Day 19 - The Train

Rocky Mountaineer’s New Glass-Domed Train Runs From Colorado to Utah

For a lot less money you can take the Amtrak California Zephyr from Salt Lake City to Denver, stay the night, and come back the next day. 22 Jun is generally the longest day of the year so you will get to see the sunrise just before going over Soldier Summit and down the other side of the Wasatch mountains. There is the boring part across the desert from Price to Green River but after that it is all scenery all the time.

Amtrak's Vista Dome cars may not be quite as fancy but they are just as good for looking around and seeing the sights. The food in the dining car is great and reasonably priced. They fill the tables up so you are certain to meet new people to share the experience with.

Past Grand Junction you are into the Rockies and running along the Colorado River. A quick stop at Glenwood Springs and then into Glenwood Canyon.

There are only two ways to go through the canyon; take the train, or raft down the river. Just before entering the canyon the conductor walks through the cars advising people with a “sensitive nature” to relocate to the left side of the car. The reason being that the rafters all know the train schedule and make sure to pull over so the can moon the train as it goes by. I think the engineer aids and abets this time honored tradition by sounding the horn along the way.

The rest of the trip down into Denver is scenic and relaxing. A perfect end to a great ride. A nice dinner in town and an AirBnB bed completes a memorable excursion.

The next morning it's up early to get back to the train station for the trip back to Salt Lake City. This is a perfect complement to the first ride. Heading west in the morning gives the scenery an entirely different perspective. Serene and composed. This time you will be going over Soldier Summit as the sun is setting and will be getting into Salt Lake late. I find the rush of the train through the urban scene to be an enjoyable counterpoint to day's natural wonders.

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Day 18 - Covid Counterpoint

I'm going to relinquish my own words today in favor of my friend Dave who offered an excellent counterpoint to my discussion of Covid and the failure of the government and media to properly explain it to the general population. Dave has done some excellent research that fills in many of the blanks. Too bad that much of what we get in the news is only sound bites and fear mongering.

~70k drug overdoses in the US in 2019. 200k+ deaths from Covid from March through November. This includes the insane death curve of the opioid thing over the past few years. Back around 2010 we had a bunch of years with 12-15k per year. I hope that puts Covid in perspective. I have three doc friends, in different areas of the country, who have never seen anything like this in 20-35 years of work at the hospitals they are at. They claim dying the way these folks do is about as dark as you can imagine with slow-growing brain tumors as amongst the few ways they would less prefer to go.

Note that if 1/1000 people died in the US it would be a tiny percentage and still 320k. The kill rate is much higher than that if we all got it though.

A bit more: I know a 38 year old 2:45 marathon runner who got it. No comorbidities^*. He was sick for 4 weeks, was not hospitalized, and has lost nearly 60% of lung function. He will never run again, so he is now an ex-marathoner with his last in late fall 2018. I also know a guy who lost his father-in-law and that man's brother in the same three week period. One had heart disease (so do 50% of men over 47 years of age by they don't know it) but the other didn't have comorbidities. Maybe they just didn't win the gene pool but who knows.

We can know a lot of folks who got sick and "are fine" but that doesn't mean the hospitals won't overflow and such as it doesn't take that many folks who would have otherwise been fine to block them up.

Dave

^* the simultaneous presence of two or more diseases or medical conditions in a patient.

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Day 17 - The Mall

Dreary is the only word for it!

I went to one of the largest malls in town today. If there was any holiday spirit there I didn't see it. Just people milling around like zombies going through an ancient ritual that had lost all meaning.

The clerks were cheerless in their greetings as the shoppers shuffled along, looking at things they weren't buying. Nobody wanted to touch anything for fear of contamination.

The stores were roped off to allow only a few people in at a time. Few people were willing to wait. Move along, don't look left or right, just go through the motions until you can get home and order on line.

Santa sat in his chair behind a Plexiglas screen. Children were not allowed to approach. The Grinch has finally stolen Christmas. The Amazon driver is Santa's new helper. Don't smile. Don't touch. Be afraid.

I fear the loss of joy more than I fear the virus. The death of joy is worse than any mortal wound.

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Day 16 - Corvid

I had an extended conversation with a person today who had some interesting theories about our current situation. He was a working class, right-leaning guy who saw the pandemic as an excuse for the government to take more control of people's lives.

He didn't deny that the pandemic was real. His thesis was that the government and media have blown it all out of proportion to the real threat. It is all a scare campaign get people to do whatever they were told.

I had to agree with him on a lot of points. It does seem that every death is now a Corvid Death no matter what the pre-existing conditions were.

Wearing a mask is probably helpful but certainly not the way a lot of people use them. They wear them all askew so that they can breathe which renders them completely useless. I don't see the news media exhorting people to wear their masks correctly.

Articles are constantly publishing big numbers of infections and deaths but don't put those numbers in context. What were the demographics of those people. Did they have other conditions that contributed to their demise? How many people died of drug overdoses during the same period? How many died in auto accidents? who really cares how many people died in Germany or Russia, how many died in my home town?

