Author: roberthuberjr13

Apparently Mark and I have this nailed down after a single backcountry cycle trip. I last posted in January and said we would start planning. Really all we did was talk about maybe doing a trip this year. Cycle trip or Oktoberfest? Well, as of last week the cycle trip won out. So, we’ve left ourselves basically 3 weeks to get ready and have no solid plan, other than Utah for sure, and maybe some Colorado in there somewhere. Mark has a dead battery and I just realized last week my registration expired on my bike. Nonetheless, it’s on! If anyone wants to tag along, they rent bikes right out of Salt Lake City – http://www.eaglerider.com

Here’s the route for the UT BDR. Should take us around 8 days. I’m thinking we will start on the northern end, since by then we should have had our first snow in the mountains, and by the time we get to the southern part it won’t be 90 degrees. Course, I’m not sure if anyone has ridden it that way. We’ll have to do some research.

If you want to check out the UT BDR information, here it is http://ridebdr.com/UTBDR

Colorado is here http://ridebdr.com/COBDR . You can see how close they come to each other on the southern end, so it’s possible to go from one to the other fairly easily.

So, Mark gets here on September 21. Plenty of time to plan this all out and be ready. The ride should be incredible going through the Uinta mountains in Utah, our highest range at 13,000′. We’ll finish up going through Moab, near or through Arches and Canyonlands National Parks and finally turning around in Monument Valley. 871 miles one way.

And we didn’t competeley give up on Oktoberfest. We’re going to hit the celebration at Snowbird Ski Resort.

Woooohoooo!

 

As I’m staring out the window looking at a few feet of snow and debating whether I go out backcountry skiing or snowmobiling today,Mark and I have already been thinking about our 2017 cycle trip. We’ve kicked around Washington, Oregon, Nevada and staying local to me doing the Utah and Colorado BDRs. The Utah BDR route is anywhere from 30 to 60 minutes from my house depending on where we join in. You can check out the videos about it here. Here is the information on the Utah BDR – http://ridebdr.com/UTBDR . Information on the Colorado BDR is here. We’re considering a two week trip and we ride as far as we get, with no real set timelines.

If anyone is interested in joining us, let us know. There are places to rent cycles just about anywhere we go, but you are going to need the gear for the trip. I can’t remember if Mark or I posted our packing list, but we can add that later. Here’s what some of my gear looked like before I packed up the bike. It takes some time to get all of the gear if you don’t have it, and it’s not cheap. Between us there is some overlap, so you don’t have to buy everything yourself.

As well, if you aren’t an avid rider, I would highly suggest taking an adventure cycle off-road course like Fran Tully’s http://dualsportschool.com or one of the BMW or Rawhyde courses. They are definitely worth it. Regardless, plan on crashing or dropping your bike often. So have crashbars, or buy insurance on any rental.

At this point, Mark is telling me the best time to ride the Utah and Colorado BDR appears to be September. I assume that is because of the snowpack. We’ll keep thinking on it and update any plans here. I ordered my BDR membership and that includes the new Nevada BDR information, so we’ll check that out before we make a final decision.

Snowmobiling…I decided to snowmobile today. Backcountry ski tomorrow.

 

Today was a road day as we are working our way back home; however, we had to pit early this morning at the BMW shop. My brake light was on for 2 days, which isn’t safe and forces Mark to ride behind a lot so cars know when I’m stopping (they see his lights). For Mark it’s not so much a guessing game as were are talking to each other on our radios. 

When I put my riding pants on this morning I also noticed fluid all overt he bottom of my pants. Then all over the lower right side of my bike and front brake and wheel. We thought maybe my brake fluid was leaking which caused the brake light to stay on. The shop mechanic was also caught by surprise when he tried to start my bike. The start button was near impossible to push with all the dust stuck in it. 

After he took it back to the shop he came right back in a few minutes and let us know my right front fork seal had blown, which caused all the fluid. He also figured out the brake issue and fixed it. Shortly thereafter he said my right front fork was scratched from impact which likely caused the seal to blow. Alas, they had no forks to replace mine and informed me since it was from a crash it would not be covered by warranty. Considering I dropped my bike 4 times, it’s likely the fork took a shot the past 10 days. It was rideable, no safety issue so we pressed on to Butte 2 hours away. 

While in Butte, on recommendations from my friend Babe, who used to live there, we hit Pork Chop Johns for a pork chop sandwich and Bonanza Freeze for a slowda (slushy ice cream mix). We also cruised up to the Granite Mountain Miners Memorial.

