Rally Bag Rampage

I think I mentioned it before, preparing for a rally is all consuming. I wake up in the middle of the night thinking about things I need to do. Our rally is only one week away and stuff is building up in the house. I've got boxes of stuff everywhere.

I don't know how many rally goers check out this blog, so I won't say what all is in these pictures. I want the rally bag to be a surprise. Several items in the bag are custom made, i.e. made by my wife. If you go to her blog, you can see some of those items.
Thise is the first rally I've helped organize, so contacting companies and asking for donations was sort of new (actually, I was an Army recruiter a long time ago, so making cold calls wasn't exactly new) but I did have some success. In the back of the above pic, you can see gloves that Corazzo donated sticking out of the box. In the front are the rally bags themselves, that my wife made.
All of the boxes in the aboce picture are either raffle items or more boxes with rally bag stuff. you can also see the roll of raffle tickets.
Here is another picture of all the boxes of stuff. On the right, is the back of one of the rally shirts. I'm not showing the front, again, because I want the shirt to be a surprise.

Well, one more week to go. I am really looking forward to the rally. At the same time, however, I worry. I want everyone to have a great time. And whether they do, or not, I feel is my responsibility. I had this great DJ lined up for our Saturday gymkhana and concourse, but he disappeared on me. So, it looks like I have another one, but I've never met him, so I don't know that he'll be as good as my first choice.

My next post will probably be after the rally. I hope to have some nice pics. There is currently rain for that weekend in the long range forecast. I know this is the desert and we need all the rain we can get, but I'm praying against the rain anyway.

Ride on,

Howard

500 Mile "Butt Burner" Test Run

As I have mentioned in this blog before, it is my goal to ride a "Butt Burner 1k" ride soon. Now, I should probably just get out there and ride it, but that is not the way my mind works, so I have been working my way up to it. Id did the 130 mile ride to Parker Canyon to test some equipment, then 250 miles to see see how the Buddy would hold up in riding wide open throttle (WOT) for a while, oh yeah, there was the ill-fated ride out to Coolidge and Casa Grande that ended with a detached muffler and a ride home from Picacho, AZ.

Yesterday (4/9/10), I decided to ride 500 miles and see if I could complete it in under 12 hours. For the full 1000 miles I've been debating on riding secondary roads vs interstate highway. Each has its merit and disadvantages. I had initially only considered secondary roads, feeling that they would be safer. I have since vacillated on this vs interstate, several times. For this 500 mile ride, I selected a route which was mostly secondary roads. Here it is. I chose this route the night before. There was another route that I preferred, but when I check all the individual intervals between gas stations, there is one interval between Lordsburg, NM and Douglas, AZ which about 110 miles between petrol stations. I have a 1 gallon gas can one the scoot, but I wasn't sure if I could make it with a full tank plus the gallon, so I chose the other route.

I got up at 6:00 am and was out the door by 6:20. Unfortunately, it took almost an hour to ride to my start point. So, it was 7:35 am before I pulled out of the station in Catalina, AZ, headed north. Below, you can see my scoots odometer reading of 15,036 miles

I immediately noticed that the morning was still a little on the cool side. The temp at the house when I left was 54 degrees, the forecast called for highs in the 80's so I was wearing my mesh jacket, with liner and my new Corazzo armored, orange, reflective vest (which I won at the Friki Tiki Rally raffle.) I passed Oracle and then had the descent into the San Pedro River Valley. 7% grade for 7 miles, woohooo! 53 miles and my first stop for fuel in Winkleman. Then it was a lot of climbing up to my second fuel stop in Globe. I passed 5000 feet just south of Globe, although there is a nice descent as you approach town. Just before Glode, a large deer walked across the road infront of me and paused, as if to say "A scooter? Don't see many of those around here." A blast of the steibel horn and he was gone.

I took the above pic at my fuel stop in Globe. Globe is very rustic and pretty, but not where I stopped. I was timing myself so I had to set all the photo ops aside. That was probably the hardest thing about the ride. Leaving Globe, I went west on US 60, across more mountains (4500 ft elev) down to Superior and back out into the desert. I continued west on 60 until turning south to Florence. I did this because I didn't want to ride through Phoenix on 8 lane freeways with LOTS of traffic. Gassed up in Phoenix, then it was west toward Maricopa. I had to cross a large Indian reservation. Signage is usually poor across any given AZ reservation and this was no exception. I wound up talking to a Southwest Ambulance crew with a GPS about how to get to Highway 1 where I could get over to Maricopa.

