Sometimes Trips Don't Turn Out Like We Plan - And That's Okay

Some years back my sister emigrated to Canada, where she lives in the interior of British Columbia (directions: Go to Prince George, turn left, ride three hours, you're there), and July was intended to be my annual visit. Their region in BC had an unusually dry winter since all the rain came down here, and as I was getting ready to leave, she told me that they were being threatened by fires. We agreed that we'd do a go/no-go before I crossed the border.

My goal was to get to the border by interesting routes, and stop in my old stomping grounds of South King County Washington, and to visit with my best friends from college, Jamie and Mary en route. In June, Jamie had a landmark birthday, so I had driven up there and scouted some routes. On that trip, I decided that in addition to being boring, that Hwy 97 was too crowded too. On the way back, I explored some of eastern Oregon, eventually getting to Hwy 395, and decided that I wanted to come back on the bike. One of the geological features that really knocked me out on that trip was the Abert Rim just north of Lakeville, OR. I'd been there before, but on the June trip I got snowed on!

I left Orinda on a Wednesday morning at the crack of 9:45 with the goal of getting some miles under my wheels, but not for it to be an stupid boring day. So after getting off the freeway to ride Pleasants Valley up towards Winters, I made my way to Chico, then up Hwy 32 to gain some altitude. The last time I'd been on 32 was during a BARF rally, and I was riding with Banjoboy, so that must have been at least ten years ago. Great road, but.... Well, there was construction, but worse than than, there was a long convoy of tree service trucks towing woodchippers. Just in case you're wondering, Mountain F Enterprises. I bring this up because these guys are exemplars of why passing zones often don't work as intended. Where it was not possible to pass, these guys could not get within a country mile of the posted limit, but as soon as they saw a sign saying "Passing Zone Ahead", each of the drivers suddenly remembered that they're the love children of Mario Andretti and Shirley Muldowney, and while they'd stay in the right lane, the hammer would be all the way down, and cagers would pull out but not be able to complete the pass.

By the time I got to Susanville I was still pissed off by the traffic, and didn't bother to stop for fuel, turning towards Alturas on 395. About 25 miles or so outside of Alturas, my fuel gauge dropped to the last bar. Oops! No fuel between Susanville and Alturas! I'd never run the tank down that far, and had no idea how far I could go. I dropped speed and nursed it, cursing my impatience for not getting fuel when I could. It was a very long 25 miles as I contemplated running out of gas on a very empty road, but in the end I got into Alturas just fine, and when I filled it up, it only took a whiff over four gallons (allegedly it holds five) with 200 miles on the trip odo. Oh well, now I know it will do at least 200 on a tank.

As I crossed into Oregon, there was a little campground right by the border, and it looked nice. I rolled back out to the little settlement nearby to find a store with something cold to drink, but there was little around, so I continued up to Lakeville where I grabbed dinner. While eating dinner, I did a search on Google maps to see if there were other campgrounds around, and it showed several NFS
campgrounds in the hills above town, so I went looking.

If lesson #1 of the day was to get gas when and where you can, lesson #2 was don't trust Google navigation on Forest Service roads. I approached a 5 way intersection, and navigation said, "slight left". I took what I thought was a slight left, but apparently I should have gone further left. Rather than telling me to turn around, it rerouted me to an intersection several miles up the road. When I got there it said I was further from the destination than I had been at the prior intersection, and it tried to turn me down a "road" that was overgrown with brush. I turned the other way, and Google approved of that choice, but then the road was blocked with downed trees. Nothing to do but turn around. Did I mention it was getting dark? Bailout time! Back to the paved road just as the sun disappeared below the horizon.

After dealing with a completely unhelpful desk clerk at the local Best Western, I stayed a place called the Fremont Inn. It was a good place. So ended day 1, no pics, but a fair number of miles under my wheels.

To be continued. More pics tomorrow.

Mooooore!

I hate being worrying low on gas...!

I can feel the tense moments just in your written words.

