New Rearsets

About two weeks ago I bought a new pair of black CycleCat Rearsets (foot controls for the lingo impared) from another Ducati owner in California. They didn't fit his bike so I got them for almost $200 cheaper than MSRP. Well they finally showed up last week and I installed them on Thursday all by myself. I was pretty happy with myself for doing all the work on my own without even needing the instructions. Part of the installation involved relocating the rear brake master cylinder which caused a lot of air to get into the brake lines. The one thing I couldn't do on my own was bleed the brakes as I had never done it before and wanted to make sure I was doing it right. Well last night my good friend Erick came over and showed me exactly how to do it. So now I can actually ride my bike again as the rear brakes finally work. The rearsets have about a million different adjustements that can be made to them so I have to spend some time tweaking everything to get the feel just right. The first time I took it out the shift lever was so high I couldn't even get it into second gear.

So after all that I took my bike into the shop this morning for some scheduled maintenance. The last time it was in was before I left for California over 4,000 miles ago. I had to order a new chain and both new sprockets because mine were just beat to shit. And of course even though they were ordered two weeks ago they still had not shown up yet to the shop. Gotta love getting parts from Italy! As I was riding to the shop this morning I couldn't feel my rear brake lever, so I looked down and it was just hanging there. I stopped and it turns out that the brake linkage had come loose so I had lost my connection to the brakes. Fun. So now that it has finally stopped raining and the sun has come out and I could actually ride again for the first time in a week, my bike is in the shop. Bummer.

Anyway, here are the pics of my new rearsets:

New Rearsets on my table:
Old Setup:
Right Side Installed
Left Side Installed
New Setup

Day Seven - Tuesday June 26

At long last my journey would be coming to an end. I woke up early and was determined to make it home by the end of the day. Riding out of Bend at 6am was by far the coldest I had been on the entire trip. It got so bad at one point that I was forced to pull over and warm my hands up on my exhaust a couple times. Eventually the sun came out and I was able to continue feeling somewhat warmer. I made my way up twords Mount Hood through the forest up there. I wound up on a paved logging road that was only ONE lane! The forest was thick and the road was barely wide enough for even a single car. If a car, or a fucking logging truck, were to be coming in the other direction neither of us would have much reaction time to get out of the way. Because of this I slowed down and was pretty cautious. It was a nervous hour or so, but I made it out the other side without seeing a single car the entire time. I just kept heading North and eventually made it to Hood River, Oregon for an early lunch.

From there I crossed the Columbia River into Washington and worked my way up to Mount Saint Helens. I could have just gone the easy route and hit I-5 to get home but that would have been boring as shit and I still had plenty of time. As I made my way closer to Mount Saint Helens I noticed that they had just opened the road up to Windy Ridge which goes up the East side of the Mountain. This was a VERY cool road as I rode right through areas that were still devastated by the explosion twenty years ago. All the trees were completely barren and grey and on their side, very erie. Once up closer to the mountain I saw Spirit Lake which had a large amount of trees floating in it still. I got some pictures and headed back. They call it Windy Ridge for a very good reason. It was so windy up there I was afraid my bike would actually fall over while I was walking around.

From there I made my final trek back home. As I was getting close to Tacoma I came upon two guys riding two-up on a little Buell. The two of us played follow the leader for a little bit passing cars and hauling ass around corners as much as possible. It was a lot of fun as I hadn't ridden with anyone else my entire journey. Finally, I made it home all in one piece after almost 3,000 total miles ridden. The bike was a complete mess and was covered in bug guts. I even pulled a full size dragonfly out of the hinge of my front brake lever. Considering everything it was a fantastic success as me and my bike were in one piece and I got in a fantastic amount of riding experience in just a week.