From there, it was another 3 hours to Idaho Falls. It was brutal. Hot. Windy. Uncomfortable on the bikes. They just aren’t comfortable road cruisers after several hours. By the time we hit Idaho Falls both of us were tired, sore and generally ready to freak out. We met some of Marks co-workers from FireEye for dinner (my former employees) then got a room for the night. We took a short ride to MarCellars to have a drink and when leaving ran into William and June Cutler, friends from IF, having dinner outside Snakebite and chatted for a few before turning in for the night.

Just liked the trip started, it’s 10:30pm. I’m posting to the blog and Mark’s been sleeping for 30 minutes already. Sawing wood. This guy is a pro. I’ve never seen anyone fall asleep this fast consistently in my life. Another 3.5 hours of riding to get back to Park City tomorrow. 

A year of planning. Buying equipment. Putting our kit together. Reading trip reports. Watching videos. 12 days of riding. 2800 miles when we are done, half on dirt. We’re both exhausted. Our bikes, and Mark took a beating. I can’t wait for the next trip! Planning will start in a few weeks I’m sure.

We’ll post some follow up/lessons learned and planning info for anyone that wants to join next year. We already have a few thoughts on how we will approach all this for next time.

And on to Missoula, MT. 

The final leg of our ride was mellow in comparison to all previous days. It was about 60% off road and the rest road. Most of the ride was through Kootenai Preserve which contained a lot of waterfowl, chukkars, sage grouse and turkey. I’ve honestly never seen so many wild turkey. 

We crossed the border into Canada for a few minutes to get some pictures then went back to Port Hill to grab lunch at Big Daddy’s BBQ which was awesome. 

Port Hill has 3 businesses. It’s definitely on a cycle touring route as all 3 businesses cater to bikers.

The previous night we went into the ‘big city’ of Sandpoint, ID for dinner. Dinner was superb and the atmosphere was great, but you notice something very quickly. There is no time to chat with the staff.  They’re just too busy. It’s too loud. They have no time to make small talk. Our wait staff was fine, but I didnt catch a name, strike a conversation or even interact with any other locals. I certainly got tired of bar food most nights in the small towns, but you definitely got to interact with the locals.

Big Daddy’s was like this. It was just Mark and I and Kim, the bartender and cook. She moved to Port Hill 3 years ago from Seattle to be near her daughter who left home (at a young age) to be with her boyfriend who took her to Port Hill. Kim followed after her divorce and lived in a nearby camper for a year before getting her own house there. 

Her story is like many others in these small towns. Very few folks were born and raised in them. Most moved from somewhere else usually tied to some life event, divorce, family moved there, trying to get away from complex lives and the hustle, and retirement. Chelsea from Lochsa actually said she liked not having the drama of Internet access. 

The view from Port Hill looking into Canada. 
We rolled into Missoula this evening and enjoyed a good dinner but ran into the same thing here. No chats with locals or the staff.

We did strike up a conversation with another visitor though. An SF guy rolling into town for some language training. Mark and I traded some military stories with him and called it a night. One thing is for sure, when you run into other military members or vets there is instantly a common bond. It goes back to my earlier post about credibility when you roll into some Podunk town and the Led Zepplin skips on the jukebox while everyone is staring at you. They find out you are from a small town or in the military and you have a bond. No matter Mark and I are cyber geeks and this guy is the tip of the spear. We probably could have hung all night with this guy.

We’ve been following the ADV Rider Idaho BDR website for updated info on the route, so we knew the Lightning Creek Pass was closed to vehicles due to several washouts of the road and bridges. We also knew that some brave souls had passed through.

So, to buy time, we decided to take a little more pavement and attempt Lightning Creek. Woof. This was bar none the biggest challenge of the trip. I’m sure my bike would agree after being dropped a few times. Luckily no real damage to the bike and none for me. 

None of these shots will show the difficulty, nonetheless, take a look. 

Washout 1

Washout 2

Washout 3

All in all, take your time, have some luck and you’d make it. The final washout, which we had seen pictures of, lived up to the difficulty we read about and some other riders told us. It was much larger, rockier, deeper and had a sketchy climb out onto the bridge someone had made with lumber from the original bridge. Here’s what it looked like after we got Marks bike across. That’s a couple foot drop where Mark is standing. 

