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September 2003

HSTA Newsletter

by Dan Hytry

 

Features

 

Ø July 19 - Neah Bay Recap

Ø July 26 - Columbia River Recap

Ø August 9 - Winthrop Recap

Ø August 15-17 - Cascade Locks Recap

Ø Johnson Motorcycles

 

 

July 19 - Neah Bay Recap by Marv Travis

 

What a day for a ride - cool in the morning and warm in the afternoon!

Dave Bolton, Chris Appel, Bob Kramer and I caught the Edmonds-Kingston ferry and ate breakfast at the Kingston Inn.  Shortly, Dan Thomas, a long-time-no-see HSTA member from Port Angeles, and Cary Perkins joined us.  Cary was there to show off his new VERY GREEN ZX-9R; prior commitments prevented him from riding with us.

Chris volunteered to lead the ride and off we went.  Before long, Dan realized we were bypassing some good roads, (not known to the rest of the group), and offered to take lead from that point.  It wasn't that Chris sucks as a ride leader, (as I so delicately informed him); it was just that Dan was the only one who knew of these good roads!

To find them: after leaving Port Angeles, turn west on US-101, then turn right just before the Black Diamond overpass.  Turn left onto Black Diamond Road and follow it to the Elwa River.  Turn right where Black Diamond Road intersects US-101.  Make a left on US-101 to East Beach Olympic National Park where you want to take a right turn.  Follow this road to Joyce, on SR-112.  A left turn on SR-112 heads you west toward Neah Bay.  These excellent roads are scenic, twisty, smooth, and largely vacant, (and can be found on the Microsoft Streets and Trips Program).

If you happen to blink as you approach Neah Bay, you might miss the stealthy sleeping cop two miles outside town.

From Neah Bay, we began to ride out to the Cape Flattery lighthouse, over five miles of washboard gravel road.  Only Dan, Bob and Chris made it all the way out; Dave and Marv gave up on the road and turned around.  You've seen that commercial where a BMW rider says, "Some riders polish their bikes; I wash mine", as he plunges his bike into a stream?  Well, Bob did his version, but it was into a muddy quagmire.

During lunch at the Breakwater Restaurant in Clallam Bay, Dan mentioned that he was racking up the miles on his ST1100.  We were impressed that the odometer read over 240,000!  Just like the Energizer Bunny, those Hondas keep going, and going, and ...

On the way back we investigated Hoko-Ozette Road, identified in DH-WA as #31.  It turned out to be strewn with rocks in some of the corners, and eventually we found it completely covered with loose gravel.  Too much gravel in too many corners convinced us to turn around and not tempt fate!

It was a great ride; nobody fell down, or stepped in anything!

 

 

July 26 - Columbia River Recap

 

This ride was much a carbon copy of last year's ride.  The most eventful thing was taking photos of our group carving through the corners on Mt St Helens and later getting droning shots on I-82 prior to hitting SR-410 back to Enumclaw (see below).  Tim also started the day with us, however once we got to Carson, he turned around and headed home.  I guess he wasn't feeling on top of his game and decided to not finish the loop.

Chris Appel, closely followed by Dan Thomas Don Grabrick and girlfriend, Chris Mr. Dave Bolton

Dan Thomas joined us once again, having ridden down from Port Angeles.  He's not afraid of an IronButt day.  (Dan subsequently rode the Cascade Classic on August 2nd:  The route followed US-2 from Everett to East Glacier in Montana, then turned south to Great Falls, Helena and on to Butte. He got back on I-90 and returned to Everett having put in 1500+ miles in 22 hours and 15 minutes.  The old ST was second finisher. It couldn't stay with a newer Goldwing, equipped with radar and an auxiliary fuel cell.  The Winger beat him by about an hour.)

After leaving Carson, we talked about hopping across to Oregon but rather opted to head east to Goldendale over one of our favorite roads, SR-142.  The road had been newly chipped and a month ago was still dirty, but this time it was clean and very grippy!

After lunch at the DQ, Dan talked us into coming back over SR-410 rather than Canyon Road, and it proved to be a great choice.  The only bad section was through the park however, it was short-lived.  We didn't see much enforcement except through Yakima where it seemed like every reservation, city, county, and state cop came out of the blinds, like they were looking for someone.  Luckily it wasn't us!

 

August 9 - Winthrop Recap by Greg Sundberg

 

Preface:  This ride report was supplied by a first-time rider with HSTA, after I had the conversation with him regarding previous ride "events".  What follows was his recap...

This was definitely the longest (450 miles door-to-door) and fastest ride I've done to date, and it was thoroughly enjoyable!