Day Seven Route

Pictures

Day Six - Monday June 25

At this point in my journey my main goal was just to get home. My goal for the day was to get to Klamath Falls, Oregon, but I was pretty sure that I would be able to get past that. So again I set out at the crack of dawn to get ahead of the traffic. I made my way up through the mountains and the forests to Lassen Volcanic National Park. Apparently Lassen Mountain is a dormant volcano that erupted not so long ago (in geologic terms at least.) The biggest thing I noticed about this park was the extreme elevation. I had been up and over numerous mountains and passes, but this was much higher than I had been previously on my trip. When I entered the park I was at 3,000 feet elevation, but at it's highest point I was all the way up at 10,000 feet! And yes, there is snow on the ground in June at that elevation. There was even a small mountain lake that was still partially frozen. The best part of all this was I had neglected to monitor my fuel and my fuel light came on while I was still climbing the mountain. I did my best to conserve gas and came down the back side of the mountain with the clutch in as much as possible. Lucky for me they had a gas station and market on the far side of the mountain so I was able to refuel on gasoline, snickers and beef jerky.

At this point I was pretty much out of the California mountains so I headed up to Klamath Falls at full throttle. All this speeding was bound to catch up to me, and it did. When I was only about 5 miles from the Oregon border I got tagged by CHP for going 80 in a 60 zone. I tried to talk him into letting me go because I was almost out of his jurisdiction, but he didn't care. Oh well, just the cost of doing business I suppose. It was still early afternoon by the time I got to Klamath Falls so I just got lunch and headed out to Crater Lake.

I had been to Crater Lake once when I was a kid, but I didn't really remember it so it was nice to go back and check it out. The lake is just an amazing color of blue. The only source of water for the lake is rain and the melting snow of the mountains that ring the lake so it is extremely pure. They don't allow anyone or any boats in the lake so that keeps it extremely clean and even from the ridge you can see way down into the water. I got some great pictures then headed off to Bend for the night. It took about two hours to get to Bend from the lake, and it was some of the most boring riding of the entire trip. Long flat straight roads with just enough traffic to make going very fast impossible. I got a room in Bend and headed to the local McMenamins for some dinner, ready to head home the next day.

Day Six Route

Pictures

Day Five - Sunday June 24

The first half of Sunday was spent at the lake packing up all our camping gear and just getting ready to head home. I got back to the cabin (where I had stored my bike and all my gear) around noon so I grabbed some lunch before heading out for the day. My goal for the day was Tahoe City along the North shore of Lake Tahoe. I left Groveland and made my way North to Jackson before turning East to head up Highway 88 to get to Lake Tahoe. This was another great road that wound up through the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains. At one point along the road I could see what looked like a large forest fire way off in the distance. I couldn't actually see the fire at this point, but I could see the massive cloud of smoke being generated. As I continued along the highway I could see the cloud of smoke getting bigger and bigger as I got closer. Eventually I realized that I was heading directly at it.

Once I got close to Lake Tahoe I merged with another highway and at that point everything changed. The highway I had been on had very light traffic with only a few cars, but now it was total gridlock. At this point the fire was just over the hill, very close to the road and it was obvious that there were some significant evacuations underway. Fire Trucks as well as Police cars were constantly moving through traffic to get to the fire. Because traffic had slowed to a crawl in both directions I just took off down the road along the shoulder. At one point I actually went right through the smoke from the fire and the entire sky was orange from the reflection of the fire off the smoke, it was very cool. I do regret not getting a picture of this.

Once I got through the fire the traffic lightened up considerably as I wound my way North along the edge of the lake. I did stop to get some good pictures of the cloud of smoke working its way over the lake. Once I got to Tahoe City I found a motel and got some dinner. After looking at a map I realized I was only about a half hour from Carson City, Nevada. It was still pretty early so I headed out over to Nevada and made a visit to the Sagebrush Ranch. I hung out in the bar and watched some of the local talent entertain me. I didn't partake in the full meal deal, but it was still a very unique experience.