And both bikes across looking back.  Note all of our gear and bags are sitting on the bridge. We took them off to reduce weight and make them more maneuverable. And save our bags from damage. 
It took everything the two of us had to get it done. We were both drenched in sweat. Paddling, stalling, lifting, pushing, holding the other rider up on the bike, moving rocks, taking some flying stone to the legs. 

You can see Mark laid some rubber spinning up the wooden ramp that slid and was about a 1/4″ from collapsing when he got on the bridge (we didn’t notice this until after he made it). I went on the center board.

We didn’t have video running so we wouldn’t break cameras and this wasn’t one where the other person could film. BUT, here’s a shoddy video walk through of what we did.​

​After this we had some high 5s and dumped bone chilling water from the creek on our heads to cool down. The rest of the ride was cake with some spectacular views. 

Mark walking up to Lunch Peak Lookout. 
Our plan worked and we ended the day earlier than normal with no real damage and no one hurt. Although Mark’s shoulder is hurting. Luckily only I dropped my bike today. Bike drop score thus far this trip: Bob 4, Mark 3. 

One more day of the official Idaho BDR left. Port Hill, ID and Canada tomorrow and then we turn and head for Park City, UT via Missoula, Butte and Idaho Falls.

After making a stop at the ER in Orafino this morning to check out Mark’s shoulder we decided to take pavement to Avery so as not to aggravate it further. This was a good turn of events since we were initially planning our route back home a few hours prior. 

At Avery Mark decided he wanted to try the off-road again so we ventured onto the forest service road to Wallace through several old rail tunnels. 

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In comparison to what we rode the past few days, this mostly seemed like highway and we were able to get to Wallace in good time. This allowed us to check out the town, find a hotel (with Marks shoulder I figured it probably wasn’t enjoyable to camp) and grab some dinner. It’s a great little town with quite a few shops and restaurants. This is not like the mountain towns we’ve been passing through. Definitely more touristy and right off the highway. Certainly worth a stop if you are passing through. 

Unfortunately the Bordello museum was closed when we arrived. 

Tomorrow /Monday the plan is to get to Sandpoint via Clark Fork passing through a washed out section of the BDR. We’ve heard it’s hard, but doable. It will certainly be a test of Marks shoulder. Stay tuned. We’re still Canada bound. 

Right from Lochsa Lodge we got on the Lolo Motorway. The intention was to ride as far as we could this day. The ride was fun. Challenging. A lot of rock gardens and babyheads on the climb and descent. Some of the climbs seemed to go on forever. It was certainly a workout. 

About halfway through we started seeing some traffic. Quads, UTVs, other adventure riders. We ran into a crew of older guys that do these types of rides every year. They were from Texas. They rent a 15 pack van and trailer and haul their bikes wherever they can to ride. We also saw a lady on a bike by herself. First woman we saw out here.

We hit the Indian Post Office, which is really a few piles of rocks where Indians left messages, meditated, and saw the medicine man. I forget to mention, this section, and a lot of our trip is on the Lewis and Clark trail.

After this section things went south as you read from Marks post. The roads are narrow, rocky, sandy, with many blind corners. As we were coming down we hit a blind corner and Mark (in the lead), was running straight into a couple riding 2 up on a bike. First 2 up we’ve seen. Mark hit his rear brake and bring in deep loose rock, he slid sideways. On a steep, that’s just not good. Mark fought well, but ultimately the bike toppled on him, 500+ lbs. You can read his post about it. He ride on 3 more hours after the crash to get yo Pierce by the way. No medical services there.

This obviously cut our trip short for the day  and we stopped in Pierce, ID, our planned gas stop. 

We stopped at the Timber Inn for dinner and ended up getting a hostel style room there. We hung at the bar until close meeting Brandi the bartender from CA, Robby the owner also from CA, the town drunkard (self admitted) that was just flat out confusing, but invited us to camp on his front lawn so long as we didn’t touch his 17 year old niece, Steve ( who was working on getting drunk), and John the town manager. They were all mesmerized by us ‘east coasters’.  A few beers, a few shots, country on the juke box, and Mark was still in pain. Hell, it was a country song.

This ride was much anticipated as it was through the Magruder Corridor. Not much traffic out here and lots of fire damage. 

Somewhere here is the Montana Idaho state line. No signs : )​

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We passed into Montana and had dinner at The Joint in Darby.

We settled for the night at Lochsa Lodge. A great lodge for rafting, hunting and fishing. 