Gas worries, so many times on different bikes over the years.
There is one thing that I got to really enjoy, with a fill up, there was a cold tank between my knees.
Guaranteed no worries for at least 100 miles.
The one bike that sucked it down, didn't give the cold chill of range available, was my V-rod. I sat over the tank.

great stuff Mr flying_hun!

that’s a heck of a first day …

Awesome! Tell us more!

And GAIA GPS is a great alternative to Google for navigating GS Roads.

Day 2

Thanks for the kind words, guys.

On day 2 I was up surprisingly early (by my slugabed standards), and was on the road by 8 AM. Seeing that it was a long way to the next town of any consequence, and given my range anxiety from the day before, I filled up before heading to Burns. This section isn't all that interesting from a riding POV, with the exception of the section between Abert Lake and Abert Rim. This was the section where I got snowed on in June. Far too warm for that on this day. Despite the riding not being very interesting, the scenery is wild and spectacular, and the road is very empty. I stopped along this section to get some photos of the rim to contrast to the snowy view in the prior post.

It's a bit of a slog to get to Burns, but I was getting it done early enough in the day that it wasn't too hot. As I rolled through Burns I kept going, hoping to find the last gas station before leaving town. This strategy resulted in my having to turn around because how else would you know which station was the last one until you've left town? So, turn around I did. Stopping at an old school service station, where I had my first chatting with strangers experience. The attendant and I had a great chat. I guess on day 1 I was too focused on making time to stop to chat, and chatting with strangers is one of the very best things about long road trips.

395 begins to gain altitude as it leaves Burns, and the road gets emptier and more interesting, and temps moderate. There is a dramatic drop from a high plateau as you approach the well-named Canyon City, which blends right into the town of John Day. This seemed like a good place to get some lunch, and the local taco trailer filled the bill. There were two other riders having lunch, but they didn't seem that friendly, so lunch was a solo affair.

395 bears west out of John Day, and here I made a navigation error (my specialty!). When 395 turned north again, I turned north with it when I should have kept going west until getting to OR 19 where I had intended to turn north. Oh well. It was a nice road, and still pretty empty, but I was afraid it was going to take me too far away from my intended route, so I started looking for places to turn west. Descending into the town of Long Creek I saw two things; a gas station and a sign for OR 402 pointing towards Kimberly and OR 19.

This was another old school service station (meaning bays for working on cars rather than a convenience store to sell you junk food). The attendant was a chatty young man, and we talked about the heat (then in the mid-90's) and local areas of interest. When I noted the remarkable necklace he was wearing, he told me about the wooden fish hook with a barb made of abalone shell, where he got it, and why it was important to him. Talk to strangers, you never know what you'll learn!

Heading west of 402 didn't look all that promising, and the only thing of real interest in the first few miles was the driver of an oncoming UPS truck giving me the low peace sign as I approached. A rider stuck in a cage!

As the road approached Monument, it got way more interesting, with a steep descent to the valley below. Here the scenery got interesting. Here also I had to confront the combination of my limitations as a photographer and the limitations of my cellphone camera. Lots of these pics don't do a good job of capturing how I was seeing the landscape.

At a viewpoint there was a sign describing how the landscape formed. It was striking (photos attached that aren't as striking).

402 connected me with 19, and temps were getting high, but the road was great. It followed the John Day river, cutting through the volcanic geology of this region, and at another park I pulled over for more shots, one looking across the river, and the other looking at the butte behind me.

I'm going to stop here because I'm approaching the limit of attachments per post. More coming.

stratslingr77 said:

Awesome! Tell us more!

And GAIA GPS is a great alternative to Google for navigating GS Roads.

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Thanks! I have this weird aversion to GPS. There was a Garmin in my luggage. I never took it out. It would have been useful. I like paper maps. Just call me Ned Ludd.

Day 2 Part 2

I had brought camping gear with me, and there were loads of campgrounds out here, so my goal for the evening was to camp rather than motel. We'll see.

Continuing on OR 19 heading from Service Creek towards Fossil, the road climbed over a low pass. There had been a number of parks along the way, but on the ascent of this pass, one in particular caught my attention - The Shelton Wayside National Motorcycle Riders Memorial! Did you know this was out there? I sure didn't.

