8 Days in Idaho and Montana

I'll write a more thorough ride report soon.
We took a trip across Idaho and Montana entirely off road for a little over 1700 miles over 8 days with 16 people.
Two of us were on WR250R's, which did great. Would even do 82 mph over the desert and could handle the single track over Massacre Mtn and the Pete King Trail. I was impressed with the little WR for sure.
Went from Pocatello to Powell via the Tour of Idaho route, then over into Montana and back down to Pocatello. Motel to motel type of trip.

Pics at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/ryann515/201008TOTBestOf

We almost ran into each other :P

Wish we would have. We saw no other off road bikes. Great riding out there!

Hi Ryan:

Just went through your album and what a fantastic ride! Loved some of the shots of the vista's and was that one blurred shot a bear???

Nice to see an old-timer amongst the riding crew too.

Riding the side of that mountain when there really was no trail and the fall off to your right must have been a PIA!!!

Some Kaw owners appeared to have problems with rear tires and the poor SOB with the slimed rear tube and having to change it anyway... I also liked the gas pump pics with the clear top showing the gallons. And quite a few of people refueling on the trail. How far out were you in some of those pics anyway?

Finally, I saw a lot of Giant Loop and Wolfman gear but everyone seemed to be packed relatively light. Pretty amazing for an 8-day road trip!

Thanks for sharing I bet that is a ride will be remembered for a very long time.

Wayne

It was a very fun trip. We're staying in motels every night so luggage is light. You're wearing the same riding clothes everyday anyway. We pack spares, air filters, tennis shoes, a pair of shorts, a pair of long pants, spare socks, a couple of t-shirts, and raingear. The rest isnt really important.

Everyone pre-slimed their tires, but we still have a few flats. When the tube gets a 1/2" tear in it the slime isnt gonna help. Works wonders on small punctures and stuff though. Most of us changed a rear tire around the 1000 mile mark in the motel parking lot since they were toast.

We did a similar trip last year in Colorado and Utah so we knew how to plan this one even better.

We had a couple of stints of up to 180 miles between gas stops. Some days were 180 miles, some almost 300 miles. We averaged a little over 200 miles per day. Everything was completely pre-planned - all fuel stops, gps routing, motel reservations, etc.

I was hoping for a ride report today - yours really hit the spot! Thanks for all the great pictures. Someday I'll get to do more than long weekend.

Was your tour guided, as in you hired a tour guide to organize and lead? I can't imagine that many people collaborating on a ride - paying for an event, yes; organizing themselves, no.

The Massacre Mtn. single track puckers me up just looking at the pictures

Thanks for posting this.

Neat stuff.

I recognize a few pics of the areas such as Pickle's Palace.

How often did you guys have to stop for the Husky guy to change his oil?

I bet the KLR guy was working hard on some of that.

It's always neat to find places that actually go somewhere and not just a short 'there and back' trail. You should post some info on the route.

Very nice... Thanks for sharing.

Good stuff. I guess the WRR was ready for a nap? BTW what clamp setup do you have with the 12v plug and stuff on it?

Yeah - that pic was after a 3rd gear get-off - ouch.
Highway Dirtbikes makes the bar clamp with the powerlet and wireless ipod control and the handguards. Awesome stuff - http://highwaydirtbikes.com

I promise I'll get a writeup of the trip to go along with the pics soon.

We planned the whole ride. We used the routes from the Tour of Idaho (motorcyclejazz.com) for the first half of the trip and made our own multi-day loop back down to our starting point in Pocatello. Everything is planned out well in advance. We pooled some $$ from everyone to get the bikes out there (5 drove while 11 flew), sat phone rental, etc. Basically, you get up in the morning and select the day's route in the gps and ride.
Even though we had 16 people, we rode in groups of 3-5 or so to keep moving and manage the dust.

ZED wrote:

Neat stuff.

I recognize a few pics of the areas such as Pickle's Palace.

How often did you guys have to stop for the Husky guy to change his oil?

I bet the KLR guy was working hard on some of that.