I had 2 McDonald's burgers, some Sweet tea, fueled up and headed southwest for Gila Bend. Gila Bend was the western-most part of my journey, so I took the above pic as photographic evidence that I was there. Apparently, GB and Roswell, NM have space things and UFO's in common.

Just to the right from the other photo is the second one, showing the "Space Age" restaurant and hotel complete. The front of the hotel is what people from the 60's would have considered "futuristic."

Now I was headed toward home. I fueled up and was off. I went across the US Air Force bombing ranges outside of G.B. and down to Ajo, very close to the Mexican border and last jumping off point for party goers headed to Rocky Point, Mexico (Tucson's closest ocean front.)

From Ajo, it was across another reservation (The Tohon-Odoham Nation) to Sells. I took another 15 minute break to stretch my back and legs, then it was back on the scoot for a short jaunt to Tree Points. A quick gas & go, then I turned south to Arivaca. Time was beginning to get short, so I decided to skip my planned fuel stop there and try to get all the way to Green Valley. I made it and realized I had less than an hour to get from Green Valley, across the valley to Vail.

I made it Vail and my watch showed it was 7:15, 11 hours and 40 minutes after leaving that morning. When I arrived home, the odometer showed 15,587 miles. Quite a day's ride. Well, this morning, I checked the official mileage of what I actually rode and the total was 480 miles. I have to have ridden another 20 miles in 20 minutes. Drat!

Where can I save time to know that I can do twice that distance in less than twice the time? I guess I'm back to the Interstate idea. If I have a chase vehicle with extra fuel on board, I can save the time associated with pulling off the road, finding a gas station, etc etc. I also stopped more often than I had to. 10 stops for fuel ate up a lot of time.

I'll keep you posted,

Ride on!

Howard

Rally Planning

The Sky Island Riders are hosting our first rally, the May Day Rally. Planning and preparing for said rally is consuming my life at this point. We are just 4.5 weeks away. I enjoy planning events and this is no different and I want this to be a great rally. Now, I have only been to four other rallies in my life, so I'm not drawing from a wealth of experience, but I'm doing the best I can. There are three other guys in the club who have quite bit of rally experience and they have been invaluable.

The most recent rally I attended was Friki Tiki, which was held the first weekend in March. It was also here in Tucson and was hosted by the Mary Janes All Girl Scooter Club. I helped a bit in the planning and was a ride leader. It was helpful to have another rally so near to ours, so it's fresh in my mind. I carefully took notes on what worked and where there was difficulty. That info is being used for May Day. Friki Tiki was unique, in that it was also also a music festival. One of the Mary Janes is in a local band, so she combined her two loves into a single event.

One of our meet-ups for the rally was "The Hut" on Tucson's 4th Avenue. Is that Tiki head not one of the coolest backdrops for scooters you've ever seen? I love it! It was moved from a local miniature golf course that closed.

That last day of the rally was a great ride, but unfortunately it rained. However,a little bit of rain, or in this case, a LOT of rain, is no reason to not go out and play in it. That's me, riding through this monster puddle outside of the Bario Brewing Company where we finished the Sunday morning kitsch ride.

Now back to planning. I have been e-mailing numerous local businesses to ask them to provide either raffle items or things for the rally bags. I am really pleased with the rally bags, so far.

My wife hand made rally bags. They are purse string-type bags all will fit in a pet carrier, on a helmet hook, or from a mirror mount. She is also making a scooter-themed quilt for the raffle as well. We are gradually accumulating some nice things for them, too.

Riding Solo

I enjoy taking long rides on my scooters. As a nurse, I have an unusual schedule with days off frequently falling in the middle of the week. Most of my scooter riding friends have more traditional Monday through Friday kinds of jobs. Additionally, week days tend to have a bit less traffic out on the roads that lead to lakes, mountains etc. So, when the mood struck me a few days back to go to Parker Canyon Lake, I had to go it alone.