Day Five Route

Pictures

The Cabin
The Fire
The Ranch

The Pedro

Every year for the past four years I have headed down to California to go camping out at Lake Don Pedro with some of my very good friends who live in California. In previous years I had always flown, but as you are well aware, I rode my bike down this year. This year my friend Chris had a big surprise for everyone when he showed up with a brand new seriously bitchin boat! We spent the next several days just playing on the boat and a pair of jetskis and getting shit hammered drunk at night. In years past we've never come close to running out of beer, but we were in serious jeopardy of running out this year. On Saturday night it was so bad that we were down to drinking Tecate beer. We were scavenging through all the coolers desperately searching for something else to drink, but we were unsuccessful and were forced to continue our drinking games with Tecate. It's all about the sacrifices.

Day Four - Wednesday June 20

Today was my big day to ride through Yosemite National Park. I got up bright and early (as always) and headed out to the park entrance. Fortunately my friends parents have a yearly pass to the park so I was able to use that to get in without paying. That's always a nice bonus. I started out heading East through the park across Tioga Pass Road. This road is closed during the Winter due to it's high elevation, but it's open during the summer. This was a great ride because there was very little traffic so early on the road so I was able to really haul ass. Once I got over the mountains it opened up into a vast meadow on the East edge of the park. There was a small market here so I stopped off and grabbed some breakfast before heading West back the way I came. This section had a great high elevation lake and I got some excellent pictures.

After heading back near the park entrance I went down into the main Yosemite Valley. This is where all of the famous landmarks of Yosemite National Park are located (El Capitan, Yosemite Falls and Half Dome). There was a lot of traffic now, but that didn't matter because it was nice to just roll along at 20mph and stare up at all the fantastic scenery. I got a couple great shots of my bike in front of Yosemite Falls here.

After venturing through the valley I went up Granite Point Road which wound its way up the mountains along the South side of the Yosemite Valley. This was a much nicer road as far as riding conditions went because the corners were perfect, there wasn't much traffic and the views were fantastic. Once I got to the end of the road there were several lookouts where you could get the best views of Half Dome. I got in some rest and some great pictures then headed back. This is another road that is closed during the Winter so there was a large elevation change across the 20 miles or so. Just as I was coming near the end of the road I passed a Jeep with a couple girls in it. I tried to get them to follow me, but they just couldn't keep up.

I spent the next couple hours winding my way down and around the various canyons and valleys to get back to the cabin. I swear ever time I thought I was getting close there was yet another hill for me to get over. I made it back to the cabin sometime in the mid afternoon after doing a little over 300 miles for the day. A few hours later all my friends started showing up for our camping trip. We stayed up late talking and drinking copious amounts of beer.

Day Four Route

Pictures

Day Three - Tuesday June 19

Today would be a much shorter day than the previous two as I only needed to make it about 250 miles to Groveland where the parents of my friend Chris have a cabin up in the mountains. I headed out in the morning through the wine vineyards of Napa Valley. Its always so nice to ride in the mornings when there is no traffic and you can just cruise along with little hassle. Eventually I left the wine country for the open flat central California valley. I had such a wicked crosswind that I actually had to lean the bike a good 5-10 degrees to the side just to stay in a straight line. A few strong gusts of wind almost blew me into oncoming traffic, not cool. Now I know why they have so many of those windmill electric farms out there.

The winds died down as I made it into the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. It was really surprising just how heavy the traffic was even out in the middle of nowhere. I was able to maintain a reasonable pace, but with so many cars traveling in both directions it made it difficult to make any real good time. There are too many damn people in California. Finally I made my way into Groveland and up to my friends cabin. Hard to call it a cabin really, that place is nicer than my house. Anyway, after three days of riding I was ready to crash on the couch and just do some nothing for an afternoon.

After a nap and some lunch I jumped back on the bike and rode the 30 miles up to the entrance to Yosemite. This was easily the best riding of the day as there was very little traffic and it was all high speed sweeping turns through the mountains. At one point I was haulin ass through a right hand corner when a CHP came along the road going the other direction. Fortunately for me he didn't turn around and I was able to keep on going. I made it up to the entrance, took a couple pictures and headed back for the night.

