Good day, my wonderful friends! It has been a minute since I’ve chatted to you. I hope everyone is well and happy.
Planning
I’ve been getting up to planning my next trip, Alaska. The plan last year, after I finished motobiking around the lower 48, was to head to Alaska in July of this year. Well, my daughter is getting married, so that has been pushed off to July 2023. 2023?! That is like a lifetime away!! It’s true, it’s a long time, but I’ve been getting ready and planning nonetheless.
Kymani Improvements
My first job was to get a motorcycle that could handle the dirt roads I expect to encounter in Alaska, and that is a bit smaller than Lucille. Smaller is easier to pick up by myself! As you know, if you’ve been around, I bought a new bike in December and have been getting her ready. Her name is Kymani and she’s a sweet little machine. She’s more than 100 pounds lighter than Lucille and nimble as can be. This is only the second time I’ve bought a brand-new bike and it is nerve wracking, but also, you have to kit the thing up from scratch! I’ve been researching, and buying things a bit at a time, and she’s finally getting to the ready point.
The first thing I did was to add crash protection bars. These are like insurance. And, knowing I’ll be riding on rough, dirt roads, I figure I will crash, it’s just a matter of when. Then I got a better windshield, as the one that came with her originally was a joke like a postage stamp stuck on the front of the bike. Ridiculous BMW! She’s now got luggage, a kickstand enlarger so she doesn’t tip over when I park her in the dirt or on hot asphalt, extra lights, a headlight protector, hand guards, and will soon have a bash plate and better footpegs. She’s coming along.
She’s almost got everything she needs.
The basic plan
I have a pretty good idea of how I will get to Alaska, where I’ll ride when I’m there, and how I’ll get home. I’d love to take the ferry home, but it’s pricey with a motorcycle and I’ll have to see how the finances are going. Weddings are expensive and kitting out a bike is expensive. Luckily, I’ve almost all the gear I’ll need, but there’s a lot to buy yet. Here’s a look at the route I’m planning on right now. Of course things can change, and I’ll stay flexible, but this is where I’d like to go.
This is the basic route. This is what it looks like through Alaska.
Back to school
As you might know, I didn’t grow up riding motorbikes like some kids. I was a city girl with very strict parents and motorbikes were NOT for people like us. As a result, I didn’t get on a bike until I was 18. Of course it was love at first ride, and I’ve pretty much been riding ever since. However, all of those miles have been logged on the pavement, well most of them. I did ride in the Philippines, and a lot of their roads, especially where I lived were dirt, but they were hard-packed, almost like asphalt, dirt. I never thought it required any special skill except avoiding falling into the giant potholes! Fast forward more years than I want to say, and I realize, I need to figure out how to ride in the dirt. I did inadvertently ride Lucille in some dirt, but I am hoping my Alaska experience will not be anything like those terror filled miles! I decided it’s time to teach myself how to ride off-road.
As with anything I do, I reached out to my friend Google to help me out. I’ve watched a plethora of videos intended to teach you how to deal with offroad stuff. This isn’t like practicing, but watching enough of these, you can pick up some information about how you should be riding. The key is to put it into practice. With that in mind, I took Kymani on a ride to some roads I’d driven a 4-wheel drive, high clearance vehicle on some years before. I thought it would be a good test.
The way in
I had forgotten how the narrow, twisty road, highly prone to rockslides scared me in a truck. Now that I was on Kymani, and, looking over the edge of the road at the hundreds of feet to the bottom, I remembered. It’s a long way back to these dirt roads, so I had plenty of time to settle in and enjoy the ride. On the way in I came across one chucklehead in my lane on a curve, two slides, and numerous heaves in the road. It was exciting and it took me more than 2 hours to get to where I wanted to be.
Why did I ride so far for some dirt? Well, for one thing, I felt I was familiar with the roads there and thought I could handle riding them as a beginner. I knew there wouldn’t be a lot of traffic in the dirt there, and, I don’t really know of any fairly easy dirt roads to ride on near me.
Practice
So, I went up into the mountains alone to practice what I’d learned from my videos. One of the first things I learned is you should stand on the pegs, rather than sit on the seat when you’re off road. This does a few things, puts your center of gravity over the bike’s center of gravity, making it easier, it gives you the built-in shock absorbers of your legs, and it helps you see what’s coming up better. As a street rider, I’ve only stood up for a minute or so on long rides to stretch my knees out. While it changed everything about riding the bike, it didn’t seem that hard. Well, I was in for a real treat!
Standing on your pegs for an extended period of time, all while trying to work the clutch, gas, brake and shift lever, was a trick. It changes the way everything feels, and I found myself struggling with the friction zone and the gas. I was either giving it too much or not enough. Also, when I was standing on the pegs, I couldn’t automatically reach the gear shift lever or the rear brake with my feet and I had to move them to either shift or brake. And, I was squeezing the crap out of the seat with my knees! It was a lot harder than I thought it was going to be!
Kymani on the dirt road. She looks so good!
The first thing I came across was a huge, downed tree across the road. There WAS enough room for Kymani to fit, but that room was filled with debris and I had never ridden over anything like it before. I actually had to stop and think about whether or not I wanted to do it! I did, and I made it through just fine. This gave me the courage to keep going. The road was full of tree debris, holes, rocks and a few gullies. I did it! I fully expected to fall, but I didn’t. I didn’t realize though, how tiring riding that way was! Though I didn’t go far, between trying to learn riding off-road, squeezing the seat with my knees, standing on those tiny pegs, and going over the obstacles, I was tired!
The downed tree.
I rode back to Auburn, and met my BFG for lunch. Our original choice was closed, sadly, so we went somewhere else delicious. All in all, I rode about 7 hours and was plenty tired at the end, but I felt good that I’d had a good start on learning to ride off-road. I’ll keep practicing and trying new things. Now though, larger footpegs are on my wish list!