Preparations

It's been awhile, and there is a lot to cover so lets get right to it: I'm riding to the Grand Canyon at the end of May! I'll be travelling with six other guys, all Desmo Northwest members, the Seattle area Ducati Owners Club (or as my mother calls them, my motorcycle gang). We will be departing on Friday May 23rd and spending the next 8 or 9 days out on the road riding through Utah to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, then heading back up via Colorado, Wyoming and Idaho. It'll be a pretty intense journey covering roughly 4,000 miles. We'll be staying in little motels along the route, which will be a little spendy, but it shouldn't be too bad as I'll actually have guys to split the cost of the room with this time instead of flying solo.

I played with Google Maps for awhile and came up with a tenative route plan. I would imagine that some of this will change, but you can get the basic idea of where we're going:

Day One - 520 miles - Seattle, WA to Weiser, ID via Hells Canyon

Day Two - 557 miles - Weiser, ID to Logan, UT

Day Three - 504 miles - Logan, UT to Cedar City, UT via Bryce Canyon

Day Four - 587 miles - Cedar City, UT to Cortez, CO via Zion and Grand Canyon North Rim

Day Five - 427 miles - Cortez, CO to Vernal, UT

Day Six - 471 miles - Vernal, UT to Idaho Falls, ID via Grand Teton

Day Seven - 562 miles - Idaho Falls, ID to Lewiston, ID via Lolo Pass

Day Eight - 469 miles - Lewiston, ID to Seattle, WA via North Cascades

A large multi-day trip like this requires me to bring along a no so trivial amount of extra "stuff" ranging from clean underwear to charging devices for all my various gadgets and gizmos. How the hell do you carry all the stuff needed for an adventure like this on a freakin Ducati 848 that is meant to ride around on a track stripped down not loaded up with tons of extra stuff? Well, if yer an engineer, you figure something out! Fortunately I was able to get some inspiration from a fellow rider with a bike just like mine (his is red, so mine is faster). He took a cutting board from Target and strapped that to the rear seat of his bike, then strapped a nice large tail bag to the cutting board, and viola, instant touring bike!

I took his idea one step furthor and added vertical sections hanging down to support saddlebags. I bought two dark plastic cutting boards from Target, and using my friends tablesaw cut one down to 10" x 17" and the other into two 10" x 8.5" sections. I then sanded down all the rough edges and using some L brackets and bolts from Home Depot I was able to bolt the side panels to the main section. I actually had to redo the left side because my original bolt placing was too far forward and caused one of the bolts to come very close to scraping up my fairing. I moved it back about an inch and a half and it's well out of the way now. Once that was completed I was able to use my dremel tool to cut out some slots in the board for the nylon straps that would be used to secure the rear seat. Once the boards were secured to the rear seat and placed on the bike I was able to attach the saddlebags and rear tail bag. It actually went together very smoothly. The tail bag has built in bungie cords that wrap around and secure nicely. It also has clips that clip right into the saddlebags so they stay firmly attached. The saddlebags also attach to each other in the rear and then to each of the passenger footpegs keeping them from moving around. And the best part is that the whole damn thing comes off in about 5 seconds. I only have to unclip the saddlebags from the rear pegs and then unlock the rear seat and it all comes off in one big piece. This will make it real easy for me to bring everything inside each night so I don't have to worry about someone coming by and taking all my stuff while it's sitting on the bike overnight.

I took a bunch of pictures during the process, here is a slideshow:



I also ordered a brand new tank bag that should be arriving via UPS today. I'll get that mounted up in the next day or two and put up some more pics of how that goes. It mounts directly to the gas cap so it should be very secure.

A keen eye would have noticed that the first picture in that slideshow was of a big red box marked "Ducati Performance Exhaust by Termignoni". That's right, I got Termi's! I actually tried to install them myself on Friday, but it was a procedure that was more complex than what I was comfortable with attempting. The kit includes a new Air Filter and ECU and part of the procedure is to remove the Lambda probe and resetting the computer. This would require some tools and know-how that I just don't have. I'm taking the bike in on Thursday for a complete service and check-up, as well as to have a new rear tire put on so I figure I'll just have them install the exhaust system at the same time and get it all done at once. This will also allow for Mike Velasco (the chief motorcycle tech) to fine tune the bike on the Dyno at the shop so hopefully it'll be running better than ever.

Anyway, as things heat up over the next couple weeks, expect to see a few more posts from me detailing all the preparations for the bike, what I'll be taking with me etc.