The guys (Mark, Don, Cary, Dave, and Tim) were very welcoming and supportive.  I never felt compelled to ride faster than my comfort level, and never worried that I would be left behind at a turn or route change.  I really couldn't ask much more than that, except cooler temps between Winthrop and Blewett Pass.

As it turned out I typically rode in the 4th, 5th, or 6th slot.  The only time I ever felt any pressure to keep up was self-imposed as I attempted to keep Cary in view.  He had the only radar detector, so it was less a concern for my riding safety and more for avoiding a ticket.

I hope to catch a few more rides with the group in the future.  Thanks, Greg

 

August 15-17 - Cascade Locks Recap

 

The ride was so awesome for the three of us that went, that it almost feels wrong to write this up and tell you about it.  There are only a couple of things that would have made this outing a PERFECT RIDE.  Had Marv gone easier on his tires, he could have ridden home with us, As it turned out, he got a ride.  And the enforcement on Mt St Helens could have been lighter but no green awards were issued.

Friday morning, I got a late start and after repacking three times, finally figured out how many cases to take and headed out the door.  I left in such a frenzy that I left my Givi key sitting on a side case.  I noticed it just before I got on the freeway and was able to save myself a whole lot of frustration at the first gas stop, with my wallet locked inside.

Chris Harnish and Marv Travis were waiting for me to arrive at Shari's.  I noticed Marv's rear tire was wearing a little thin, being at that wear bar in the center.  I didn't think much of it since I wasn't sure how well the BT020s wore.  This fatal flaw would plague us later.

Chris was joining us only long enough to take in St Helens, and would turn around to attend his 20-year reunion in Tacoma.  Marv and I would meet Tye in Carson, and then continue on to Oregon.  I asked Tye to do some trip-routing and he did an excellent job of navigating AND leading for the better part of the weekend.  Since there were just the three of us, we decided that there was no need to basecamp in Cascade Locks and we would ride as long as we felt with no predetermined route or stops.

Our route went as follows: we crossed into Oregon at Cascade Locks paying our toll on the Bridge of the Gods.  We proceeded east to Rowena Lookout (above) where we stopped to take a few pictures of the view from, and road to, Rowena.  We continued east to The Dalles, south to Dufur, and caught FR-44 (not worth riding) towards Mt Hood.  We rode on to Government Camp where we gassed up for the next leg.  Heading southeast on US-26, we caught FR-43 to FR-48 heading east to Tygh Valley.  From Maupin, we took Bakeoven Road to Shaniko, which was one of the best roads ridden this weekend.  Then it was SR-218 through Antelope and east to Fossil, south on SR-19 and SR-207 to Mitchell.  Lastly we headed west to Prineville on US-26, where we spent the night.

For dinner, we had a fantastic pizza at the Cinnabar Pizzaria.  The lady at the counter laughed at us when we mentioned we might order a second pizza.  As it turned out, we only ate half of the first one.  The motel ran $50, split 3 ways so the price was right.

Saturday morning, we set out for more wilderness twisties.  Since the weather was getting progressively warmer, we chose to stay in the hills as much as possible to stay cooler and, for the most part, it worked.  From Prineville, we caught SR-380 east to Paulina where we originally intended to go east to Izee, and then SE toward Burns.  We missed the turn and ended up on US-395, south of John Day.  We dropped south for 8 miles to Seneca and then continued east on FR-16 to Unity, where we probably could have stopped for the day after only 250 miles.  This would turn out to be our turnaround point for the weekend and we would start to work our way back to Seattle.  From Unity, we caught SR-245 to SR-7 to Baker City.

We stopped at the Yamaha dealership to investigate tire choices for Marv, having noticed it was getting REALLY thin.  They didn't have a 170/60-R17 in stock and besides, they wanted no less than $180 for their 180/55-R17 tires.  Marv turned them down and we rolled on.  Hindsight is always 20/20 and we should have forced Marv buy the tire.

After a quick lunch in Baker City, we proceeded north to North Powder and then west on FR-73.  There was a 3-mile section of gravel to deal with which made us nervous about Marv's tire taking a puncture.  It survived.  Not only did Marv have a tire to be concerned about, be he also had limited fuel range.  We knew that we couldn't make Ukiah on what gas Marv had so we were forced to ride a little out of our way to Granite (20-mile RT) to get fuel.  Once in Ukiah, we decided that it was getting late and that Heppner or Condon would be our resting spot for the night.