I've known several people who have caught the virus and they've all recovered. All of them agree that it was a horrible three days of misery but they are not only back to normal, they are immunized for the next year. However, they still have to wear a mask because they might be a carrier!

Ignoring these questions and classifying these people as ignorant only inflames the conspiracy theories and leaves us wondering what the truth really is.

In the end we did agree that it was definitely a conspiracy by the Plexiglas manufacturers that is behind all this.

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Day 15 - Coco

It turns out to be harder to write all this than I expected. For a person who “talks too much” and “has a million stories”, I'm finding that it isn't so easy to organize my thoughts into something coherent and interesting. Who would have guessed?

I wrote about wanting to visit India and go for a ride with Gaurav Jani. Of course that plan has failed because Gaurav died a few months ago.

Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.

Time passes quickly and our plans slip through our fingers like water. One day we say “Tomorrow” and many tomorrows later we find we are stuck in the same old rut.

Today is yesterday's tomorrow.

I'm pretty good at making plans and following through but I can also be lazy and let things slide. Case at point:

A few years ago, 12 to be exact, my friend Marty and I rode our bikes to Baja. We had few plans other than to avoid getting arrested. We had a paper map and big gas tanks. We were happy.

One of the goals on the trip was to stop at Coco's Corner and meet the man, the myth, the legend. Alas, it was not to be. We were there but Coco was not. We hung out thinking he might return but while we waited a couple of hours it was not to be. I planned to return the next year but that was not to be either.

I was thinking of Gaurav today when Coco crossed my mind. Is he still alive? Is he still in residence? A quick Google search indicates that he is alive and doing well at the Corner.

Just as I challenged myself to write this blog, I now challenge myself to go back to Baja and find Coco in the spring. This time I will not let the opportunity fade from my grasp.

Want to come along? Let me know.

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Day 14 - Stupid Magazine Articles

I just saw a review of the new Honda 125cc Trail Bike in Cycle News. I used to have one of the original 90cc versions from the '80s. About as simple a machine as you can get. 2 wheels, 1 engine, plus a seat and handlebars. It will go anywhere and if you get stuck it's so light you can just pick it up and carry it out of trouble.

This is a bike for hunters, campers, and people who like to fish while being quiet enough to never disturb the Green Taliban. In other words, it's for everyone who wants to go farther into the woods than they care to walk. It's a mild mannered machine for people who want a capable motorcycle and are not bothered by their image. The kind of people who often bungee-cord a milk crate to the rack to carry their stuff.

So what does Cycle News do? They show pictures of it flying into the air over jumps and doing wheelies. The last thing that any actual buyer would be doing with such a machine.

I find this really irritating. Why do publications feel they need to show bikes and riders doing hooligan things when they so rarely do in real life. Worse, they seem to be encouraging people to do such stunts which only further tarnishes the image of the motorcycle community.

To me this is just plain and simple arrogance, and I wish they would cut it out!

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Day 13 - Favorite Motorcycle Movies

As soon as I say I ride motorcycles I often hear, “I loved that Fastest Indian movie.” And so do I. I have friends who knew Burt Munro and they say that the movie is pretty realistic for a Hollywood product. It compressed the events of several trips into one but it created a good story that made people happy so I say, Good Job!

There are other motorcycle movies that are equally good but have not had all the fanfare that Hollywood publicity creates. Here's a list of my favorites.

On Any Sunday is the classic of all motorcycle movies. It was made by Bruce Brown in 1971 as a follow up to his Endless Summer surfer movie. It was made by somebody who had the true feeling for motorcycling and really distilled the essence of the era. It has spawned several sequels by Bruce and his son but nothing equals the original.

As much as I like Sunday, it's not my choice for greatest motorcycle movie. That honor goes to Riding Solo To The Top Of The World, a 2006 film by Gaurav Jani. No film comes close to capturing the soul and spirit of the adventure traveler that this one does. It has inspired many of my own travels. Gaurav and I discussed the possibility of traveling together at some time but, regrettably, he passed away in May 2020 before I ever got to meet him. A reminder that life is short and tomorrow is never assured.

People often mention Long Way Round but I've never seen it. Free motorcycles, a camera/support crew, and a big budget reality show do not interest me.

“Oh darn, I have a flat tire. Julio would you be so kind as to fix it for me? And Maria could you make us all a latté while we wait?”

Far more fun and infinitely more real is Mondo Enduro. A bunch of English riders on Suzuki 350 bikes go around the world before mobile phones and gps. What they had was an 8mm movie camera and paper journals to record their trip. They are out for fun and adventure before "Fun & Adventure" became a thing.

I've ridden through Baja several times and one of the high points was seeing the start of the Baja 1000. Dust to Glory is the movie that captures all the chaos and excitement of that race. It was filmed by Dana Brown, son of Bruce Brown, and shows that great film making runs in the family. Just be prepared for 97 minutes of unrelenting excitement!

Those are three of my favorites. Leave a comment if you want to share yours.

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Day 12 - Photography

I used to teach a B&W photography course at the San Diego Ocean Beach Free School. I was really into it back then and spent almost as much money on camera equipment and lenses as I did on motorcycle things.