Day Three Route

Pictures

Day Two - Monday June 18

Again my journey began at the crack of dawn. I was up and on the road by 6am. Let me tell you, it's COLD at 6am along the coast, even in June. Again I was very glad to have that extra layer of clothing to keep me warm. The scenery on Monday was by far the best of the entire trip. The ride down Highway 101 is as beautiful as any I've ever witnessed. Once I made it into California I was soon traveling through the Redwood forests. The sheer size of these trees is amazing, that and the forest was very dense with so many of these ancient trees was incredible. It was mid morning with the sun shining as I was riding along yet it was almost dark due to the density of the forest. Hwy 101 actually turns into a four lane freeway through one of the forests, but fortunately there was a side road, The Avenue Of The Giants, that went along parallel to the highway through all the trees. This was one of the best stretches of forest road I've ever been through. At the South end they even had a tree that you could drive through. The insides of the tree had burned out long ago so it was actually hollow, but yet the tree was still alive.

Highway 101 turns inland away from the coast so I needed to get on Highway 1 that stayed along the water. I stopped at a little town called Leggett where the two highways came together for a short break. Hard to call it a town really, it only had three buildings: a post office, a gas station, and a small market. The market had a couple tables out front so I grabbed some lunch and sat down to eat. A few minutes later a local hottie sat down at the other table with a snack. I tried chattin her up, but she clearly didn't give a shit. Crash and Burn once more.

The first stretch of Highway 1 to get back to the coast went up and over some hills. This was some of the most technical and challenging road I've ever ridden. Lots of very tight slow speed turns up and down hills through the forest. Very cool stuff. Once I got to the coast I proceeded South yet again. The road was still very windy and only 2 lanes, but there wasn't much traffic so I was able to make some decent time. I was planning on spending the night in one of the small towns along the coast, but there was really nowhere to stay so I was forced to turn East and head into Cloverdale for the night. It was a 60 mile stretch of road that took me almost 2 hours to travel due to the incredibly narrow and windy road. This was without question an amazing ride and was only tainted by the fact that it was so late in the day I was already very tired and wasn't able to rail the corners as hard as I would have liked. Again, very challenging and technical, but well worth it.

Day Two Route

Pictures

The Oregon Coast
California!
One of the drive through trees
The redwood forest
Wine Country

Day One - Sunday June 17

The start of my big journey began in some rather cold nasty weather. I'm very glad that I wore my thermal leggings and black turtleneck to keep me warm because it started raining about a half hour into my trip. I took off first thing in the morning around 7am and headed out to the coast through Shelton. Once I made it to 101 I just started heading South into Oregon. I stopped off at Cannon Beach for a few pictures then continued on to the Tillamook cheese factory where I stopped for lunch. Being Sunday they weren't actively making any cheese, but all the machinery was still running. It was a little odd seeing everything running with no people and no cheese moving around. Got some of their fantastic blackberry ice cream and headed out once again.

This stretch of 101 was probably the worst of the day. Being that it was a Sunday, and Father's Day even, there was a ton of traffic so I wasn't able to go very fast or pass hardly anyone. Even if I did pass a car or two there was another line of traffic just ahead. I stopped again in Newport at the Rogue brewery for a bit of a break. Got in some rest and a pint of beer. From there I just made my way to Coos Bay and then took a few back roads out to Coquille and then back down to Bandon where I found a little motel to spend the night. It was a pretty long day, rode about 440 miles, but the scenery along the coast was fantastic even if I was trapped in traffic all day.

Day One Route

Pictures


Cannon Beach
Haystack Rock
Cheese!
Beer!

Final Route and Pics

I've deleted the previous two posts (that were over a month old) that recapped Days 1 and 2 of my big trip because I wrote them when I was a little drunk. So I'm going to take some time today to write up everything and post my actual route from each day as well as the pics from each day.

Day One - Sunday June 17
Day Two - Monday June 18
Day Three - Tuesday June 19
Day Four - Wednesday June 20
Day Five - Sunday June 24
Day Six - Monday June 25
Day Seven - Tuesday June 26

Pictures!