Thisguy > Thisguy's Blog Posts > Riding the Mojave Road

January 03, 2008 21:25

Riding the Mojave Road

Here is a ride report from a trip through the Mojave desert last week.

The week before Xmas I bought a moto-x bike stand and some tools. I’ve never been particularly good with a wrench, but I decided to lay it on the line this holiday season. Not that I intended to do technical or complicated stuff, but I was going to prep my own bike for a ride across the desert. If I failed, I wouldn’t get to go on the trip… or even worse, I might get half way through the trip, then break down in the middle of nowhere.

Well, step one was installing a bigger tank. Removing the old one was easy enough, but while installing the new one, I found the the existing tubing wasn’t long enough for the new tank. I always read about people have to make runs to buy parts in the middle of a job. Me too.

The guy behind the counter at Thousand Oaks Honda/Suzuki was good. When I told him a needed fuel line, he asked if I’d removed the charcoal canister from my bike. Yes. Okay, then you can just pirate the unused tubing.

I thought that was a cool suggestion. But the canister was removed by the previous owner, and I don’t have the tubing. He nodded in understanding. Then he asked if I’d brought the tubing I wanted to replace. “Well, no, but I can point to it on the bike in the showroom.”

So we went to look at a new bike, and I pointed to two different sized tubes that I needed. Based on that, he went and got some tubes. And just to be safe, he disconnected the tubes on the new bike and pressed on the tubes he was about to sell me in order to make sure of the fit. I thought that was real cool, too. I know Dale hasn’t had good luck with T.O. Honda, but I’m happy so far.

So I took the new tubing home and installed my new tank. I cut the vent hose just right. It fit perfectly. I cut the fuel hose and installed it, but it got a kink between the petcock and the carburetor. It wasn’t too bad, so I decided to leave it.

The day after Xmas I put my bike on the stand and pulled the wheels. This should be a simple job, but I made all the newbie mistakes. I undid the nuts and bolts, pulled the axles… and the wheels wouldn’t come out. Oh, I have to undo the brake calipers. Sigh, okay, here goes…

I took the wheels to Cycle Gear in Canoga Park, and Matt installed my new knobby tires. Major props to Matt. The store was swamped with after-Xmas shoppers, but he still made time to mount and balance the tires.

While I waited for the tires to be ready, I went to Sears and bought a few more tools, including a torque wrench and some sockets. I had to make two purchases because the more I thought about it, the more tools I needed.

Finally my wheels were ready. I took them home, and they pretty much mounted right up. fortunately I’d had the good sense to store the axles and spacers in order, so I didn’t have trouble remember how to put things back together. The torque wrench worked like a charm… I think. It sure felt like I was going to strip something.

As I was cleaning up, feeling good about having done the work myself, I noticed that the fuel line had developed an extreme kink between the petcock and the carburetor. I guess I put enough line in there so that it was able to bend onto itself. Damn! I looked at it for quite a while, and eventually determined that if I shortened the line, it wouldn’t have enough length to fold onto itself. But it was late now, so I left it for the morning.

The next morning I woke up and still had a headache from all of the fuel and lubricant I’d been inhaling the past couple of days. It took me a long time to do everything because I had to be very methodical, make mistakes, make corrections, then check and double check everything.

Well, I went to the garage, snipped some of the fuel hose then re-installed. It worked! The line still kinked, but the kink was closer to the bottom of the petcock, and it wasn’t as bad.[1] Now all I had to do was pack my bags, have some breakfast, and hit the road.

The guy who sold me my bike had removed the tool carrier from the rear fender. I decided to re-install it at the last minute so I wouldn’t have to carry the tools in my back pack. The bolts and retaining nuts were 11 mm, and I only had one wrench in the size. It was awkward working with the one wrench plus a crescent wrench that was too big for the work space.

Then I remembered… “Duh! I bought some sockets yesterday. I should use those.” The tool carrier went on in a jiffy once I’d pulled out the right tools. I finally hit the road at about 10:45.

I had gone to the bathroom twice before I left, but literally 15 miles into my ride I had to go again. “Hell with that. I’ll just tough it out.” It was a cold and windy day, by the time I had 55 miles on the odometer I was desperate. I pulled to the side of the 210 somewhere around Azuza and took a leak.