On the first day of classes I would haul in all my stuff and lay out some big 13x19" prints that I had made. As the students filtered in I invited them to look over what I had laid out. At the start of class I asked them what they thought and inevitably the comments went something like, "If I had equipment like yours I could take great pictures too"

After a bit of discussion I pulled an old Kodak Brownie from my pack and explained that every one of the pictures they had just praised was made with this simple camera. Some of them were amazed and some thought I was making a joke.

I pulled out more of them and handed them to the students. They were yard sale finds at a dollar apiece. Some were dismayed that they wouldn't be using their fancy Nikons and Pentaxes and expressed the opinion that they should be able to use whatever they wanted.

I explained to them that the camera did not take the picture. The eye, the mind, and the heart took the picture. The camera was just a clever mechanism for capturing what the eye saw, the mind imagined, and the heart felt.

Some students never came back but most of them got it. They had fun experimenting with the limitations of the Brownies and getting to know what the interplay of light and shadow was.

When they had exposed 3-4 rolls of film I showed them how to develop it and how to make prints with yard sale enlargers. There is a great satisfaction in seeing the joy in a person's face as their first print comes slowly to life in the developer tray.

I taught the course for a couple of years. To me, the photography lesson was learning the eye, mind, heart connection. The rest was just physics and chemistry.

Note: those old Brownie cameras now go for $25-50 on etsy. I should have saved them all for my retirement fund.

Day 11 - Hiking

Went hiking today. The town I live in, Tooele, is in a valley between the Oquirrh and Stansbury mountain ranges. There is a road zig-zagging up the side of the Oquirrh to the east that I can see it from my living room. It's a service road for the power lines and I'm guessing that it's about 8-10 miles long and ~3500' elevation climb above the valley. It has been calling to me since I moved in.

Today we went looking for the bottom of that road. It's off an old mining road with a gate across it so we parked the car and climbed over the gate. In a mile or so we were under the power lines with no access in sight so we started bushwhacking up the side of the hills.

Came across a large deer carcass that must have been brought down by a mountain lion. Everyone has to eat and survival is a hard case. Mother Nature is not sentimental.

I chose to follow a deer track up the side while Beth chose a different path. When I was halfway to the top I looked around and saw that she was already ahead of me. Amazing woman!

An hour later we intercepted the service road which was our goal for the day. We followed it back down to see where it intersected the mining road. Much easier going down than climbing up! Next time we'll know where to start our climb.

I kept thinking about what a great trail this would make for the motorcycle but the mining company must have read my thoughts. Armco guard rails cut off all access to the area. I just don't see myself lifting my bike 4' into the air to get past them. There are plenty of legal places to ride all around here, this one will have to remain a hiking adventure.

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Day 10 - Thanksgiving

#GiveThanks - It's been all over social media. Here's my list:

1. Beth - 30 years of marriage that has been, at times, inspirational and stormy, but never dull. What's not to like? A Honda Hawk GT, 2 Ducatis, a Moriwaki land speed record bike, a couple of AHRMA race bikes, and she's a great cook! (I do the dishes and clean the kitchen). Best of all, she's been my best friend and companion through all theses years.

2. Takeo Fujisawa - When you think of Honda you think of Soichiro Honda who was certainly an engineering genius. However, I would suggest that Honda would be nothing but an interesting side note if it were not for Takeo Fujisawa. When Honda went to Europe to buy modern machine tools, it was Fujisawa who made sure the money was available to pay the bills. His financial expertise is what gave Honda Motors stability and helped it flourish. It was a perfect team that lifted the world of motorcycles to an new level. They really were, “The Nicest People … “

3. Friends - I have plenty of acquaintances but I have been truly fortunate to have more than my share of true friends. It's well known that I can be a little crazy but I've had so many friends who have shown me patience and love throughout the years. Without them I have no idea where I might have ended up.

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Day 9 - Honda Dream

This is moto-insanity!

Bring A Trailer has concentrated on special interest vehicles since it began a couple of years ago. They seem to filter out the scammers and cheaters and try to ensure that the cars, trucks, and motorcycles on their site are honestly represented.

Unlike eBay their format is like a traditional auction. What you bid is what you agree to pay. No max bid hocus-pocus. Also, like a real auction, the bidding continues as long as there are bids. No sniping! At the very end, every time there is another bid the countdown clock is reset to 2 minutes. I've seen auctions that went more than 30 minutes past their deadline because two or more bidders were still duking it out.

All this gives the site a tremendous amount of credibility and the prices that are bid reflect that trust. However, some times there is no understanding what goes on in people's minds.

Case at point, “No Reserve: Restored 1965 Honda CA77 Dream Touring” This is a semi-popular Honda that is over restored to the max. I'll bet that it will never see the road again and is merely a piece of jewelry to enhance somebody's ego.

The final price: $24,652 !! This one you can't blame on the millennials because they weren't even born when this was made.

Compare it to this 1966 Dream on BAT. Same bike except for being a year newer and restored to a state as originally delivered from the factory. No polished points covers, no gleaming brake hubs, no wet look tires. Just dead stock factory original. Not as pretty to sit in your lawyer's office to impress the yocals who don't know any better.