As we finished our leg to Heppner on FR-53, we noticed that Marv's tire had finally given up the ghost.  It did not blow out but how it continued to hold air was beyond our comprehension (reminds me of Peter Broda's tire - you could SEE the air on the inside of that one).  There were sections of steel belt that had rubbed completely away and the cross belts of the last layer were visible.  Just five miles prior, we had a near miss where we came upon a small herd of cattle in the road (I hate free range areas), coming around a corner and all three of us had to act sharp to avoid them.  That could've proven disastrous for Marv.  We also got lucky in getting the last motel room in town due to a rodeo that weekend.  Again, we lodged for the bargain price of $50, split 3 ways.  Marv could not have ridden another mile on that tire and how it made it to Heppner, is nothing short of a miracle.

This...

(Fossil to Mitchell)

Plus This...

(no digital enhancement)

Equals This!!!

(a trailer ride home)

Tye and I headed out first thing towards Condon, where we ate breakfast at the renovated Condon Hotel. For being out in the middle of nowhere, the hotel was quite fancy and will most likely end up as place to stay on our next outing.

We finished off Oregon by heading northwest to Biggs, then crossing into Washington.  From Goldendale, we took SR-142 to Lyle and rode west along the Columbia for a spell.  We caught a worthy side road (Cook-Underwood) and then retraced our steps from Carson to Randle, where Tye turned around to head home to Portland.

Mt St Helens must be developing quite the reputation.  We saw enforcement actually hiding along our route, tucked under some trees in a shady area.  We spoke with another biker at the Burger Buggy who also heard of multiple speed traps set up over the weekend.  We saw a car club (Subaru WRX) heading the other way with no less than 40 vehicles, looking like they were having fun.  I'm sure they would get a talking to as some point.  Chris stated he got a warning blip Friday on his way back and Tye got a warning flash on Old Man Pass as he returned to Portland.

I finished up my trip by heading up to Chinook Pass, by way of SR-123 and SR-410, and took a few pictures.  Shortly thereafter I was home after 1300 miles, a sore butt, and achy wrists from reaming on the bars all weekend.  It doesn't get much better than this folks!

 

Johnson Motorcycles

 

HARLEY DAVIDSON FACES STIFF COMPETITION FROM JOHNSON MARINE WHO INTRODUCES A NEW LINE OF MOTORCYCLES

Winimac, WI - At a press conference late Monday, the CEO of Johnson Marine, makers of Johnson outboard marine engines and other recreational equipment, following the apparent success of Polaris with their line of Victory motorcycles, unveiled a new line of heavyweight cruiser style motorcycles designed to compete head to head with industry leader Harley-Davidson.

In fact, the two companies have a heritage as William Harley designed the first successful marine carburetor for Johnson/Evinrude some 100 years ago.

Peter Long, Johnson brands marketing manager said, "We have studied the market and determined that Harley, while highly successful, has narrowly missed the mark when targeting motorcycle buyers." Long added, "We at Johnson are convinced that our product hits the target dead center and promises to draw sales away from Harley-Davidson in a way no other motorcycle has been able to accomplish".

The new line of bikes, marketed under the name Big Johnson Motorcycles, will, according to Long, deliver what Harley has only promised. "Our research show that this, a Big Johnson, is what Harley buyers are really after".

At the unveiling of the new line Monday, several current Harley owners agreed. "When I bought my Harley, what I really needed was a Big Johnson," said one Harley owner. " But I see now that riding a Harley is no replacement for having a Big Johnson." Manager Long also said that his company would follow the lead of Harley-Davidson and cash in on a huge market for non-motorcycle related products. "We realize that not every guy can have a Big Johnson," said Long, "But image is very important to people. If they don't have a Big Johnson, they at least want to project the image of having one."

Asked if he anticipated Big Johnsons showing up in the hands of Harley owners, Long said it was unlikely. "I just don't see the need to have a Harley if you have a Big Johnson," he said. "And I can't imagine someone who spends all their resources to acquire a Harley having a Big Johnson. I think it boils down to this - You either have a Harley, or you have a Big Johnson, but you are not likely to have both." "Given the choice," said Long, "I think most guys will opt for the Big Johnson."

Another force driving sales for the company will come from women. A survey of the wives and girlfriends of nearly 1,000 potential motorcycle buyers indicates less than 5% would approve of their partner spending $15,000 on a Harley Davidson. But, when asked if they would be willing to pay the same amount of money to get their partner a Big Johnson, nearly 4 out 5 thought that would be money well spent.

One female present at the product unveiling was quoted as saying, "There is no way I will let Lonnie drop 15 grand on another one of those Harleys, but 15 grand to get him a Big Johnson? Well, that's something we could both enjoy, and it's something he really needs."

Carla Roundheel, manager of the dealership network now being established, said her motto is simple. "I service what we sell." Big Johnson Motorcycles will be traded on the NYSE under the symbol PNSNV.