Forth and Back TOR '21

[RBMann]

I don't know why it has taken me seven months to start this report but here we go.

Once again Ralf(BeeKeeper) and I would venture out into the real world. TOR was held in '21 and we planned on going but the schedule didn't work out for us. Our route would be The Continental Divide from south to north. Not the CDT that is all dirt but a modified version.

One of the first great MC trip reports I read was Whizmo & Gizmo, 'The Great Divide Tour' in '02. They set a standard that I can't even approach. I heard from a relative of Gizmo that sadly Whizmo has passed away.

The Great Divide Tour - Introduction

I copied and added to their trip in '05 and this is the only S content in this ride report.

https://forums.pelicanparts.com/bmw-r1100s-r1200s-tech-forum/248689-great-divide-trip.html

I bagged 66 Divides in '05 and after looking at the maps I could see the potential for around 80 this time by adding in some dirt roads. Why do I even try to plan things? We ended up crossing 56 Divides in 6830 miles during 27 days of riding.

Day 1-Seattle to Maryhill SP,

I headed south to pickup Ralf in San Diego going past Mt. Rainier and Mt. Adams to a campground on the Columbia River near the Dalles, OR.



Mt. Adams near Trout Lake, WA-260 miles



Columbia R. near Wishram, WA-

[RBMann]

Day 2-Maryhill to Mt. Vernon, OR, 205 miles



Nice 72ºF. to start the morning-





Heading up the John Day River, OR-



Quick stop at the mountain identifier that I had never noticed before-



Wind turbines and Mt. Hood-





Along the river again in the John Day Fossil Beds Nat. Monument-



Home for the night and surveying the aftermath of my chain oiler dumping its entire content in one afternoon-

[Chris216]

RB, great pictures as always, look forward to seeing the rest.
Chris

[sgoodwin]

Looks like you shouldn't have to oil anything for the rest of your trip.

[RBMann]

Day 3-Mt. Vernon to Goose Lake SP, 372 miles



Today I wanted to ride OR 28 along the Crooked River because it looked interesting on a map and I have never been there. 54ºF. in the morning and sunny so the promise of a good day ahead. This area of OR is one of my favorites with lots of low traffic small roads but even the main route Hwy 26 is nice-







Once more into the breech-



On 26 east of Mitchell, there were about ten helicopters being readied in a farmer's large field. My guess then was something to do with forrest fires-



Mitchell is a dusty little town which supports the local farmers. I found two old objects, a Datsun 520 truck('65-'68) and some sort of blue/aluminum box with a book of TP inside-

[RBMann]

Day 3 continued-

Made it to Crooked R. Rd. around noon. It was a nice twisty low speed drive along the river. On the south end of the canyon it turned to dirt and I headed west to Bend so I could go south to Hwy 31 and Summer Lake-



Hwy 97 South out of Bend had a lot of traffic so I was happy to turn SE on Hwy 31. That happiness was short lived as the sky became smoky at Fort Rock SP-



At Summer Lake the sky was getting ugly when I stopped for gas and found out the forrest road I had planned to use parallel to 31 was closed because of a big fire. Forrest fires would be this year's theme-





The store at the turnoff for Goose Lake SP. The smoke does add to the sunset pics-

[RBMann]

Day 4-Goose Lake to Spanish Fork CG, 246 miles



Still smokey skies in the morning. 57ºF. at wakeup time but the day got hotter. Not any water in Goose Lake as far as I could see-





I was looking a little rough for only four days on the road but made a new friend when I stopped for lunch in Aden, CA-





After lunch the heat was on so I rode up and over through Lassen Nat. Park. At least 20º cooler at the top except the mud pots-









The heat was on again as I dropped elevation. 104ºF. when I arrived at Spanish Fork CG after stopping in Greenville for supplies. Lots of talk in camp about a big fire to the SE that had closed Hwy 395. By the time I got home this CP and Greenville had both been burned-

[RBMann]

Day 5-Spanish Fork to Big Pine, 343 miles



Woke up and it was still 74ºF. Going to be another hot day going down past Lake Tahoe on Hwy 89 with lots of traffic-



The temperature dropped a little as I continued south going over Monitor Pass. I remember the clutch starting to slip from a failing rear main seal on a '76 R90/6 when I crossed this pass in the 80s-





Following Ralf's advice I popped over to Hwy 338 in NV which parallels 395 going south. Enjoyed a couple small cloud bursts that helped cool thing down-





I arrived at my campsite in Big Pine to find the tree the town is named after no longer exists, sad-

[ckcarr]

Off to a good start!
Excellent photos !