One side of me says, “A happy buyer and a happy seller make a great transaction.” The other side of me says, “This is moto-insanity!”

YMMV

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Day 8 - Honda 250 Scrambler

My next major motorcycle was a Honda CL72, a classic Honda 250cc Scrambler.

Not the original bike but one just like it that I own now.

It was heavy, had questionable brakes and not much power to challenge them. What it had was high pipes and a skid plate under the engine. Another adventure bike!

Down the Coast Highway I went. In a little more style than with my little C110. I went to L.A. looking for something that I don't remember. What I do remember is getting tired of the city and riding up into the hills looking for a place to spend the night. A little searching and I found an out of the way place where I could throw down my sleeping bag. I sat looking down at the night lights of L.A. and thought about Steve McQueen's quote, “I rather wake up in the middle of nowhere than in any city on earth.”

I woke in the morning and found I had acquired a few friends in the night. A small snake, a lizard, and a couple of gopher rats had all snuck into my sleeping bag to get warm. No problem, I shook them out and sent them on their way. Fellow travelers in the night.

On the way north I suddenly lost all power and noticed a long black thing laying in the road behind me. My chain had broken and was beyond repair. I pushed it to a nearby house and the owner said they would keep it until I could return with a new chain. People were like that back then. Maybe they still are.

I hitchhiked back to San Francisco and found that Honda had two different chains for that bike depending on whether I had an early or late model. I, of course, had no idea which one I had but I took a wild guess and started south. I, of course, had the wrong one but I got it to work by letting it hang loose and taking it easy on the way home.

I got the right chain and decided to give it a tune-up and general cleaning. By the time I was done it was late and I was tired. I decided to leave it parked in front of the apartment on Grant Street rather than take it to the garage across town.

OF COURSE, it was not there in the morning. Stolen and never to be seen again.

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Day 7 - Dan

I've had a long history with Yosemite. My aunt and uncle had a small vacation cabin in Foresta which is inside the park boundaries. I would visit them once in a while and camp out by myself at other times.

I was driving up in my Jeep late one evening, the cold seeping through my thin Army surplus field jacket. No top, no doors or windows, and most regrettably, no heater. Climbing up into the mountains only increased my misery as I reduced my speed to cut the wind chill factor.

A family in a station wagon flashed by and I, for a moment, wished I was just a little less radical. Then I thought to myself, “I'm the youth of America, master of the future, and everything else I can see before of me!” I sat up straighter, put the pedal to the metal, and roared off into the night.

When I got to my aunt and uncle's nobody was there. It was dark and I was cold. What to do?

I saw a light off in the forest and thought it must be somebody else's cabin. Mountain people are friendly and generous I reasoned. Surely they would take in the frozen nephew of Betty and 'Pad' Padilla for a night. Surely they had a warm couch I could sleep on until morning. Surely even a mug of hot chocolate for a weary traveler was possible.

I wasn't sure of the roads in this little community so I struck out cross-country with enough star light to avoid walking into trees. However, not enough light to see Crane Creek before I tumbled down the bank and into the water. Now I was really cold and miserable. I climbed up the other side continuing my quest for the light.

That's what I found, A LIGHT, hanging from a cord, attached to the A-Frame of an unbuilt house. Thus, I met Dan, who would become my lifelong friend. He was building the cabin but this was as far as he had gotten. He did, however, have some spare blankets he was willing to share and we ended up talking about life and carpentry into the night.

Dan was from San Francisco and had a real car with a real heater. He said he came up every other weekend and I was free to ride with him whenever I wanted to visit Betty and Pad.

A couple of weeks later he called me at work and said he was going up and asked if I wanted to ride with him. I accepted and it became a regular thing. Not to see my aunt and uncle but to help him build his cabin. Along with others we built it by hand over the next months and years. We would go up on Friday evening, work on Saturday and Sunday, then stop at the Pine Cone Restaurant in Merced for dinner on the way home. An interesting aside is that my mother worked as a waitress in that restaurant when she was a girl.

All who built it were free to use it with the exception of Dan's bedroom which was not only off limits but was too crammed with stuff to be usable anyway. 

Wherever I've been in the world that cabin has been a beacon of stability for me. Over 50 years of stories and misadventures have been witnessed by those walls. Maybe some of them will make it into these pages.

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Day 6 - The Jeep

When I was living in San Francisco in the '60s I had an old World War II Jeep (MB Series) for a while. It had no top and no doors. What it had was a cracked windshield and a couple of bullet holes in the side. It was painted a ghastly green by some previous owner but I didn't care, it had 4-wheel drive and could take me to all the places I wanted to go.

My friend Chip and I used to drive down to Big Sur picking up any and all hitch hikers along the way. A jug of wine, a baggie of weed, a buck or two for gas; each sharing what we had to get a little further down the road. We camped out under the stars and told ourselves that we were free and that it would never end.