Arizona in an amazing place. (I suppose all states are in their own right.) If it weren't for the mountains in the background, wouldn't this look a lot like Kansas? A few posts back, i mentioned the Iron Butt Ride. well, I'm still planning on making a run at it, so, I have tried to start fitting in a few "training" rides. Then only way your butt gets used to sitting on a scooter for hours on end, is to sit on the scooter for .... you got...."hours on end." Hence this ride to Parker Canyon.
I picked Parker Canyon because a. it would give 160 miles round trip and b. I couldn't remember ever going there before. Now I'm sure that my mother will say that I've been there "lots of times." but the fact is, I have no recollection of ever having been there. Even now, after the fact, I'm sure I've never been there.

As you leave Tucson and head south, southeast on AZ highway 83, you climb slowly, but steadily. Once you leave Sonoita, the climb steepens and soon you are in mountains, the vegetation changes and it begins to get cooler. You can see the first part of the mountains in the pic above.
Eventually, the road steepens and gets twisty. The photo above shows one of the many signs. You probably can't tell from the picture, but there is a significant downhill grade (I was looking behind me) and I had just passed through a series of five 180 degree switchbacks. Very fun, both ways. The road isn't in very good condition and dodging potholes adds another level of difficulty to the ride, as does dodging cows, since much of the last 30 miles is open range.
I was rewarded with the sight of water. If you're not from the desert, this probably doesn't mean alot to you. But around here, standing water always attracts a crowd, even if it's a puddle left over from a brief rain. In the background, you can see the dam. That's about all there is to Parker Canyon Lake. There was what appeared to be a Jeep Club in the parking lot when I got there. Six or seven Jeeps and their occupants visiting and having a little picnic.
I don't know if you see it, but I turned over 14,000 miles on my 2008 Buddy on the way home. Far the highest mileage on a Buddy, but far from the lowest. I think I have the highest mileage on a Buddy in the Tucson metro area, anyway.

This was a great ride. The scenery was beautiful and the scooter ran great. My butt tolerated the ride well. More butt training rides are in the works. I'm hoping to do the Butt-Burning around the end of the month.

Ride on,

Howard

Glad to be the Slowest

This past Saturday, I put together another ride. It was not one of our monthly rides and I put it together on short (3 days, I think) notice and there was rain in the forecast. Therefor, I wasn't too surprised when only two other scooters showed up. What did surprise me, was, that for the first time in our club's history, only manual shift scooters were present.

Obviously, we are not a "vintage only" club, but it was still kind of interesting to have only shifties. I had planned a route with 2 variations. One if I had some beginners showed up (which was what I anticipated), another if only experienced riders showed (which I figured was pretty unlikely.) Well, in addition to being only shifties, it was also only experienced riders.

I have only been riding scooters for less than 2 years and I really enjoy introducing people to the world of scooters and helping them to improve their skills. Our club is almost entirely made up of newer riders and that is the way I like it, but it was kind of refreshing to have a ride made up of only experienced riders.

As we wound our way through Tucson Mountain Park, I realized that I didn't have to look behind me as often. Partly because there were only 3 of us and partly because we were all comfortable negotiating corners at speed. After topping Gate's Pass and maneuvering down a steep twisty road, we eventually found our way to a long stretch of straight, mostly flat, two-lane black top, so I opened my Stella up.

It was then that I realized that I was not only riding the "slowest" scooter (In the pic above, you can see my black Stella and two P-200's. The red one is pretty modified and is VERY fast.) but I was also the rider with the least experience. I found it to be quite "enlightening" to know that I could ride as hard and as fast as I chose and still not have to worry about my compatriots.

It was with a light heart that I led our little group through a particularly dangerous section of road that has decreasing radius, downhill left turn that has claimed two scooters in the past. We finished our ride at Sir Veza's Taco Garage, where 4 member of the Green Valley scooter club met up with us. Note: If you look out the window, you can see that it started raining shortly after we arrived for lunch. I had a wet, soggy ride home. But it was still fun.

A Sense of Community

I bought my scooter because it was so much fun. Once I began to make contact with other scooter folks here in Tucson, I discovered something else. People who ride scooter are good people. I like them.

I used to attend a "biker church" in Missouri. (Heart of God Fellowship" in Sibley, MO for those of keeping score.) The biker culture, both good bikers and bad, is one of brotherhood. My biker friends in the church would drop everything to help of their church or biker brothers. I wish I could say the same of other church friends.
The above pic is of Theron Spurgeon. Theron is visiting AZ from Sacramento. He posted on our club website a couple of weeks ago, that he was here and would like to ride with the club. Well, we set up one ride, but his training times were changed and he couldn't make it. Well, this past Friday, he called me, said he was wanting to head in to Tucson and ride. I had him meet me at my house so we could ride. He didn't have a scooter with him, so I offered him the Buddy to ride.
Theron in front of a saguaro cactus.

