeze past the car. I very carefully walked the bike backwards down the steep slope, and parked it on the road in front of the house. A few trips between bike and house to unload the luggage, and I was officially home.

Another adventure had come to an end, with a fair helping of excitement and those small events that turn into fond memories. Certainly this trip had been more rewarding than the previous year, two weeks on the road with the bike was better than one. I had traversed two provinces (Alberta and British Columbia), and ten states (Washington, Oregon, California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho). I had ridden in rain and shine, but thankfully this year I had not encountered any hail. I had seen the ocean and the desert. Ridden through some phenomenal rock formations in Utah, and had some experiences that almost go beyond words. Temperatures had ranged from 0C (32F) to 52C (125F). Total mileage, once I accounted for all of the detours, both planned and otherwise had exceeded 10,000 kilometers (6,200 miles) on the final reckoning.

The trip had been a success for everyone involved. The BBB gathering had come together with representatives from Australia, the States and Canada. Nomo had flown in and rented a bike. Badazz, RRW and Backdraft representing Arizona had trailered their bikes to Phoenix before riding the rest of the way to join the group in Kanib. Wheatie and myself had met up with the Aussie contingent, AVSReid, Rocketmonkey and RocketD. It was a gathering of kindrid spirits, united by two wheels.

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  • Member Contributer

Thanks again ...your final stretch on 93 thru Kootenay NP is sensational VFR sweeper road if there ever was one. After your bout with the RCMP I feel fortunate as I the road is so perfect for.............

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Here is a basic idea of the route I followed this summer. (Unfortunately Google Maps would not allow me to add enough points to fully detail the route nor specify all of the roads that I took including side trips and rides with the group during the meetup, but this will give a basic idea of my routing.)

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