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Temporary Insanity, or "How NOT to do an SS1000" (long)


JonathanE

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So, it turned out that I was going to get one last chance for a long ride this fall, before winter forces me to stay close to home for four or five months. I was given reason to travel to Portland Oregon for a few days and half a reason to continue on to Seattle and then Moscow Idaho. Somewhere along the line during trip planning, I realized that it would probably be about a thousand miles home from Moscow. Should I try to do it as an IBA Saddlesore 1000?

 

I had my chance to just say nope. Why ruin a good ride by doing the whole shebang in less than 24 hours? But nuooooooooo, once I think of a goal, I have to get myself all worked up about it and then it’s just too darned late. I’m committed, or perhaps I should just “be” committed.

 

I had read of a few nice roads up near my planned start in northern Idaho, and I figured that Highway 395 must be pretty (for the most part) and fairly fast (wrong), since the sections of 395 I had ridden before all were fast and pretty. The route started to look like Idaho 95 to Lewiston, Washington 129 to Oregon 3 to Enterprise Oregon, Oregon 82 to 84 to Pendleton Oregon. From there, I was supposed to take Highway 395 about 600 miles south to Reno and cross the Sierras on either I80 or Highway 50. Pretty straight forward, huh?

 

The day before the ride home was a rest day with no commitments at all, so of course I had to go ride around Idaho and Washington and nearly got to Oregon before turning around for home sweet motel. While out and about, I found out that Washington 129 finished with ten miles of downhill curves and tight switchbacks, on chip coat, under trees. Since it was dropping into the 20s every night, I decided that I couldn’t leave at my usual 5:00 a.m. the next morning. Ice under those trees would be trying to end my ride early if I got there before 6:00 as planned. So, I had to delay my start until after sunrise, when my ambient temperature thermometer said it was a toasty 28.2 degrees F. Just a wonderful way to start a long day riding.

 

Electric vest sucking electrons out of my dash, and with my start witness signature from Jana (It’s been nice knowing you. I’ll tell our son about you when he gets old enough to ask.), and a start gas receipt from the Moscow Chevron, I ran through the heavy morning commute traffic (a pickup, a sedan and a feed truck) down to Lewiston and across the river to Clarkston (get it? Lewiston & Clarkston?). The kids walking to school through downtown Clarkston with their backpacks on were pretty darn cute. It kinda reminded me of my youth, when it was safe for kids to walk alone through the town where I grew up. Not anymore.

 

A couple of sharp curves while rising up to the plateau, and then it was fifth gear across the farmlands. The RT’s top gear barely got warmed up before I was back in the forest and climbing to some pass (Rattlesnake Summit?). Right after the pass was a long descent down Rattlesnake Grade. The rate of descent was OK, but the road had been chip coated with the largest, coarsest, sharpest gravel I had ever seen. At least they had rolled the gravel flat, instead of just leaving it dumped on the road for the car traffic to distribute, like they do at home. The temperature was still in the low 30s, so I kept the lean angles conservative and crept my way to the bottom of the canyon in second and third gear in case there were any patches of ice left under the trees. I lost count of the curves in the 70s. These roads were written up recently in Rider Magazine and that article lured me into taking this route home.

 

A few miles south of the Grande Ronde River, Washington 129 becomes Oregon 3, and the chip coat ends. Thank you Oregon! The twisties don’t end though. Lots of fun, but very slow going. The sun was trying to thaw itself off of the mountainous horizon and climb into the sky, but was having trouble doing so. This was the first stretch of road that worried me about running into deer. I had a great time working my way into the farming/ranching town and fishing/hunting destination resort of Enterprise. This wasn’t the first or last time that I would see signs specifically welcoming hunters to a town. No signs welcoming me, but the people were all friendly in every town I stopped at that day. Perhaps there aren’t many idiots riding motorcycles through many of these mountain and high desert towns this late in the season. I added a little sugar and caffeine to my bloodstream and only 2.8 gallons to the RT tank (uh oh, almost three hours into the ride and only 123 miles on the odometer).

 

I hit the road and found another jewel for riding, Oregon 82 from Enterprise to La Grande. Most of the time it follows a river between tall mountains, which provides nice medium sweepers. Exactly what the RT loves to carve just above the speed limit, but within LEO tolerance. BTW, over the course of the ride I got many looks from local LEOs and various state police and highway patrols, but no tickets or even stops. This was mostly due to my choice of roads. Almost all of the roads I traveled were either tight enough to keep me close to or even below posted speed limits, or wide open deserts in southern Oregon, or I5 in California in the middle of the night when I couldn’t ride much above the limit due to fatigue and cold.

 

Anyway, I jumped onto Oregon 84 for a fast (finally, a fast road) 45 miles into Pendleton, home of (hopefully you guessed) Pendleton Woolen Mills. The sun was up and toasty warm, so the electric vest and the sweatshirt came off. I enjoyed a very nice lunch at Como’s Italian Café (try their spicy hot tortilla soup), a very large iced tea, added 2.5 gallons to the RT after only 120 miles (in order to pick up a change of direction receipt for the IBA) and I was on the road again. At 1:00 p.m. Uh oh.