Investigation was required. Beyond the sign, I didn't see much else about the memorial, but I did note that there was a large county campground (running water, picnic tables, pit toilets) that looked promising, but it was kind of early to stop.

Back on the road, I continued over the crest of the pass followed by the long, gradual descent into Fossil. Fossil is a cool little town. You have to get off the highway to really appreciate it. It's named for the local fossil beds found by John Day. I was thinking about what to get for dinner, and I circled the town until I saw a little general store that looked promising. My clue was the KTM in front with a Washington plate. I rolled up and greeted the rider, and stepped inside to shop. This place was a classic general store with some of everything a family living in or camping near Fossil might need. I knew for sure that it was the right place when a whole kluster of KTM's arrived. This is adventure riding country with far more miles of gravel roads than paved roads. These guys had been all over, and were trading info on where gas could be found. The plates were mainly from Idaho.

The next leg was to head back to that campground, set up camp, cook dinner, and settle in for the evening. When I pulled in to scout for a site, I noticed it was empty. I mean EMPTY. No campsites taken. Well, it was a Thursday, but this struck me as odd. I've camped alone in undeveloped areas, but I've never had a whole campground (~40 spots) all to myself. I figured someone else would show up, but the only people who did were a traveling family who used one of the toilets, and a lady who was running her dog without getting out of her car.

I took a couple of shots looking up and down the campground, and another of a few trees whose company I was enjoying. It was a quiet and lovely evening.

Day 2 map

More to come.

flying_hun said:

Thanks! I have this weird aversion to GPS. There was a Garmin in my luggage. I never took it out. It would have been useful. I like paper maps. Just call me Ned Ludd.

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GAIA is an app you run on your phone. It's cloud-based so you can plan routes, etc. on your desktop and it'll show up on your phone. I navigated the Oregon BDR using GAIA a few weeks ago and it was great!

...and really enjoying the ride report, BTW! I've been all over Oregon on my bike, including many of the areas you're describing here.

Day 3

This would be the day when I would be arriving at the home of my friends in Maple Valley, WA. This was also a day during which I could have used a UV/haze filter on my phone's camera.

After waking up and making myself some coffee and breakfast, it was time to break camp and reload the bike, still all on my own. Isn't it always the way? You break camp, pack up, gear up, saddle up, and just then the body announces that it's time to poop?

The original plan for the day was to head towards Hwy 97, cross the Columbia, then over Satus Pass to Yakima, then over Chinook Pass to Enumclaw. Well, that was the original plan, but like Von Moltke the Elder said, "No plan of battle survives first contact with the enemy." But first, I had to get to Washington.

The ride to Condon, OR was beautiful and empty. Hardly a soul out there. Heading from Condon to Wasco several things caught my eye. First, I'm always open to a visual joke, and the one I saw this morning was a commentary on how harrowing the trip had been.

Next, Mt Hood came into view, then Mt. Adams, and finally I could see Mt. Rainier. Three snow covered volcanoes all at once. The challenge was that with no telephoto and no haze filter, you'll have to really expand the attached photos to get a hint of the peaks.

At 97 I decided that it had been a while since the last time I had ridden from Carson, WA to the Windy Ridge Overlook of Mt. St. Helens, and that it's some great road. Since that was going to take me to the back of beyond, I needed both food, then fuel. Brunch in Bingen where a lady told me that when her kids were little that instead of playing slug-bug on long road trips, they played slug-moto so that her kids would learn to spot motorcyclists on the road. What a great idea!

This was already shaping up to be a really hot one. Riding west on Washington 14, the view down the gorge was stunning, and the breeze coming up river was cooling, then I turned off towards Carson where I got fuel.

You know, I could have looked up road conditions on my route, but where's the fun in that? The road climbed through cool, conifer forest, and produced one of the sweetest stretches of road to the trip to that point. I was loving it, and only took a break to get a photo of St. Helens from a distance.

The problem was that when I reached the junction to take me to Windy Ridge the road was closed. My alternatives were to backtrack to 97, which would likely get me there after dark, or bail out through Cougar to pick up I-5 near Longview, WA. This would get me there before dinner time, but would be a buzzkill. Oh well.

