A Man, His Motorcycle, and Many Miles of Dreams

For some reason I never got around to completing this blog from last year, and now that riding season 2011 is just around the corner I figure I'd better finish it. Some of the comments are from last year, and I'll note that, so hopefully it'll make more sense.

Comment 2010 "All last year while I was refinishing my motorcycle my friend Ed would come over and check on my progress. Last week we were talking and he mentioned we should ride up to Midway and see Swiss Days. I took a half day on Saturday and came home at 10am. Packed up and left."

Comment 2010 "We took the scenic route through the Alpine Loop which is up American Fork Canyon. Here we are waiting in the line to get through the toll shack."

If you are just going through the canyon and not planning to stop and camp or picnic there is no fee, which I thought was pretty cool. I think this year I should come back down here and go through the Timponogos Cave, would be a good excuse to make the ride again.

The wait wasn't too terrible, but it was warm, and when you are straddling an engine while wearing a heavy denim jacket, it's VERY warm. I tend to turn my bike off during this type of thing for a couple reasons, one is to save gas, another is because my engine is air cooled. When idling an air cooled engine for long periods of time you run the risk of warping engine parts or just out and out seizing them... no bueno.

The road is pretty narrow when compared to the regular streets in town, but not so bad that it's scary. I liked how the trees kind of formed a tunnel of sorts, very fun to ride through!

Here's Ed, he was a good sport about letting me stop whenever I wanted to snap some pictures, and even being in some of them. I've decided I really like his motorcycle style, it's made for both on and off road riding, and I think that would suit me very well. I believe my next motorcycle will be this style.

More pics :) I believe this is for the turnoff onto the actual Alpine Loop. This is a super fun ride, you can't go very fast because visibility is limited and frankly it's just too dangerous, but you can really lean your bike over in the twisties! I actually managed to scrape my center stand on one :D

Lots of pretty Quakey Aspens in this area.

More Scenery.

Most of the way was paved, albeit poorly, but it was solid. Here we left the pavement and rode on loose gravel for about 5 miles. I don't remember exactly how fast I was going during that time, but I'm pretty sure I didn't reach 20mph. I kept the bike upright ok and never had to do an emergency stop to keep from tipping, but it was a pretty good challenge.

I think the riding position my bike has helped, unlike modern cruiser style motorcycles which have you sitting with your legs extended in front of you (your knees are pretty straight) my bike has you sitting with your legs right beneath you (knees are at about a 90 degree angle). I believe this helped keep me stable.

I believe this is Jordanelle Reservoir off in the distance.

Look, more gravely road!

We finally made it the Swiss Days festival, and there were tons of people.

The traffic getting in was so bad that my bike started to overheat and blow thick white smoke out of the exhaust. I think one of the only things that kept it from getting super bad is I was running 20w-50 weight oil in it, which is a lot heavier than the manufacturer recommends, but with the kind of riding I do, it seems to help.

More people.

So I was thinking of making wise cracks about trying to pick myself up a "Swiss Miss", but after these young ladies exited the stage, the MC came up and asked us to give the "Swiss Miss's" a hand.... um they are way too young for me, so that pretty well killed that joke dead.

Ed had a program for the festival, and there were a couple groups he wanted to see if we could, but he absolutely wanted to catch this gentlemans act.... sorry, his name escapes me at the moment. This guy is a world famous yodeler. Story goes that he served his mission in Germany or Austria, and heard some yodeling music. When he returned, he went back to potato farming, and to pass the time while driving the tractor up and down the rows of potatos, he'd yodel.

While I don't see myself ever choosing to listen to yodeling on the radio or my iPod, I have to admit the man was entertaining. He'd take popular rock songs, oldies, and others, and play them on the accordian while yodeling.