 

This was to become my favorite part of the ride. US 395 in Oregon from about 15 or 20 miles south of Pendleton to just south of “Canyon City” is a blast. Up and down, tight to medium twisties. Rarely did I need any gears other than 3rd and 4th. Even rarer was the sight of a car, in either direction. This road is a must ride for anyone who can get anywhere near it. In fact, one of my future trips will be to travel 395 from end to end, over two or three days of course. Unfortunately, Canyon City is when I stopped having any fun.

 

It’s 3:30 p.m., I’m in Canyon City Oregon (city?) and I’ve only gone 380 miles. I’ve got at least 700 miles to go. I had calculated my ride finish time based on previous long distance rides of 700 miles and 800 miles. I few weeks earlier, I had ridden 700 miles to Vancouver Washington, after work, in 10.5 hours. That was just a little tiring. The ride home was an easy 700 miles in 10.5 hours including a stop for breakfast. A thought occurred to me that all of those previous long rides were primarily high speed interstates with 70 mph posted limits or wide open Nevada deserts, or both. I had just spent 8.5 hours travelling about one third of my miles for the day. UH OH!

 

So, in Canyon City, I began to worry. I realized that I wouldn’t be getting into Reno/Carson City until late, very late. While riding south into the southern Oregon Desert (which looks just like the Nevada deserts BTW) I began to wonder how cold it was going to be when I got to Reno. After the sun went down, the temperature dropped again and I had to stop to add layers and the electric vest. It hovered in the 40s, so no problem yet, but it was still 300 miles to Reno. I also began to worry about how cold it would be a couple of thousand feet higher than Reno at 2:00 in the morning at whichever pass I crossed to get to the Sacramento Valley. The more I thought about it the worse it looked.

 

A few dried up lake beds later, and I was in “Lakeview” Oregon. Hmmnnn, no lakes here, but plenty of wind. If there is one thing I hate far worse than sub freezing temperatures while riding, it’s severe gusting desert winds. Well, at least I hadn’t crashed, yet. I added 4.9 gallons to the RT’s tank, a candy bar and a complimentary cup o’joe to my tank, made a left out of the station back onto 395, and pushed on.

 

Next town was Alturas, California. I would have been happy to finally enter my home state, but this was as far from home as you can get in California, a good five hours at least. Here I made the one good decision of the day/night. I found a little highway called 299 that wound it’s way on the map to Redding, over three low passes. I think the highest pass was only 5200 feet. Well, at least I don’t have Donner Summit to worry about, and I’d bee in the northern end of the Sacramento Valley. It can’t get too cold in there, right? It sure looked like a smart move compared to riding all the way to Reno and then failing to ride over the passes at night. I had been seriously considering just stopping for the night at each of the motels I saw open in the last two towns. So, I added 1.2 gallons to the RT in order to get a change of direction gas receipt for the ole IBA, and headed west on 299.

 

What a great road! I am going back there for seconds one of these days. And I mean days. It would have been pitch-black back in those hills but for the three quarter moon in the sky and the 220 watts of PIAA fog lights and driving lights on the front of my RT. My greatest fear on that road was to drop my concentration for just a second, take too much speed into a corner and fly right off the road. My second greatest worry was to T-bone a deer. Nobody knows I am out here on the road. They might never find me. They certainly wouldn’t find me before the critters had stripped my bones. As it was, I was having fun again, even though it was nearly midnight, I’d been riding for 12 hours, for over 800 miles. I finally pulled into Redding a little after 11:00, and I CAN’T FIND AN OPEN GAS STATION! What’s with this town?

 

Half an hour later, I had found an open gas station (you just have to look near the motels), added 3.4 gallons to the tank and secured the mission critical “printed receipt” to document another direction change. Even better since I was getting a little hungry again, there was a Denny’s across the street. Some scrambled eggs, hashbrowns, and sour dough toast went down real well, and I was on the road again, at 12:15, a.m. I’m beginning to think that maybe I’ll actually make it.

 

Of course, the food in my stomach, the ambient temps in the low 40s, and the long day were teaming up to knock me off the bike. I had to slow down since I could feel my attention wandering. I couldn’t react fast enough to things springing into my vision out there in the dark in the middle of nowhere. I found my eyelids closing and dove into a rest area just north of Arbuckle, I think. That’s what I remembered and wrote down in my trip log, but I can’t find a town called Arbuckle anywhere on I5 with my Delorme map software, so maybe I was delusional. Actually, I can get witnesses that I am normally delusional.