It was a pretty enough road getting down to the freeway, but the freeway was horrid. I mean really, really horrid, and you can't lanesplit in Washington.

I briefly considered turning east on Hwy 12 to take me up to Packwood, and to cross over the backside of Rainier, but I was concerned it would take too long, so I stuck with the freeway. That was not a great idea. I-5 offered up miles of slow and go interspersed with stop and go (yeah, I had to put a foot down on the effing freeway going through Chehalis. More than once). The I couldn't think of a good way to get east of Olympia, then once you get up to Ft. Lewis/McChord there is no way to go east from the freeway for miles. Made worse by the fact that there was some sort of event going on there, and the Thunderbirds were rehearsing buzzing the freeway, screwing up traffic even more.

I was scratching my head thinking of alternatives, when I got the bright idea to get off of I-5 on Hwy 512 through Puyallup, but as I approached the exit there was at least a half mile back up for the exit, and the backup was completely stopped. There was a diamond lane through Tacoma that helped a lot, and my next bright idea was to get off the freeway on Hwy 18 to get me out to Maple Valley, but that exit had a backup at least as bad as the one on 512. My best option seemed to be to surface street it out to Maple Valley. Even if it was taking me through areas I once called home, the whole thing sucked.

The good part was getting to the home of old friends. Their house is on a little lake in Maple Valley. The lake is so small that no ICE craft are allowed, making the lake quiet, calm, and great for swimming. This place was owned by Jamie's grandfather, and Jamie rented it from him while we were in college, so I've been coming here for decades. It's so nice to be with friends who've known me a long time, who know my weaknesses and have seen me at my worst, yet we remain close friends. View from the deck below.

Day 3 route

Day 4

This was the day planned to cross the border, hence it was the go/no-go day. I spoke with my sister on the evening of day 3, and at that time a big fire was closing in on their place from the west, and smoke blocked their view of the lake (they have lakefront property), so she advised that I not come.

Jamie and Mary invited me to stay another night, so day 4 would be a rest day from riding. So, I invited them to have lunch with me at the Black Diamond Bakery. Mary couldn't join us because of another commitment, so Jamie and I headed there on our own.

A little background here. Many, many years ago my parents embarked on their Mother Earth News Back to the Land adventure. I was in high school when we moved to Washington, bought an acreage three miles outside of Black Diamond where we built our own house, raised our own food, etc. At that time, Black Diamond had a population of 800 which supported four taverns. I always admired that! Black Diamond was a mining and logging town, with a fair number of people who lived in the area who worked at Boeing, Pacific Car & Foundry, or Weyehaeuser. I don't know how many people live inside the city limits now, but I'd guess that combined with the surrounding unincorporated area that there must be at least 8000 people there now. Traffic sucks.

What I had not counted on was that this particular day was Miners Day in Black Diamond, streets were blocked, there was live music, and the museum was hopping. We had a great lunch at the bakery, then we stopped to admire some parts of the display which included this 37 Chevy with the very interesting engine under the hood. What fun!

The museum was a kick! We were greeted at the door by a docent was was showing us displays, one of which had an East Bay Regional Parks logo on it. I knew there was a Black Diamond Park in eastern Contra Costa County, and I knew it was associated with coal mining, but I had no idea it was in fact the same company in both places. The docent said that when the mine at Nortonville played out, they moved all their equipment up to Washington and founded the town of Black Diamond. What a coincidence that I ended up living close to both.

As we wandered around the museum, they had lots of cool displays. There was stuff on mining, stuff on logging, a recreation of the local doctor's office, another of a classroom, and downstairs they had a reproduction of a portion of the Morganville Tavern. You know how you know you're old? When you correct the museum docent on the historical details because you were actually there.

You can read a bit about the Morganville at the link above. I'll add a few things. First, the Morganville was the only bar I've frequented that had a hitching post in front that actually got used to tie up horses. It had a legendary silver dollar bar, a dance floor, and it attracted an interesting mix of clientele; loggers, miners, truck drivers, cowgirls, hippies, and bikers. Fights were common. One Labor Day I was there when one of the cowgirls rode her horse into the bar. It was a wild place! If you remember the old Jimmy Buffett song, Livingston Saturday Night, that about sums it up.