I think one of the funniest things to learn was not only does Ed have a couple of his CD's, but he will make the scouts listen to them while they drive to campouts :D

More pics of Jordanelle. There were some guys with enormous kits and surf boards kite surfing. It was interesting to watch whenever I could spare a glance from the road. Traffic was pretty thick trying to exit the festival, so I didn't really have a chance to take a picture of the kite surfers.

More pics.

On the way back through the Loop. The trail is so narrow that you really have to watch for oncoming cars, cause if you are leaning over when one comes up, you run the risk of having your head taken off.

See, I really am on the ride ;)

Another of Ed.

We found a pull out on the way up and I made a mental note to try and stop at it on the way back and get some pictures of the canyon. The Loop goes all the way from the floor of the canyon to quite high in it. It is pretty steep in some areas and you have to down shift to keep the RPM's up.

More from the pull out.

Gratuitious pics of me, since I'm told that's one of the reason anyone reads the blogs.

More of the canyon. It's really very beautiful. I really wanted to go back through it when the leaves changed for the fall, but sadly life got busy and I was unable to make it.

Well, that's all for this adventure, I'll have to be sure to write and post the blogs while the trip is still fresh on my mind.

Until next time, keep the shiny side up!!

My mom was invited to spend Friday at the Snowbird Ski resort due to something she does where she works. After work I headed up Little Cottonwood Canyon. I have to admit that even though I live only a few minutes from it, this is the first time I have ridden this canyon. There are lots of twisties and if you can do the speed limit the entire way up you can lean your bike over pretty far! I'd love to know how close my pegs were to scraping the road.

Here's a pic a few miles from the mouth of the canyon.

I took the curves as fast as I could with the vehicle in front of me, but it was fast enough and as I said, I leaned her over pretty good. On the way up I saw a deer on the side of the road which surprised me a bit as there were quite a few people around and it was broad daylight. Apparently she was used to humans for the most part. I wish I had taken a picture, but by the time it registered, I was already a couple twists away.

I arrived at Snowbird and found a parking spot, conveniently right next to my pickup which my mother had driven up. I stowed my riding gear in the cab and snapped the necessary picture showing the motorcycle at our destination.

The rest of my family had already arrived a few hours before and ridden some of the various rides that were available. When I got there I called my mom and she came out to meet me. We walked in and waited for Rosalie and Mathew to ride the Zip Line down.

It was a decent wait for them to get their turn on the Zip Line, but it finally came. Mathew is a little harder to find in this picture, he's ahead of Rosie and in the shadow of some trees, can you see him?

While waiting for them to take their turn, we watched many others ride the line and none of them screamed at the end. Rosalie on the other hand must have believed she wasn't going to stop and let out out a pretty decent one.

Dinner was provided for free by Snowbird and they didn't hold back. You know you are being wined and dined when you get nice crystal to put your free soda in!

Even Addison got to eat, although I don't think hers was near as tasty as mine :)

I don't really care for posed photo's, mostly cause it gives people time to object or hide, so I tend to take a lot of candid shots.

There was live music, and the view from the deck was really nice.

After our meal we walked over and boarded the Tram for a trip up the mountain. I've been on chair lifts before and they are not bad, but I wasn't a fan of the Tram. My biggest problem with it was it would sway back and forth and there was no railing or anything for me to hold on to, so I felt as though I'd fall over. I was really hoping to hike down to a chair lift at the top and ride it down, but unfortunately they were closed down, so unless I wanted to hike down a few miles of rocky trail, the Tram was it... I did give the hike down some consideration.

I think this has to be one of my favorite signs, I think it should be included in a scavenger hunt or something :)

Here's a bunch of pics I snapped from the top of the peak, in no particular order.

This just struck me as funny!

Here's some more pics from up top.

I survived the Tram ride down... ok I'm making it out to be worse than it was, but still. It was time to go, so we left. As Rosie and Mom were packing up the stroller I was holding Addison and making goofy faces at her. At first she had this puzzled look on her face that was absolutely hilarious, and then she started to smile a little, and then decided her hand would taste good.