California was a lot less up tight back then. You could drive out to Ocean Beach and race up and down the sand chasing sea gulls. Another great idea that proved to be my undoing. While trying to have fun with a new girlfriend I got caught in the sand as the tide was coming in. By the time a truck came to tow me out the only thing to be seen was the top of the windshield. The tow truck drive handed me the hook and told me to swim out to the Jeep and connect it because he sure as hell wasn't going to do it.

Once on dry land I received a quick chemistry lesson. To wit: salt water does not play nice with copper wiring. The girlfriend stuck around for a while, the Jeep had to go.

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Day 5 - The Vespa

The second important bike in my life was a motor scooter. A Vespa 160 GS. It belonged to a friend of by brother who was under orders to sell it because he had broken the rules once, or very many, too many times.

This was a disaster waiting to happen. Too much power, too little brakes, and absolutely no suspension to cope with the streets of San Francisco. Those little tires were never meant to deal with the craters euphemistically called pot holes.

The tiny tires also meant that cornering was always a challenge because leaning it too far over meant that it would scrape the bodywork. This would lever the back wheel off the pavement if one were not careful. Centrifugal force would immediately take over and fling the scooter and rider off the street and into the nearest stationary object. Ouch!

I didn't care. It was fun to blast through traffic, cutting in and out and in between the bigger cars and trucks. It was the '60s, the Haight-Ashbury generation, and all young people in San Francisco were supposed to act crazy!

The little wheels also meant that it was prone to doing wheelies whenever going up one of those famous hills. I once had a girl on the back and let out the clutch too fast. The Vespa wheelied, she fell off the back, hurled many bad words at me, and walked home. Alas, I never saw her again.

I did ride it to Yosemite one time. Remember, this is a 160cc machine, not the 50cc of my little Honda so I was not quite as crazy. Until the ride home …

There was a Corvette coming down the Altamont Pass at the same time I was. Now a Corvette and a Vespa are not usually in the same competition class but where he had the power, I had the maneuverability. I was cutting in and out, lane splitting before it was legal, doing anything I could to get ahead. Maybe he saw me or maybe he was just in a hurry but I was having the time of my life!

Until …

The engine seized!

Remember those little wheels? Let me tell you that they do not offer much stability when they are not turning. I managed to grab the clutch and keep it upright while I coasted to the side of the road. 50 miles to home in North Beach and I was wondering what I was going to do. Having nothing to lose I started kicking it over and over until it miraculously started. It must have overheated and seized but was able to restart once it cooled off. It didn't run very well but it got me home.

The following weekend I took it over to my friend Dan's place because he had a garage I could work in. I took out the engine and carefully cleaned it off so I could disassemble it. Then left it out on the sunny sidewalk to dry off while I went into his apartment to make a sandwich. He came in and said, “Wow, you've got it back together already?”

“No, I'm waiting for it to dry off so I can work on it.”

“Well it's not out there now.”

I ran out and, sure enough, it was gone. Vanished!

I called around but a replacement engine was more than I could afford so I sold the body for a little money and became a regular patron of the MUNI, San Francisco's bus and trolley system.

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Day 4 - My first Honda

Looking at a digital album of the motorcycles I've owned I'm amazed at the variety of interesting bikes I've had the pleasure to ride and the vast amount of adventures I've had on them.

Street bikes, dirt bikes, touring bikes, and what's come to be known as “adventure” bikes. Mostly Hondas but a smattering of Brit and Euro bikes to add flavor.

My first bike, a Honda C110. 50cc of awesome power! My dad wouldn't let me have a driver's license but did allow me to purchase this tiny tiddler.

It was a magic carpet for me. I used to sneak out of my bedroom window at night and push it down the street so he wouldn't hear it start. I would go up to Skyline Drive and rode along the ridge with the lights of San Francisco beckoning across the bay. I'd go for hours and miles until I was exhausted. Then return home to push it into the backyard, climb back through the window, and fall asleep to happy dreams of adventure.

The following summer, after convincing my parents that I wasn't crazy, I rode the bike down the Coast Highway (Rt 1) all the way to Disneyland. It took me 2 days to get there but I was in heaven. After a couple of days roaming around L.A. I got on and rode up to Yosemite. Trust me, the Tejon Pass is 10 times as long when you only have 5 1/2 horsepower. My aunt and uncle lived in Merced so I stopped there for the night.

I got in late and didn't want to wake anyone so I spread out my sleeping bag on the front lawn and fell asleep. My uncle liked to tell the story about how he thought one of his kids had left their sleeping bag out and was very shocked when it let out a scream when he tried to pick it up.

They fed me breakfast and offered opinions about the sanity of going anywhere, let alone Yosemite, on my little bike. However, I was not to be deterred and left in high spirits.

Past Briceburg the the old Yosemite Railroad roadbed parallels the highway on the far side of the Merced river. Since my bike had a high pipe it must be a dirt bike, right?!?!

Bouncing along the rutted and washed out path it was wasn't long before I went over the side. Luckily the bike only weighs ~160 pounds so I was able to drag it back up the bank and head back to Briceburg. Then up to Yosemite and my first of many, many visits to the valley medical clinic. They patched up the tear in my arm and offered their opinion about my mental capacity. It was beginning to seem like a familiar chorus.