[youtube]X7ckBvSKG-Q?t=19[/youtube]

Next stop was a charity fundraiser at another lakefront house, followed by a tour of the lake on Jamie & Mary's trolling motor powered pontoon boat, followed by grilled steaks on the patio. It was a pretty good day.

No map today.

flying_hun said:

You know how you know you're old? When you correct the museum docent on the historical details because you were actually there.

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Sounds like a fun day..! Always love some history.

budman said:

Sounds like a fun day..! Always love some history.

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Indeed, it was a very fun day!

Day 5

Jamie was leaning on me to stay longer. For whatever reason, I was thinking about heading back south. The nonprofit board I sit on had a meeting coming up, and while I had expected to join it via Zoom, I began to think about getting home for it.

When I was sketching out this trip in my imagination, my thought about the trip back was to cross back into the US at Osoyoos on Hwy 97, heading towards Oroville, WA (the town in which I had my first experience being physically tossed out of a bar), then I was going to pick up Hwy 20 to Republic, then Kettle Falls, but now I just wanted to get back to eastern Oregon.

It took some time to get going this day, and I didn't roll out of Maple Valley until about 11 AM. Probably a mistake. This was another day during which I was stunned at how much the population and traffic of western Washington has grown since I moved away. I took back roads to get around Enumclaw to head up Hwy 410. Seeing as it was late Sunday morning, I was not surprised by the endless stream of vehicles coming down the mountain to head back to town, but I was surprised by the volume of vehicles going up the mountain. I was in a line of traffic so long that even with frequent passing I was still in a long line of traffic until I was way past the top of Chinook Pass. I finally cleared the traffic about 15 miles west of Naches (AKA, damn near to Yakima).

Temps were lovely and comfortable up high, but as I descended into Yakima, it got predictably hotter. Cruising across the valley was blisteringly hot, and the climb over Satus Pass to get to Goldendale wasn't much cooler.

I had looked on the map for an interesting route through Oregon, and I had found a route labeled as the Blue Mountain Scenic Byway, and that sounded exactly like what I was looking for. This route begins at an exit from I-84 at a place called Heppner Junction.

When I reached the junction of 97 and 84, I turned upriver. Out here there are no trees, no shade, and lots and lots of wind. It wasn't what you could call fun riding. I began looking for fuel before leaving the freeway, and at a place called Arlington I found a Shell station where I stopped for some Gatorade, iced coffee, and a bite to eat. When I got to the counter to pay for it the cashier took one look at me and said, "I want you to go stand in the cooler until you feel better. I don't need a heat emergency today." I was dripping with sweat and bright red in color. It was a good call.

Once marginally recovered, it turned out that Heppner Junction was much further on the freeway. Here was the change I had been looking for. No traffic. I mean NO traffic. The first vehicle I encountered on OR 74 was nearly 25 miles after turning off the freeway. The road slowly climbed away from the Columbia, and it cooled slightly, but was still damn hot.

[youtube]pJJBbK2XNbE[/youtube]

There were a couple of small farming towns on the route, and when I got to Lexington, I pulled up into the shade of a building to check my map. Just as I was about to pull out again, I heard a bike, and in my mirror I could see an FJR pulling up behind me. The rider got off to come talk to me. It turns out that Rick, who lives near Silverton on the west side, spends a lot of time on the weekends riding over on the east side. He regaled me with stories of roads and small towns I should visit. When I told him that I hoped to get as far as Anthony Lake, he told that's good, but that if I have time I should ride OR 245. He claimed it was the jewel in the crown of eastern Oregon roads. Duly noted!

After chatting a bit longer I felt the need to get moving, so I bid Rick farewell, and continued. The bike I was riding doesn't have a temp read out on the dash, so I wasn't exactly certain of the temps, but it was beginning to feel like it was cooling off a little. When I got to Heppner there was a time/temperature sign at the edge of town that read 99. Yeah, that was cooler.