Traffic wasn’t too bad, but I had bouts of lane splitting. As I approached the 15 interchange I saw the big caltrans signs: “WARNING: high winds from Ontario to Cajon Pass”. Yeah, no duh. The winds had been knocking me around from the start. It didn’t help that I was wearing my MX helmet.

Here’s a funny aside about the MX helmet and the knobby tires. I was expecting the tires to be noisy and uncomfortable. They actually weren’t that bad. I was particularly surprised at how quiet they were. It turns out that I just couldn’t here them over the howling of my MX helmet. I wear ear plugs, so it was nothing unbearable, but it’s just kind of funny. Since then I’ve used my road helmet with the knobby tires, I’ve realized that they are fairly noisy.

On my way to the Cajon Pass summit, I spied a motorcycle and dismounted rider by the side of the road. I didn’t have much to offer, a cell phone, and a tire kit that I really needed for myself, but I pulled over. Turns out he had just run out of gas. He thanked me for stopping, and said that someone was bringing him fuel.

Jeez, it was my second stop, and I’d barely done 100 miles. Oh well, I was freezing. I took the opportunity to take another leak, then I looked for my balaclava… oh look, I forgot I had these insulated gloves. Woot! I’ll put them on, too.

That was MUCH better, but I was still very cold. I finally stopped at a Denny’s near Barstow. Mac had made me a nice bowl of Cream of Wheat before I left, but I was cold and hungry. My own waitress wasn’t paying much attention to me, but another one, a blonde who seemed very sweet and cute to me at the time, soon brought me hot coffee (decaf, I’d already had to take two unscheduled pisses), and I soon felt better. The hot food was a real spirit lifter.

Before I left, I put on my rain gear for warmth. I’d wanted to do it earlier, but I didn’t want to pull everything out of my pack while I was out in the strong winds. The forecast said no rain, so of course I packed my rain suit at the very bottom of my pack. I had to pull out all sorts of stuff while I was in Denny’s, including my toothbrush and underwear, before I could finally suit up and hit the road again.

My next gas stop was in Essex, CA. I’d been getting very shitty gas mileage riding uphill and against the wind. I was disappointed in my new tank. But I was happy to stop and take another break. There was a guy on a Harley when I pulled into the station. We had instant camaraderie as soon as we made eye contact, but it did give me a look like I was a little crazy.

I had some more coffee and a nutrition bar, then hit the road again. From here it was a seemingly short trip to the Avi Casino on the south end of Laughlin. I got there about half an hour before my riding mates who were trailering their bikes in from Idaho. Dinner in the casino was delicious. I had a very good blackened salmon. Unfortunately the service was particularly slow, but the meal sure was good when it arrived. After that there was some talking and some back slapping, then it was time to sleep. The hot shower before bed sure felt good.

I didn’t sleep very well. Poor Martin, my roommate for the night, was getting over a cold. When he wasn’t snoring loudly, he was coughing and hacking. Poor guy, he slept worse than I did.

The eastern end of the Mojave trail is right by the casino, so the next morning we were soon on the trail… once we had everything ready, that is. Martin’s bike, an XR600, wouldn’t start. We had to push it to the top of the parking structure four times before it finally bump started.

I was better prepared this morning. I had taped one of those chemical warmers to my belly, a trick I learned from the late great Lutz Mueller. The trail was pretty well defined, and it was a mixed terrain. Sometimes it was hard-pack, sometimes it was sandy, and sometimes it was rocky. I was worried about my 17-inch rims going over the rocks, but by and large, the DRZ with street rims and dirt tires did very well.

I worked up a sweat wrestling my bike over the trail. Eventually I tossed the heating pad. Later on we came to a broad and well maintained dirt road, Cedar Canyon road. (http://tinyurl.com/2vyeyc) Here we could fly along at 50 to 60 mph. This was very nice, except I was wearing my Lee Parks leather gloves. The gloves were moist with sweat from the previous trail, so my hands were freezing until our next rest stop.