A couple of nights camping out in the valley and hiking around the falls with my Kodak Instamatic made me feel the stirring of the great wanderlust that continues to this day.

It all started with a bike so small that it wouldn't get a second glance these days. But it was the start of a wonderful relationship between me, Honda, and the world!

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Day 3 - Fire

I just read an interesting article on preventing California wildfires by Sashi McEntee, mayor of Mill Valley, CA. She states that people must take direct responsibility for their circumstances. Blaming climate change or other factors does not reduce the need for “Vegetation management, Evacuation planning, Early detection and alert systems, and Neighborhood preparedness”

I recall all the people who cheered the old ladies who chained themselves to trees and said something like, “Every tree is precious!”. There was another woman in Oregon who built a tree house and sequestered herself in it to prevent it from being cut down. Admirable at the time but creating a policy that has come to haunt us now.

Every tree is not precious. Some have to go so that others may stand. Nature takes care of this in a natural manner but humans seem to think they know better. No logging to thin the forest, no roads to create fire breaks, no natural fires to clear the underbrush.

Who or what will save the forests from all these good intentions? The Law of Unintentional Consequences dictates that the more we try save nature, the more we will destroy it.

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Day 2 - The Book

Sitting down this morning I wrote ~250 words on the merits and limitations of a Vino 125 motor scooter for an internet forum. Good, but not what this writing challenge is intended for.

I am proposing to write an educational tech book. The premise is that most books teach in isolation. As if any real world technology was an island unto itself.

There are plenty of books to teach the Angular framework. They help you setup the environment and show you how to write Hello World to the console. Which is very nice if you think there are any jobs for Hello World writers.

The real world demands that you write your program, write tests for your program, and integrate it with the work of others. You have to keep a record of your work in progress, check the work of others, and attend a daily meeting where you explain your work. If all you have been concentrating on are the basics, your first day on the job will be like trying to take a sip from a fire hose!

I've never found a book that brings it all together for the reader. Time will tell if I accomplish this but I'm going to give it my best shot!

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100 words for 100 days

One hundred words doesn't sound like much until you have sit down and write them. Then it seems like staring down a very long and dark tunnel. In fact, it isn't such a big deal. I simply have to have some kernel of an idea and then let the words follow one another onto the page.

The premise is simply this, 100 words for 100 days. No breaks, no excuses, no “I'll do 200 tomorrow”. Of course anything over 100 is OK but it buys no future exemption for a missed goal. 100 * 100!

See, it's not really so hard. Already I'm over 100 and I've hardly begun to babble

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Death March Tours Quiz #2

Death March Tours is gearing up for another season of fun and mayhem. To get ready for your next adventure answer all questions honestly and keep a note of your score. 

1) What is an MT21? 

• A) Tire 
• B) Missile 
• C) A mountain. 

2) When using a roll chart, on which side of the handle bars is it best mounted? 

• A) Left hand side 
• B) Right hand side 
• C) In the middle

3) When riding off road on gravel with fully inflated tires, is it best to ? 

• A) Lower air pressure 
• B) Add a little more air 
• C) Find an alternate route 

4) When riding along a very narrow trail with a drop off to one side, is it best to ? 

• A) Send your riding buddy along the trail first to see how he does. 
• B) Slightly lean your bike away from the drop off side, while counter balancing your bike with your body weight. 
• C) Place the bike in neutral, and try to walk it out. 

5) While riding in an event you notice a rider with a flat tire, do you ? 

• A) Stop to help them 
• B) Close your eyes and hope they go away 
• C) Mark their position on your roll chart so you can advise someone at the next check point 

6) You're pulling the best wheelie of your life in front of a large crowd, when you notice that you're running out of road. Do you ? 

• A) Push the cut off switch on your bike 
• B) Pull in the front brake and push down on the bars 
• C) Roll off the throttle and apply a little rear brake

7) You're riding along some twistie country lanes, when you come to a Harley rider broken down. Do you ? 

• A) Stop to help them 
• B) Ride on by while laughing loud enough for them to hear you. 
• C) Stop and grab your cell phone to call your buddies up, so they can all come over and have a look

8) You've just fallen off your bike and it's leaking gas on to some dried out grass. Do you ? 

• A) Pour some water on to the leaked gas to help break it down 
• B) Set fire to it, and wait for it to fully burn off 
• C) Dig up some dirt and cover the grass over

9) You come to a road sign which reads. "Not recommended for motor vehicles, enter at your own risk" Do you ? 

• A) Give your riding buddy the thumbs up and go for it.
• B) Knock the sign down, and wait for some unsuspecting motor home driver to come along. 
• C) Turn around and find an alternative route 

10) You're riding along a forest service road when all of a sudden a cat sized rodent jumps out in front of you directly in your line of path. Do you ? 

• A) Swerve in to the direction the animal came from 
• B) Open the throttle and try to ride over the rodent 
• C) Slam on both brakes and hope for the best

11) You're all alone and 29 miles from your camp site in the middle of a forest when you get a rear flat tire. You don't have a spare tube or any way of fixing the flat, but you do have some duct-tape. Do you ? 