I began to think about where I would stay for the night, and I was dying for a shower and AC, so no camping tonight. Fortunately, right at the edge of downtown Heppner there was a little old cinder block motel that looked intriguing. Definitely old school. Very old. Checking in at the front desk, the price was right, and the lady at the desk was talkative. She gave me a rundown on Heppner, what it has to offer, and why it's known as Flood Town. So the gear came off the bike, and I wandered across the street to the store to get something I could heat up in the microwave, and a big Modelo to help me cool off.

There was a picnic table out on the sidewalk in front of the motel that was meant for smokers, but it served admirably well as a place to drink my beer and people watch. Also, it was a good place from which to appreciate the symmetry of the motel's courtyard. I'd already had some good chatting with strangers moments this day. The clerk at the Shell, Rick on the FJR, and the lady behind the desk at the motel. It seemed like a good chatting with strangers day, so I sat down with my beer and waited (it's kind of like fishing).

Apparently, it had been so hot all day that folks had been staying indoors along with their pets, but as the sun went down and temps dropped, the dog walkers came out in force. Soon enough a friendly border collie named Luna came to investigate me, bringing her human with her.

Let me take a moment to expand on talking with strangers. Part of my inspiration for my habit of doing this was my dad who was a past master at it. I have also been inspired by Andy Goldfine's little booklet in which he extols the virtues of talking with strangers.



I'm not sure what the magic is of meeting strangers on the road, but in my experience, the longer you've been on the road, and the more fatigued you are, the more interesting the conversations. I liken it to the road knocking our armor off, making us vulnerable and authentic. Folks can see that openness in our demeanor, and they become more open themselves. Some of the most authentic conversations I've ever had in my life have happened in these circumstances.

Luna's owner kept going, but eventually he and Luna returned, and we began to talk. I asked him about Heppner, telling him that I'd never been here before. Joe told me about how he came to be in Heppner after growing up in South Dakota, moving to Portland as an adult, struggling with substance issues, being serially homeless, and eventually breaking his addiction, to where he is now as a supervisor in a local mental health agency. Amazingly rich and authentic conversation. I love this stuff. To me, this is the best part of long solo road trips. It's like the icing on the cake.

With that, I finished my beer and headed to bed.

Day 5 map.

Another great adventure post. Really enjoying this and it sounds wonderful even though not as you had planned. Thanks!!!

Beautiful read.

A barfer in a cooler to beat the heat.. seen that before

budman said:

Beautiful read.

A barfer in a cooler to beat the heat.. seen that before

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Yeah, Steve was definitely on my mind as I cooled off. Thanks!

Day 3 - Addendum

Man, I don't know how I managed to miss this in my original post! But, maybe it deserves a post of its own.

On the morning of day 3, not long after I had rejoined Hwy 97 heading north, descending the long hill towards the Columbia, I spotted an older Honda on the shoulder on the other side of the road. The rider was astride the bike, but had his helmet off like maybe he had an issue with the bike. Time for a quick u-turn to investigate.

The rider was the original owner of an 1982 CX500 Turbo. He had owned it since new! The bike had no problem, he was just reading a text from his brother who he was on his way to meet. The rider was from the Tri-Cities, and his brother lives in Bend, and they were planning to meet in the middle.

This is where the story gets really unique. His brother had been the owner of another Honda of that era. I don't recall which. Maybe an early Sabre or Interceptor, or maybe a CB900F, I don't recall. Anyway, the brother was envious of the constant attention the Turbo got whenever they were parked together, so the brother decided he wanted one too. The brother found one online that was located in Iowa. He had it shipped out, and when it arrived they found that the two bikes had sequential serial numbers!

Lovely fellow, but geographically challenged. He asked me where I was from, and I told him the Bay Area. He then asked if I had left home that morning. I told him no, that this was the morning of day 3, and that maybe I could have gotten to that point on day 1 if I had left early in the morning, come a more direct route, and averaged over 100 mph the whole way.

The main thing is, the bike was gorgeous. The guy clearly puts a lot of effort into keeping it nice and original. Some cool stuff out on the road.

I noted people calling "Coos Bay" the Bay Area when I was up there.
I wonder if that is what he meant?

Sequential numbers... that is amazing. Cool tid bit.
You meet the nicest people on a Honda.