 

I slept for 15 or 20 minutes, and woke when a car drove down the rest area parking lot. These rest stops on I5 are more popular than KOA campgrounds! There were hundreds of cars, campers, semis, and one idiot motorcyclist at the “Arbuckle” rest area, and the same mix of customers at the one just north of I80 where I stopped, but couldn’t sleep. I blasted my way further down I5, instead of cutting the corner home on I80, since my mental calculator told me I needed to loop around home to get my 1000 miles in. I picked up another receipt to document my route in Lathrop, noticed that my core temperature must be low (uncontrollable shivering), and added another candy bar to fuel the internal fire. The last 50 miles home was pretty scary. The morning commute rush starts at 4:00 a.m. on the 580 corridor. Add a zillion frenzied commuters, one groggy motorcyclist, average traffic speeds over 80 mph, (did I say I was tired? how about cold?) and you have an accident waiting to happen.

 

Well the accident is still waiting. I made it to Danville Chevron for the arrival receipt at 4:55 a.m., 21 hours and 45 minutes after departing Moscow Idaho. 1088 odometer miles, Delorme says 1030 miles for the route.

 

I waited until 6:00 before I bothered one of my neighbors for an arrival witness signature. One well earned Sierra Nevada (yeah, I know, drinking in the morning), a shower, and I was asleep until noon.

 

Will I ever do it again? I certainly hope not, but only The Shadow knows.

 

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russell_bynum

Nice job.

 

When I did mine, I did it the easy way. October across the desert on I-8/I-10. I really admire you nuts who pick a tricky route with twisties and stuff. smile.gif

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Jonathan: Congratulations, you lived to tell the tale. You done good even if you did freeze a bit. I've had the uncontrollable cold shakes, no fun at all. You Iron Butts scare me. My longest day is 680 miles and my friend and I toyed with the idea of doing one some day. Take care and again congratulations. smile.gif

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It sounds like a sucessful SS1000 to me! The only thing that really hurt you but you couldn't do anything about is your start time. You are looking at 21 - 22 hours on the road and going through the night after a long day is tough.

 

Congrats

 

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In reply to:

I found a little highway called 299 that wound it’s way on the map to Redding, over three low passes.


 

Hwy 299 is definitely worth taking, though I've only taken it from the Redding to the coast. It's the route back from Rick Mayer's place that he suggested. It was fabulous, though the occasional bit of snow on the side of the road and bits of icy run-off were scary.

 

Just south of it is Hwy 36 which is good enough to keep me from making it back to 299. Life' rough. :-(

 

My SS1K had even worse execution, as I found myself passing Tehachapi Summit going through snow and climbing over ice on the way back.

 

Congrats for making it.

 

Greg

 

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Congratulations - I'm looking forward to doing this and stories like yours certainly feed that urge.

 

And in dice-terminology, you did it the hard way. Great ride, great tale.

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Barry Cottrell

Johnathon,

Congratulations! Wow, 21 plus hours. I know when I finished mine after 17 1/2, ( interstate all the way), that I was ready to stop. The thought of having another 3+ hours ahead of me at that point might have done me in. In spite of the wear and tear, you can say "I did it." To me, thats the big payoff.

 

Barry

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Jonathan:

 

Great write up! Most entertaining! When I was reading your story the last thing I expected you to run into was morning commute traffic!! How unbelievably hilarious! If I was surprised reading it, I'm sure you must have been more than surprised when you found yourself there.

 

Rides like you planned and rode are just plain nuts. I love 'em.

 

Congratulations.

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I'm going to do a SS1000 one day. I've always wanted to have my picture made at that place in Key West where it says "Southern most point in the Contenintal US". From Nashville to Key West is about 1000 miles. Hummm???

 

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Thanks for the feedback gents. I hope y'all found the read interesting.

 

If I was to do an SS1000 in the future, knowing what I know now:

 

Warmer weather is required. No freezing temps allowed. No temps over 100 deg F allowed either.

 

The road mix should be primarily slab with a posted speed limit at or above 65 mph (75 is better), with short sections of fun road thrown in periodically to keep me entertained. No more than 100 or 200 miles of fun road.

 

I'd try to have most of the ride cover ground that I am already familiar with. No sense getting all tired out on new roads when I need my strength and focus for an endurance event. I love new roads and countryside when riding, but it takes a little more work to safely ride new roads than those same 'ol roads.

 

If I eat and drink a little at every stop, I won't have to stop for sit-down meals. Actually though, I think the extended stops did a lot for freshening my mind and reflexes. I'd aim for 15 minute gas stops and 2 half hour rest stops. On an interstate superslab type of route, this would provide for a total trip time of about 17 hours.

 

You know, the negatives from the experience are already beginning to fade from my memory. laugh.gif

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I didn't realize we had people THAT crazy in town! laugh.gif Why does Jana put up with you?!

 

Congratulations for having done it the hard way, Jonathan.

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Jonathan, I guess you were sleeping on 3 on your way to Enterprise. FYI, every right hand turn going South on 3 in the Rattle snake area is covered with loose gravel being kicked up from the trucks cutting corners. Does this bit of sharing give you a little rush.

 

Great road choices for riding but not for a 1000.

 

You got to be half crazy but ignorance is bliss.

 

PS - Great write up

 

Later

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