• A) Wrap the tape around the tire and wheel and ride back to camp at a slow pace. 
• B) Remove the rear tire and wrap the tape around the wheel rims, and ride back to camp at a slow pace 
• C) Throw the duct-tape at that Harley rider that just blew by you, you remember the one you didn't help from question 7.

12) Is it easier to ride a bike with a ? 

• A) Front flat tire 
• B) Rear flat tire 
• C) Remove the air from the non flat tire so both are flat and level

13) You've just rode 200 miles through a desert and your air filter is as clogged as a Dutch man's feet. You have done a quick filter clean with some gas from your gas tank, but need to oil it. Do you ? 

• A) Use some baby oil from your bag of toiletries 
• B) Use any remaining oil off of your chain drive 
• C) Use some oil from your engine

14) You're just about to ride a stream crossing. The stream isn't too deep but the bed is cover in rocks. Do you ? 

• A) Take your boots off and walk your bike across 
• B) Lean as far forward on the bike as you can to help keep the front down and ride across slowly 
• C) Keep your weight to the rear of the bike and ride across slowly

15) Which of these three items would you find more useful on an adventure ride ? 

• A) GPS 
• B) Cell phone 
• C) Hydration system

16) Is "neutral" a classed as a gear ? 

• A) No 
• B) Yes 
• C) A little green light comes on my instrument cluster

17) A trail is totally water logged, the mud is 2 inches deep along the entire length of the trail. Which brake has the most stopping power ? 

• A) Front brake 
• B) I'd use the gears to slow down 
• C) Rear brake

18) You've just hit reserve and know you have enough gas for 18 more miles. You have just travelled 18 miles from your truck to get to the point you are right now all down hill. But you know there is a gas station 19 miles further down the mountain. Which direction do you go ? 

• A) Go off exploring 
• B) Back to the truck 
• C) To the gas station

19) Which of these items would you find most useful in the desert ? 

• A) Empty water bottle 
• B) Book of matches 
• C) Lantern

20) You're riding along and have a sharp pain in your chest. Do you ? 

• A) Pull over and take an aspirin 
• B) Start coughing 
• C) Ride to a phone booth. 

21) When riding up a steep rocky hill which of these three choices do you use the least 

• A) Brakes 
• B) 2nd gear 
• C) Horn 

22) You're 45 miles from home, one of these three items is just about to fail on your bike. Which one would you prefer to break ? 

• A) Sub-frame 
• B) Clutch cable 
• C) Head gasket

............................ 

Instructions : 
Receive 5 points for every "A" answer. 
Take away 5 points for every "B" answer 
Receive 2 points for every "C" answer. 

Scores: 
0 to 10 ... You don't own a bike do you ? 
10 to 20 ... How long you owned your Harley ? 
20 to 25 ... Not bad, let's ride sometime 
26 to 34 ... Way to go !!!! you know your stuff. 
35 to 45 ... Not bad, not bad. 
46 to 55 ... At least it's only time you wasted 
55 to 110 ... Keep taking the meds please

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Agile is not a synonym for “Hand me a new roll of duct tape”

This is a copy of an article I wrote for medium.com. I'll be posting techy articles there from time to time. If you find them interesting subscribe and spread the word. Don't worry, the moto articles will continue here as I continue to get inspired

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Agile is not a synonym for CHAOS.

Agile is not a synonym for “Whatever … “

Agile is not a synonym for “Hand me a new role of duct tape.”

Agile is not a synonym for “Run for the fire extinguisher!!”

Agile is a layer in the development process that starts with a vision of where the organization is going. It’s aim is to get there by a constant refinement of that vision that is understood by all the parties involved.

The next layer is goal setting.

Then a map of resources to goals with a timeline can be created. A strategy for attaining the goals and allocating the resources across time is negotiated. Budgets, people, and time are all resources that may not be elastic.

Then, the promises are made and the deliverables are scheduled.

Finally, the agile part comes to bear. Agile is not a technique displacing preparation. A Kanban board or scrum meeting will not cover-up lack of planning. Agile is a philosophy of open, honest, and transparent communications between consumers and producers to assure that, as development progresses, what the consumer needs is what the producer is delivering. NOTHING MORE !!

Agile does not create anything, it merely facilitates reality in time, budget, and production.

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Rocky Mountain High

A few months ago my friend Marcus told me that his BMW airhead engine had committed suicide and asked about contact info for Peter at Moto Bogotaro. Peter and MB are definitely the #1 shop to go to in the NYC / Brooklyn area if you want great workmanship and fair prices. The problem is that Peter is so good that the waiting list is months long.

I half jokingly told Marcus that it would be easier (and probably faster) to fly out and buy my '88 R100RS. While not perfect cosmetically, it has a performance modified engine and a transmission that shifts like a Honda! And who wouldn't want one since they are the ultimate babe magnet ?!?!

He got back to me and gave me a verbal handshake on the deal. We agreed that Labor Day would be the best hand off. I would ride with him for a couple of days to make sure that he was happy and then turn back to Utah while he continued to New York.

I picked him up at the airport and we looked over the bike. I had changed all the fluids and tuned up the bike in preparation for the trip. He looked the bike over, we went for a brief ride and he wrote a check. 