It occurred to me as we were riding, "Howard, you gave the keys to your scooter to a guy you've on met online. If he were to take off with it, you wouldn't be able to do a thing about it."

Immediately, my counter thought was, "yeah, but he's a scooterist. It's okay." And that is exactly right. On multiple occasions, I've heard members of our club offer one of their scoots to someone they had just met. When my scooter broke down, I made a technical call to Sean and he not only answered my question, but offered to drive 50-60 miles to come fetch me. I ended up having my son come get me, but I am honored by the offer. However, this is just something that one scooterist will do for another..
Theron and I had a great ride. We even had to go around one section of road, because it was flooded with snow melt. That's something that you don't see in Tucson very often. Theron will be heading back home to Sacramento next week. I know now that I have a scooter brother in California and if I'm ever up that way, I know that he or one of his scooter friends would be there to help if I needed it, because that what we, of the scooter community, do.

Ride on,

Howard

Scooter Adventure?

Yesterday, 1/25/10, the weather was beautiful and I had been itching to do a long scooter ride. A week or so earlier I had plotted a 200 mile loop, (shaped more like a lollipop on a stick actually) as one of my preparation rides for doing my Iron Butt ride in March. Since I will have to average 50 mph to finish the Iron Butt in 20 hours, I decided I would time the entire ride, gas stops and all, so I could calculate a realistic average speed.

So, it was with a light heart, Google map in my pocket, extra fuel in the pet carrier and a smile on my face, that I set out on my ride. The sun was shining. Snow capped mountains could be seen on virtually every horizon. The photo above is of the north side of the Santa Catalina mountains as seen from Park Link Road, northwest of Tucson.

I normally have a range of about 110 miles or so on the Buddy. It was with a slight bit of concern that I noticed that my gas gauge was decreasing at a rate which seemed faster than usual. Now, when people in most states say that something happened "in the middle of Nowhere" they are saying it would be inconvenient to get help but realistically they are probably less than 5 miles from some form of human habitation. In Arizona, and few other states, when you're "in the middle of Nowhere," you could easily be 20 or 30 miles from help. So, about 10 miles after my gas gauge pegged on empty, I pulled over to the side of the road and poured in my "reserve" fuel, about 600 or 700ml from a little bottle that I have carried, but never used. By my calculations, I estimated that I was about 15 miles from Coolidge, AZ. I have estimated that this extra fuel will get me about 20 miles.
I ran out of gas about 10 miles later. I was in farm country and there was plenty of room to pull off to the side of the road. "Well" I thought to myself, "at least people on farms should have gas powered things around. How hard can it be to walk up to a house and get some gas?" There were four houses within a quarter mile of the intersection where the Buddy died. (Remember my earlier post about the silence after your scooter dies? I was feeling it here.)

House #1 - Big fence with big, aggressive looking and sounding dogs inside. I'll pass.

House #2 - No answer either at the house, or on the shop doors. Five or six pick-up trucks in the driveway, but no dice.

House #3 - Two teenaged girls at home. "I need to call my mom." says one after I ask about getting a bit of gas. Mom apparently says okay, directs daughter to where the gas is and "Mom says you should check and make sure there's no water in it." The 1 gallon container has about a quart of liquid in it that smells ever so faintly of some unidentifiable petroleum product. I thank the young lady for her attempt but decide to walk on. At this point, walking was beginning to be a bit painful, as I had surgery on both feet approximately 12 days previously.

House #4 - Has a sign out front about roping teams and a quad is visible in the garage. Ah, good sign. The sounds of banging metal are emanating from the workshop, so I limp over (still in good spirits, I might add) to see about some fuel. After requiring assurance that I would bring back his gas can, the man working in the shop agreed to let me have as much gas as I needed.

The gas was in a full, 5 gallon, steel can. I lugged it back to the intersection. Just as I removed the gas cap and began spilling gas all over (there was a little bit of a breeze and I had no funnel), the owner of the gas can pulled up in his truck. "I was going to bring you a funnel, but I don't have one, but I thought I might help, anyway." I couldn't help but think to myself, "I wish you would've thought of that BEFORE I lugged 50 pounds of gas and gas can all the way back to my scooter!" but I kept my mouth shut.