[Swamper]

I like your riding style, we seem to get so involved with laying down mileage that we don't stop to take many pictures and smell the Roses. Very nice pictures you've taken.

[RBMann]

Thanks Swamper. We have talked about daily mileage at TOR. A common method is to say I have seven days of vacation to ride from A to B which is 5,000 miles so I have to average 700+ a day. I am lucky and have always had the luxury of flexible time off. I used to look at where I want to go, know my riding style, divide by 250-300 miles and take the days off I need. Now I just workup a route and ride to the end or when I want to go home.

[RBMann]

Day 6-Big Pine to San Diego, 339 miles



74ºF. when I woke up before sunrise. I was sweating before the camp was packed up and I hit the road-



Hello gas, goodbye $$$-



There can be some pretty scenery but today was mostly cover the ground and get to Ralf's place. I saw 109ºF. heating down 395-

[RBMann]

Day 7-San Diego to Gila Bend, 293 miles



After two days in San Diego installing a new rear tire I had drop shipped to Ralf's and finishing touches on his packing we headed off for New Mexico. One of the few times I agreed to use a freeway as backroads would be longer, not more scenic and only increase the 'bake time'. In one day we ran across AZ in 2018 with 400+ miles over 100ºF. I told Ralf, "Not Again". So the plan was get to Gila Bend find a hotel with AC and a pool. Great plan as this was the hottest day of the trip and a thunder storm rolled in at sunset-







Those beautiful(barren) AZ rest stops-

[RBMann]

Day 8-Gila Bend to Silver City, 322 miles



It was nice to have a room during the thunderstorm last night. It was already hot in the morning at 88ºF. Today was more heat but we lucked out as the cloud cover kept the temperature reasonable. In the afternoon of the tenth day after I left home we bagged the first Divide crossing on our route-



Just as we reached Silver City another thunderstorm hit and we dashed into another motel. Glad to have shelter as the rain really came down-



Pulled up a weather map and quickly realized being indoors was a good choice-

[RBMann]

Day 9-Silver City to Glenwood, 182 miles



Nice weather in the morning at 61ºF. In numerous places people mentioned that if it rains in NM then the dirt roads quickly turn to slime. Since it had rained for the last two days we opted for the paved route to reach Datil, NM. Ralf wanted to see the Gila Cliff Dwellings Nat. Mon. and we could bag three Divides by looping N, then E to Mimbres and back through Silver City. We had our second Divide just west of town before heading to Gila. This was done in case the dirt roads looked okay which when we got to them they were muddy-





Gila Cliff Dwellings are cool and hardly anyone was there. We did the 2 mile loop and for me they were the best cliff dwellings I have seen-

[RBMann]

Day 9 continued-

Someone we met on the hike and a Divide out by Mimbres where the weather was nice but the roads muddy-

[RBMann]

Day 10-Glenwood to Blue Heron SP, 275 miles



First Divide of the day and why I like NM. Wide open spaces and plenty of photo ops-





The Very Large Mobil Array east of Datil on Hwy 60 and another storm trying to catch us. The dirt route would have been right in the middle of that storm-





The Divide just outside of Pie Town is Gizmo Pass. The marker in on a tree up the bank-





Gizmo 2010 on the way to Texas-



Gizmo 2005 on my first Divide Trip-

[RBMann]

Day 10 continued-

When in Pie Town eat pie-





The dirt road 603 NW from Pie Town crosses the CD a number of times and it is really hard to tell where there is a Divide crossing. I counted three-



Natural arch in El Malpais National Conservation Area on hwy. 117-



We had stayed at Blue Heron SP in 2018 and found it enjoyable. This time was busy and chaotic. No open site so they told us to just camp in the picnic loop. Then we saw all the people camping on the lake, easily 4-5X as many people as the last time-

[flatbutt]

Originally Posted by RBMann

Day 10 continued-

When in Pie Town eat pie-





The dirt road 603 NW from Pie Town crosses the CD a number of times and it is really hard to tell where there is a Divide crossing. I counted three-

Ah the Pellie one footed stance and PFFOG would be all over that pie!

[RBMann]

Originally Posted by flatbutt

Ah the Pellie one footed stance and PFFOG would be all over that pie!

We were too.