Only one problem flawed the transfer, the side panel that had never been a problem in all the years that I had owned it suddenly decided that it wanted to stay in Utah and disappeared along the side of the road. We went back over our route but found no trace of it. Bummer!

My friend Linda in Aspen had agreed to put us up for a night. It was a great trip spanning all that Utah and Colorado have to offer. We started south in the desert and then turned east into the mountains. With over 400 miles to go we stopped only for gas and lunch. Sorry, no pictures of that part of the trip. Just take my word for it, with great roads and perfect weather it was a gorgeous ride that is the stuff of dreams.

Looks Photo Shopped but it isn't. It's really this great!

The next morning we packed up and got an early-ish start. It's cold at that altitude (7800') and we were willing to give the sun a chance to warm things up. The altitude was also taking a toll on the bikes as they were not jetted for the altitude. Both bikes were running smoothly but were significantly down on power.

Our plan was to ride over Independence Pass and then continue on to Manitou Springs where I would turn back. I will put this route up against anything that the European Alps have to offer. It runs along the Roaring Fork River on the western side and tops out over 12,000'. Beautiful scenery and tight roads are a challenge as you try to make the most of both without taking a flying lesson off the side. 

At Buena Vista we stopped for lunch and decided that I would return from there. Labor Day crowds packed the road and I had seen it all before. Motorcycling is a solo enterprise even when traveling with a friend and I felt confident in Marcus and the bike. 

While eating lunch a guy came over and asked who owned the Transalp. I admitted that it was mine and he and his partner joined us for a discussion of bikes and life. He wanted a bike, she liked her Lexus. Park the bike, wear the gear, and somebody always wants to talk to you. It's one of the joys of traveling by motorcycle.

It all has a happy ending. This is the BMW parked in front of Marcus's garage in NY. No problems or drama. I made it home with a similar lack of events. My only note is that the panniers seem to add quite a lot of wind resistance at highway speeds (70+). They didn't affect the handling but the gas mileage dropped considerably. A small price to pay to get home quickly.

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Inspiration

Note: I came across this letter I wrote to a friend some time ago. We cannot change our past but we can continually improve our future by acknowledging our debt to the ones who helped us.

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Socrates: "The unexamined life is not worth living"

You asked me what inspired me and I admit to being at a loss for words, let alone ideas. I mentioned Yosemite as a place that I think of as home but it isn't really inspirational in the sense of a call to action.

On my drive back to Connecticut the question kept running through my mind. I admit that I'm pretty comfortable with my life and rarely ask the BIG questions anymore. By now I know who I am, what I am, and am somewhat ambivalent about why I am. But, still, the question kept reappearing. If nothing else, it helped pass the two hours on the road.

As usual, the answer came when I finally ignored the question. When I stopped trying to find the answer, the answer found me.

I mentioned that Yosemite inspires me but that isn't quite true. What it does is provide a place of spiritual quietness. A place where I can consider my life and actions. It's a place for contemplation and reflection, but not inspiration.

What inspires me are the small kindnesses of others. That might sound very Blanche DuBois but it is what drives me forward.

We talked about those moments when we flinch with chagrin at the missteps of our past. I am embarrassed at the rude and thoughtless acts I have done to others. The times when I was petty or harsh to people for no other reason than that I was trying to be smart.

I can look back and blame this on the ignorance and arrogance of youth. I have learned to forgive myself for the misbehavior for no other reason than that I can not change it.

However, I can do better and I try to. There were some who were steady in their friendship through all my chaotic swings. Those who supported me when I was less than sterling. It is by them that I am inspired.

It is also by the small acts of kindness that happen to me all the time. The nameless farmer in Tennessee who I met in a small diner on my trip across country last summer. After talking as we ate he stood, shook my hand, and wished me a safe trip. When he was gone the waitress came over and informed me that he had paid for my meal. Not because he thought I was poor or in need but because he wanted to add a bright moment to my day.

It costs so little to make people's lives better. I am hardly a sentimental, touchy-feely kind of guy but a smile, a helping hand, and a little effort can go a long way to making a difference in another person's life.

So it is the ones who have stood by me in my life, who were patient, and who have given me that smile, helping hand, and extra effort who inspire me.

Beautiful sunsets last only minutes

and mountains fade away in a million years

but kind words and good friends last forever.

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Why I Don't Use K&N Air Filters

This is a K&N air filter I pulled from the R100RS. It's supposed to be cleanable but I'm not buying it. I don't believe that all that dirt is ever coming out not matter what I do to it. That means either restricted performance or dirt will be getting through to the engine.

This is an OEM BMW air filter. Free flowing and certified by BMW to do the job correctly. Clean air and no restrictions. Properly balanced for the carbs and intake system.

Price is not on K&N's side either. ~$90 vs ~$35. You would have to clean the K&N 4 times to save any money and who wants to do that dirty job? Plus it's never going to be as good as a new one. You wouldn't reuse the oil filter, why is the air filter any different?

They have a great advertising campaign but nothing else to offer in my humble opinion.

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