All of the staff were 20 somethings. They stay there all season and fill many roles. Chelsea, our waitress took care of us. We asked her if they had laundry and she said if we bring it back before 9pm she’d have it to us the next morning. I was all over that. This girl was so dang go lucky. Every one needs a Chelsea. She was working double shifts, being a waitress, housekeeping, laundry and who knows what else. According to her, it’s all good. Heck, she even said she enjoyed doing laundry. 

Sure enough, next morning she waited on us at breakfast and had our laundry. And she was STILL happy. I wish I got her story, but she was too busy working to chat much.

The ride from Burgdorf to Elk City was certainly challenging. A ton of elevation gain and loss and me mostly riding on the inside track to avoid the steep drop. 

In these pictures if you zoom in you can see our tracks switchback left and right up the mountain. 

After a short ride we ran into a logging operation on the trail. Let me tell you, a loader and 18 wheeler on a dirt road turn the road to dust. Deep dust and a lot of tree debris. We had to wait 45 minutes to get around the loader. It was quite an art watching him load the truck. It reminded me of a huge game of pick up sticks. The loader actually had to push the 18 wheeler to get him started. For us, several inches of dust for 30 minutes proved challenging and fun. Not to mention the dust cloud he kicked up which prevented us from seeing a dang thing until he kindly pulled aside to let us pass. 

Our second short delay was waiting to cross the wire bridge.

After a few more hours riding along the river we made it into Elk City. We stopped for fuel and food at the saloon where we met bartender Chris from New York. Luckily we caught steak night. 

Lots of ‘murica round here, not many dentists.

We did come across a dog catching a ride on the back of a truckload of wood at the store. 

We setup camp at Riders Rest, 

owned by Kelly and his wife Karen. Originally we drove past Riders Rest and a guy on a 4 wheeler chased us down and told us about the camp. So after we ate we went back to it and Kelly sold us on it. Flush toilets. Showers. Laundry. Firewood. Perfect. Showers are big when you are eating dust all day. All of our gear is covered in it. ALWAYS. 

Of course everyone on the trip asks where you are from. Every time Mark says Maine he always gets a “what?” , and funny looks. I struggle with the question since I’ve lived in 6 states at this point. We both point out we either live, or lived in small towns.  That buys us some credibility. Mark gets more being from Maine. Everyone along our path is extremely patriotic so our military service usually pops up and we get some more credibility. Anyway, Kelly is from Washington state and his wife Karen is from the Bahamas. They certainly took care of us. How Karen made it to Elk City I didn’t find out.

That night, as Mark posted, we finished our bottle of Crown (the sleeves are handy dust wipes for our face shields) and headed over to the VFW wearing our PJs, headlamps and flip flops. No one batted an eye when we came in.  We ran into Chris the bartender from the saloon again and some ol’ timers telling stories before we turned in.

The next morning was cold. Low 30s. Everything out was frosted. 

We had breakfast across the street where we listened to some more ol’ timers talk about how the country is going to hell. I’m sure the same conversation is taking place across thousands of diners in small towns across America.

I forgot to mention. I’m posting all of these from my phone. It stinks, but bringing a laptop didn’t seem like a good option. Giving the riding we’ve done, the dust, and the fact that I’ve dropped my bike twice and busted one of my panniers, I think it was the right call. Excuse the typos. 

The ride to Burgdorf was great. Plenty of winding roads and remote towns along the way. Our first stop was Yellow Pine. We had a quick stop at the Yellow Pine Tavern for lunch where we met Laryn, the bartender, and a few other locals. In most of these towns folks are retired and either hunters and fisherman, or miners. 

After lunch, we had to take advantage of the local espresso shop where we chatted for a bit with some other locals. They told us about the wolf problem and how they were decimating their elk herd as well as some insight into the local mining. Folks are serious about mining here. You don’t talk about it, ask about it or trespass. Considering all the open carry we are seeing, that’s probably good advice. 

The rest of the ride was incredible. We were climbing and descending for 8+ hours. A lot of the ride was across the mountain top which provided fantastic, if not harrowing views. Nothing like riding cycle in sand and rock up and down steep grades with no shoulder and drops of several hundred feet. 

We rolled into Burgdorf later than we hoped, but luckily the office was still open so we were able to get into our cabin for the night, Ann Marin. 2 beds, a table, wood stove, a couch and an outhouse. 

Dinner was some yummy freeze dried Chinese food compliments of Mark.

In the morning we took a dip/bath in the 100 degree pool and talked to one of the caretakers that moved there as a kid in the 60s from Rhode Island.

All in all, Burgdorf is a must stop. Bring your own adult drink of choice.