It's always neat to find places that actually go somewhere and not just a short 'there and back' trail. You should post some info on the route.

The Husky's radiator broke on the Massacre Mtn loop, but we JB Welded it back and it held for the rest of the trip. That Husky is a great bike, but is a torture rack for the amount of miles we were doing.
The KLR did not do the single track, but it handled the rest - someone slower but had a good rider at the helm.

I'll post our gps tracks after I get them cleaned up a bit. It was a great ride.

I was the other WR rider on the trip. The bike was great from start to finish! I rode with all my gear loaded in my Giant Loop bag and still managed to get a best of 63 mpg and a worst of 53 mpg on the trip. I had budgeted my fuel based on beating 48 mpg so I was overjoyed, and very relieved, when early results had me in the clear. This didn't account for how often I got lost but I never ran completely dry. I'm nowhere near as skilled a rider as Ryan so my speed, or lack there of, may skew the numbers a bit. But I had a great time and enjoyed some incredible views.

Feel free to read my blog for more details at Average Joe's View of the World

Lastly, Ryan is being modest about the planning. He's a one-man show and did an amazing job. I'll be buying him beer for a long time.

Here are the recorded tracks from our ride.

https://docs.google.com/a/nelsonandco.com/leaf?id=0B-tWWev7jHN6N2JkMGQ1M2YtOWRhNi00MmQzLWEzYWItZWRiNzAyYzI3ODdk&hl=en

Still need to get on that ride report!

Ryan Nelson wrote:

Here are the recorded tracks from our ride.

https://docs.google.com/a/nelsonandco.com/leaf?id=0B-tWWev7jHN6N2JkMGQ1M2YtOWRhNi00MmQzLWEzYWItZWRiNzAyYzI3ODdk&hl=en

Still need to get on that ride report!

Thanks big-ems for the tracks!

I hope to head west from VA someday and do the ride!

Well at least I am dreaming.

Your ride looks like a blast!

When I click on the link to the tracks I get a login page. How do we get to them?

Link should work with no login.

If not - let me know. I assume I cant add it as an attachment to this post.

http://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B-tWWev7jHN6N2JkMGQ1M2YtOWRhNi00MmQzLWEzYWItZWRiNzAyYzI3ODdk&hl=en

I still had to log in, but I have a Google account so no problem.
Thanks.

so sweet, thanks for the pics! One day I hope to visit that side of the states to see some real mountains. For now I just hang out in the Whites (NH)

Great ride, thanks for posting!!!!

We've done similar rides and I have a couple of questions:

what brand/model tires were the most popular?

How did the camera work that was exposed to dust mounted on the bars?

Did you let everyone take the tools they wanted to take or did you try to coordinate so there was less duplication?

What seems to work the best for motorcycle jacket/pants?

Last trip we broke into two groups, an early risers group and the rest of us that wanted to sleep later. We always caught them about noon... How did you manage to stay together? keep track of the rider behind you?

thanks for the gps track!

taoshum wrote:

Great ride, thanks for posting!!!!

We've done similar rides and I have a couple of questions:

what brand/model tires were the most popular?

How did the camera work that was exposed to dust mounted on the bars?

Did you let everyone take the tools they wanted to take or did you try to coordinate so there was less duplication?

What seems to work the best for motorcycle jacket/pants?

Last trip we broke into two groups, an early risers group and the rest of us that wanted to sleep later. We always caught them about noon... How did you manage to stay together? keep track of the rider behind you?

thanks for the gps track!

D606 rear tires worked well with any front mx tire.
The camera works well on the bars. I dont shoot from there but use the hotshoe to just have the camera easy to take off, shoot, and put back on the bars while moving down the trail. I also had a chest mounted GoPro Hero HD video camera as did a couple other riders.
Everyone was basically self sufficient - carrying everything they felt they needed.
Everyone wore different stuff, but I love my Klim pants with a First Gear Killamanjaro jacket.
We split into several groups and rode with 3-5 people in each group. We had a policy that you wait for the person behind you to make a turn - works well and keeps us spread out.
I need to get off my butt and right a thorough report . . .