• Welcome, Guest! We hope you enjoy the excellent technical knowledge, event information and discussions that the BMW MOA forum provides. Some forum content will be hidden from you if you remain logged out. If you want to view all content, please click the 'Log in' button above and enter your BMW MOA username and password.

    If you are not an MOA member, why not take the time to join the club, so you can enjoy posting on the forum, the BMW Owners News magazine, and all of the discounts and benefits the BMW MOA offers?

Border to Border Ride (Mexico to Canada)

CaptRehkopf

New member
My Border to Border Ride (Mexico to Canada)
The Motorcycle Tourer?s Forum (MTF) http://www.mctourer.com sponsors various rides each year and this year their Border to Border (B2B) ride looked interesting to me so I registered and started looking forward to the ride, but with a little apprehension knowing it would be HOT, and I don?t ride well in the heat! There were two time limit options of doing the B2B ride, a 24 and 36 hour limit, I choose the 36 hour knowing that was easily doable. The ride was basically an Interstate route of 1660 miles with a few regular highway routes along the way. http://www.mctourer.com/rides/2013/B2B

My basic plan was to make this a three certificated ride, an Iron Butt Association (IBA) Saddlesore 1000 and a Bunburner 1500, along with the MTF certification for the B2B ride. With that in mind the rest of the planning was predetermined, set the rest stop further than 1000 miles and then ride the remaining distance before the time limit. I set the rest stop in Missouri Valley, IA about 1170 miles from the Mexico border. So with one decision the ride planning was complete. I knew the B2B was an Interstate ride so to have some fun and scenery I decide to add those goals to the beginning and end of the ride by visiting friends on Plano, TX, and riding the Great River Road home.
THE RIDE: I left Plano and stopped in San Antonio Riverwalk for a $15 club sandwich, but it was in the shade and by water!

I arrived in Laredo at the host hotel and the owners could not have been nicer. Each of our 17 rider?s rooms had an interior garden patio plenty big enough to park our motorcycles for safe keeping, and a free happy hour with hot dogs, etc and beer each night!

The ride was went pretty much uneventful until my wingman, who I only met online, who said his tank range was 200 miles, ran out of gas at 120 miles! Needless to say we stopped often, which was actually a good thing because of the 108 degree heat throughout Texas, Oklahoma, and Nebraska. We arrive at the hotel on time according to a schedule I had created, but had to wake an hour earlier than planned because of the fuel stop requirements.
Arriving at Pembina, ND at the finish witness location everybody stayed around to swap tales, except for the 24 hours rider?s who were long gone by the time us wimps showed up. Everybody had a tale to tell and it was fun, and that everybody made it safely was great. I spent the night in Pembina and headed out the next morning for eastern MN and Voyager NP.

It was about 53 degrees and I was lovin it! On the route I saw a Bald Eagle next to the road feasting on a road kill, I had never seen a wild Bald Eagle that up close before, it was truly amazing. Also another amazing site was thousands of white turkeys wandering around in a field! It looked like a turkey farm but they were freely wander around outside un-caged. Don?t they fly?
The Great River Road was as good as predicted and I will do it again. I think riding north on the west side of the river and south on the east side would offer better river view while riding in the lane next to the river. As far as the B2B, been there done that and it?s in the books and probably won?t do it again. My SPOT tracks are here: https://spotwalla.com/embed.php?id=...0&height=600&scale=on&zoom=default&refresh=no
On the top of the screen select from the drop down menu 2 WEEKS and then click Go and zoom in and out to see the whole trip.

Ride Safe,
Robert
Ps Total B2B miles a little over 4300.
My Next Rally?s/Rides: THE VOID http://www.rallythevoid.org, MTF Flower Sniffin? http://www.mctourer.com/rides/2013/Ohio, and the IBA BIG-AS Texas Party & SS1000 ride http://www.ironbutt.com/texas
 
Thanks for sharing Robert

You must have lots of energy; it tired me out just reading it. Hope you have many more adventures; ride safe.
DW
 
Back
Top