Jim Shaw
New member
24 JUL 2004
Arrived at the Ann Arbor house last night about 11, with the GS clock ahead by almost exactly 9,000 miles.
Rode the first leg with my friend, the incomparable JJ. We took the new jet ferry across Lake Michigan, from Muskegon to Milwaukee. It is a great trip, and the $80 fare for one bike and rider is competitive with the costs for us to ride all the way around Chicago. The trip through Canada to Edmonton was uneventful with good weather, except for 40 knot gales through Manitoba that tried to take my head off. Then things got a little interesting, dodging the many forest fires in BC and Yukon. The Alaska Highway was much better than I remember it from eight years ago (and the GS was better in the construction zones than the old K100LT was). We were delayed one day in Fort Nelson with the (only) road closed due to fires.
The Last Frontier Rally, in Houston, Alaska was a great time. Got a day off the motorcycle, camping was great, people there are friendly, and the food is good. Not a big rally - maybe sixty-seventy there - including 17 states represented. I'd definitely go back, if it were just a bit closer.
The fires were a problem in the North, so I cut off planned trips to Fairbanks and Denali. Visibility was poor, those places stank of smoke, and I'm told many of the hotels were filled with evacuees from the forest fires.
So, we headed back out through Tok and Haines Junction. I was told the Cassiar Highway (planned route) was pretty ragged due to construction most of its length (source of wisdom: two pretty rugged looking GS riders from LA, who'd just come up it). JJ desparately wanted to go to the Lunatic Fringe Rally, near Calgary, so he went his way at Haines Junction. I took the FluffyButt option, and floated down the inland waterway on the Alaska Marine Highway. Cost about a grand, but I had a stateroom. They had a piano in the bar, so the beer was mostly free. Saw a pod of Killer Whales (USFS naturalist on board said 20-30 of them - very rare to find). What a sight! Whales breaching and blowing everywhere, right next to the ship. The Marine Highway is a nice cross between a ferry and a cruise ship. It took five nights to go from Haines to Bellingham, WA.
Arrived in Bellingham the Friday morning before the MOA Rally, so I met up with my rabid IronButt riding friend, John Ryan for some sightseeing. John had just finished an IBA 50CC Gold ride (New York to San Francisco in 47 hours), recuperated for a couple of days, got his Russell seat rebuilt in CA, and rode up to Portland, where we met up for some northwest touring.
A meal at the Timberline Lodge at Mt. Hood has become ritual for me, when in the Portland area. It's as nice as ever, though overrun with people even older than me. Then, a day around Mt. St. Helens. I visited a friend in Seattle, while Ryan did St. Helens from the other side, and Rainier.
I rode alone (remembering for a day how nice it is to ride alone) across WA 20, which they call the "North Cascades Highway." It is one of the more beautiful roads I've ever ridden, and was wonderfully free of other vehicles. 20 dropped me off in Spokane, where I was a day early for the MOA "Northwest Passage" fete. In a word, it was the best MOA rally I've ever been to. Jackie Hughes, the Rally Chairman, left no detail unplanned. This year, I hotelled it - at the very comfortable Best Western just a couple miles from the site. MOA provided hourly shuttle service to the rally, in case I wanted to indulge at the Beer Tent. GiSmo, my trusty GS, got a couple days off for good behavior.
Saturday night, after the closing ceremonies, friends Paul and Tricia Taylor, Jeff and Sharon Davis, Rebecca Vaughn, John Ryan, and I had a fine seafood dinner at the four day old Anthony's restaurant in Spokane. Paul offered Ryan a buck if he'd ride through the city's fountain on the way. In a rare show of citizenship, John decided a buck was too little pay for the stunt, and we were saved from a probable jailhouse visit.
Sunday morning, at the crack of noon, John and I set out for the return voyage. He'd ordered a new Roadcrafter to replace his trademark beaten-to-within-an-inch-of-its-life leather jacket. So, we rode US 2 all the way to Duluth - a pilgrimage many riders make to the Mecca of riderdom - Andy Goldfine's Aerostich factory. What wonderful people he has working there! I bought a new set of bounce pads for my Darien (now about age seven), and got free fixes for a couple of broken zippers, a new belt, and a handful of zipper-pulls, for free.
From Duluth, it was a short ride across the UP to St. Ignace, where John headed for a friend's house in Vermont, and I crossed the Mackinac Bridge on my way to Ann Arbor, later to ride to my home (and GiSmo's garage) in Ohio.
Total Mileage: 9,001
Time spent away: five weeks
Gasoline used: Lots
Highest price paid for a US gallon: $3.54 (in the Yukon)
Tires: 1 set, Tourance, now still going strong after 12,000 miles
Oil change: one, in Tacoma
Washes: One, in Spokane, to remember what color GiSmo was, and to remove about twelve pounds of Alaska
Repairs/adjustments/oaths to GS: Replaced the gas cap in Anchorage, after an out-of-control gas spout whacked it and broke the hinge
Glad to be home; glad to have gone. Now what?