"At least I can block the wind for you." An excellent observation on his part, since gas was sloshing down both sides of the scooter. So he promptly began shielding the stream of gas from the wind WITH THE HAND WHICH HELD THE LIT CIGARETTE! "Maybe it would be better if you did that with the other hand." I suggested.

"Oh! Right!" he quickly changed hands and, explosion averted, I quickly splashed about a quart of gas into my tank, thanked him sincerely, and headed into Coolidge, which, the man assured me, was less than 5 miles away. At this point, I know that my original plan of timing the whole ride is kaput, so now I'm just out to enjoy the rest of the ride.

I happily filled my tank and rode west out of Coolidge on 87, turned southwest onto 387 and made my way toward Casa Grande. Went over a beautiful mountain pass and headed toward

I-10 and into Casa Grande. I stopped for a snack and some hydration and headed south.

It is shortly after I turn east, going toward Arizona City, that I begin to notice that my scooter isn't making the same sound it usually does. It is hard to diagnose what the difference was. I pulled over and revved the motor once or twice. "Maybe it's just me" I think. After all, the wind had been whistling past my helmet for about 3 hours at this point. There are no services in Arizona City, I continue on toward Eloy.

Not wanting to run out of gas again, I decide to stop for fuel in Eloy and to better examine the scoot. It is here, that I realize that the bolts on the rear bracket for exhaust has sheared off and my beautiful Prima pipe is being held on only by the two bolts on the manifold. The pipe is moving a LOT.

I looked through what few tools etc I had with me. I just needed something to hold the pipe up so that it wouldn't bounce around and break off at the manifold. "Aha!" I found a bungee cord, fit it to the end of the pipe, up around the rear rack and viola'. I topped off with fuel and headed toward Picacho. From there, it would only be about 40 miles home then I could go about repairing my beloved scooter.

But it was not to be. As I rode down the not so smooth road toward Picacho, the sound of my scooter's exhaust continued to change. I realized it was working its way loose from the motor end of the exhaust as well, in spite of my bungee efforts. I slow down and watch vigilantly for bups and potholes. Spotting them isn't a problem, after all, this is an old, seldom used stretch of I-10 access road. Dodging them is a problem. Determined to limp home, I press on.

It is at the Picacho Peak (Picacho Peak itself is in the background of the above photo.) gas station and curio shop, that I realize more additions to my Eloy repairs must be done. I kept having visions of the front of the pipe dropping off the bike, hitting it with the rear tire, then flying through the air as the scooter suddenly stars going end over end.

I asked at Bowlin's Running Indian (one of a chain of curio shops) if they have any kind of wire with which I can secure the front end of the pipe to.... to.... something. The nice lady says they have nothing like that, but refers me to the tow shop on the other side of the interstate and up the long and, as it turns out, extremely bumpy road. It is on that road where the pipe pulls completely away from the motor and was kept from falling to the ground (and under my rear tire) by the center stand. God bless center stands.

The fellow at the tow shop assures me that they have no wire (What?!) but I could have a couple of clothes hangars. You can see the hangar modification near the bottom of the 3rd picture in this lengthy post. I secure the pipe as best I could, then called my wife to let her know that I would be babying the scooter home.

I rode the now extremely loud scooter down the hill and back past Bowlin's. Then I pulled off to the side of the road where I decide to call one of my scooter buddies. I still don't know that much about scooter power plants and I wanted to check and see if I was going to be buying a new motor if I continued riding home. John assured me that a.) I probably end up needing a new motor if I continued and b.) I probably wouldn't make it home because the motor would likely be destroyed somewhere between Picacho and Tucson. He offered to come and retrieve me. Not wanting to be a pain in the butt, I declined his generous offer and, instead, called my son and had him come and get his unfortunate old man.

I had been planning on getting a trailer hitch installed so that I could then purchase a Versa-Haul for events such as this. I learn yesterday that won't be necessary. Once the two seats are removed from the back of my Dodge Caravan, there is sufficient space and these beautiful tie down location in the floor where the seats attach.

It was an unfortunate series of events, but through it all, I still had a good time. After all, are you a true scooter freak if you've never had to hauled back home after your scooter conked out somewhere?

Ride on,

Howard