At the intersection with Kelso-Cima Road (http://tinyurl.com/2c3rd4), I put on my insulated gloves, and I taped on another heat pack. Ah, now I’m ready to ride again. The next section of the trail was very fun. It was the dry Soda Lake. (http://wrgis.wr.usgs.gov/parks/mojave/sodalake1.html) We goofed around a bit, doing donuts, trying a few wheelies, and generally enjoying the solid, flat ground.

Getting out of Soda Lake was a different mater. Eventually we found ourselves following the Mojave River bed. There were several water crossings. Most of them were small enough to be fun, but one or two were downright scary. It seemed like the water came up to the bottom of my tank. I don’t know. I couldn’t see much. I though I hit the water at a nice slow speed, but I got a huge wall of water thrown up in front of me. My bike has a smallish supermoto fender, so I had plenty of water thrown into my face. On time, I literally could not see in front of me because the wall of water thrown up was too tall and too thick. It was over my head, and it rained onto me as I passed. The worst part was that my crotch got pretty wet. Fortunately I was wearing wicking underwear, and it dried fairly quickly.

Eventually there was no more water, and I was happy. But then we hit the dry river bed. It was very soft and sandy. My bike actually did the best in the sand. I think it must’ve been the over sized tires. I was able to easily ride ahead of my companions. Just the same, it was the site of my one crash. I was following Dan at the time, and he made an unexpected stop to check his GPS. I instinctively got on the front brake, and I buried the front wheel a little bit. It was just a stupid 3 mph drop in the sand. Just the same, I broke my right-side rear turn signal. Oh well, we rode on, but no matter how fast we rode, it soon became clear that we were going to be riding in the dark.

I got disoriented in the dark. It was all you could do to follow faint tire tracks left in the sand. Finally we found Afton Canyon Road (I think) which lead us to I-15. (http://tinyurl.com/246r4z) From there it was 30 miles of pavement into Barstow. Boy was it nice to be back in civilization.

We were all dirty and tired, but we got good service and good food at Los Domingos Mexican Restaurant. After that it was another hot shower and bed. Martin slept much better that night, and so did I. But I didn’t sleep entirely well…

It was at the elevated speeds on pavement that I noticed something wrong with my bike. The right-side radiator shroud was flapping around. Two of the three retaining bolts had rattled out. Damn. I clujed the shroud together with some zip ties I got from Martin. “Don’t worry,” he said. “We lose fasteners like that all the time, especially with the kind of riding we’ve been doing. I always use some lock-tight to keep them in place.”

Oh great, here was my failure due to the prep I’d done on my bike. I’d been too stupid to use lock-tight. Now my bike was going to rattle to pieces. Fortunately we were already on the pavement when I noticed. I was confident I could make it to Barstow.

But my confidence was shaken for the next day’s ride. We were supposed to ride the Mojave Road back in the other direction. I was worried that the petcock I’d installed on my new tank would rattle lose. It would be disastrous if I started losing fuel out in no-man’s land.

But the petcock fasteners had lock washers. It would probably be okay. I decided to wait until morning to see how I felt and to make my final decision.

Well, perhaps not too surprisingly, I decided to skip the last day of riding and head for home. I was pretty sore. Perhaps I should’ve taken ibuprofen the night before. And I was half way home. The thought of having to slab 320 miles if I returned to Laughlin was too much. Better to slab it home from Barstow a day early and to be reunited with my Little Mac.

The slab ride home was rather uneventful. It made me tired and stiff and sore, but it wasn’t as cold as it had been on the way out. I even took Mulholland once I reached Woodland Hills. I was very surprised at how well the knobbies handled the canyons. I wasn’t particularly pushing, but I was dreading the knobbies and they turned out to be not so bad.

I rode through the parking lot of the Rock Store a little after noon. Didn’t see any bikes I recognized, so I kept rolling. At last I was home.

Currently I’m trying to decide whether to just leave the knobbies on until they’re worn out, or to remove them and try to save them. Oh well, we’ll see.

Steven

[1] Ken T and Dapper Jim told me of a trick while we were up at Newcomb’s. You just put in enough extra hose so that there’s a loop between the petcock and the carburetor. Very nice solution.

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