Jim Shaw
Ann Arbor, MI and Hinckley, OH USA
Arrived at the Ann Arbor house last night about 11, with the GS clock ahead by almost exactly 9,000 miles.
Rode the first leg with my friend, the incomparable JJ. We took the new jet ferry across Lake Michigan, from Muskegon to Milwaukee. It is a great trip, and the $80 fare for one bike and rider is competitive with the costs for us to ride all the way around Chicago. The trip through Canada to Edmonton was uneventful with good weather, except for 40 knot gales through Manitoba that tried to take my head off. Then things got a little interesting, dodging the many forest fires in BC and Yukon. The Alaska Highway was much better than I remember it from eight years ago (and the GS was better in the construction zones than the old K100LT was). We were delayed one day in Fort Nelson with the (only) road closed due to fires.
The Last Frontier Rally, in Houston, Alaska was a great time. Got a day off the motorcycle, camping was great, people there are friendly, and the food is good. Not a big rally - maybe sixty-seventy there - including 17 states represented. I'd definitely go back, if it were just a bit closer.
The fires were a problem in the North, so I cut off planned trips to Fairbanks and Denali. Visibility was poor, those places stank of smoke, and I'm told many of the hotels were filled with evacuees from the forest fires.
So, we headed back out through Tok and Haines Junction. I was told the Cassiar Highway (planned route) was pretty ragged due to construction most of its length (source of wisdom: two pretty rugged looking GS riders from LA, who'd just come up it). JJ desparately wanted to go to the Lunatic Fringe Rally, near Calgary, so he went his way at Haines Junction. I took the FluffyButt option, and floated down the inland waterway on the Alaska Marine Highway. Cost about a grand, but I had a stateroom. They had a piano in the bar, so the beer was mostly free. Saw a pod of Killer Whales (USFS naturalist on board said 20-30 of them - very rare to find). What a sight! Whales breaching and blowing everywhere, right next to the ship. The Marine Highway is a nice cross between a ferry and a cruise ship. It took five nights to go from Haines to Bellingham, WA.
Arrived in Bellingham the Friday morning before the MOA Rally, so I met up with my rabid IronButt riding friend, John Ryan for some sightseeing. John had just finished an IBA 50CC Gold ride (New York to San Francisco in 47 hours), recuperated for a couple of days, got his Russell seat rebuilt in CA, and rode up to Portland, where we met up for some northwest touring.
A meal at the Timberline Lodge at Mt. Hood has become ritual for me, when in the Portland area. It's as nice as ever, though overrun with people even older than me. Then, a day around Mt. St. Helens. I visited a friend in Seattle, while Ryan did St. Helens from the other side, and Rainier.
I rode alone (remembering for a day how nice it is to ride alone) across WA 20, which they call the "North Cascades Highway." It is one of the more beautiful roads I've ever ridden, and was wonderfully free of other vehicles. 20 dropped me off in Spokane, where I was a day early for the MOA "Northwest Passage" fete. In a word, it was the best MOA rally I've ever been to. Jackie Hughes, the Rally Chairman, left no detail unplanned. This year, I hotelled it - at the very comfortable Best Western just a couple miles from the site. MOA provided hourly shuttle service to the rally, in case I wanted to indulge at the Beer Tent. GiSmo, my trusty GS, got a couple days off for good behavior.
Saturday night, after the closing ceremonies, friends Paul and Tricia Taylor, Jeff and Sharon Davis, Rebecca Vaughn, John Ryan, and I had a fine seafood dinner at the four day old Anthony's restaurant in Spokane. Paul offered Ryan a buck if he'd ride through the city's fountain on the way. In a rare show of citizenship, John decided a buck was too little pay for the stunt, and we were saved from a probable jailhouse visit.
Sunday morning, at the crack of noon, John and I set out for the return voyage. He'd ordered a new Roadcrafter to replace his trademark beaten-to-within-an-inch-of-its-life leather jacket. So, we rode US 2 all the way to Duluth - a pilgrimage many riders make to the Mecca of riderdom - Andy Goldfine's Aerostich factory. What wonderful people he has working there! I bought a new set of bounce pads for my Darien (now about age seven), and got free fixes for a couple of broken zippers, a new belt, and a handful of zipper-pulls, for free.
From Duluth, it was a short ride across the UP to St. Ignace, where John headed for a friend's house in Vermont, and I crossed the Mackinac Bridge on my way to Ann Arbor, later to ride to my home (and GiSmo's garage) in Ohio.
Total Mileage: 9,001
Time spent away: five weeks
Gasoline used: Lots
Highest price paid for a US gallon: $3.54 (in the Yukon)
Tires: 1 set, Tourance, now still going strong after 12,000 miles
Oil change: one, in Tacoma
Washes: One, in Spokane, to remember what color GiSmo was, and to remove about twelve pounds of Alaska
Repairs/adjustments/oaths to GS: Replaced the gas cap in Anchorage, after an out-of-control gas spout whacked it and broke the hinge
Glad to be home; glad to have gone. Now what?
Jim Shaw
Ann Arbor, MI and Hinckley, OH USA