Hello from the Nevada Outback

I'm David. In the run-up to retiring our old (Legalizer equiped) Honda XRs and purchasing two brand new 08 WR250Rs I've been lurking here for about three weeks. (Yes, two brand new 08 WR2Rs purchased in Reno, NV two weeks ago.)

This Forum is very informative. Thank you all! Special thanks to the long suffering admins! I don't know if I will post much but I'll be lurking here and there and everywhere! Never-the-less I'm happy to be here and understand my membership is a privilege and not a right.

My wife and I are life-long motorcycilist from our early teens... both street and dirt. Our Sport Touring rides are BMWs. Very excited for the new chapter of exciting, multiple day, off road adventure riding that awaits us on our new Yamaha, factory street legal, dirt bikes. Please don't get me wrong, the Hondas were good but it is nice to be back on Yammies!

A line about myself: Hopelessly addicted motorcyclists, US Army paratrooper (82nd Airborne Division) and career wildland firefighter, retired (US Forest Service.) I'm also a nut for the Celtic/Irish/Scotish/etc. music. I love Canada's "national treasure" Loreena McKennitt but my fav is Órla Fallon out of Co. Carlow, Ireland. (For you Kiwis I love Hayley Westenra too!!!)

Welcome to the pack! I'm sure Jager's gonna jump on the paratrooper end of things. I'm with wildland fire div. here in BC. I work for BCFS during fire season.

Welcome from a fellow BMW sport-tourer!

BuilderBob wrote:

Welcome from a fellow BMW sport-tourer!

Yes welcome. We wont' hold that ^ against you.

greenfire6 wrote:

I love Canada's "national treasure" Loreena McKennitt but my fav is Órla Fallon out of Co. Carlow, Ireland. (For you Kiwis I love Hayley Westenra too!!!)

Never heard of her. Is she on the Women's Olympic Ice Hockey team?

To be a "national treasure" in Canada, you've got to be a hockey player.

That's why I put it in quote marks. One person's "national treasure" is another person's noboby.

The 435 Transport and Rescue Squadron (Winnipeg, Manitoba) likes Loreena. They invited her to be their Honorary Colonel in December 2006.

Here is Loreena's website:

http://www.quinlanroad.com/homepage/index.asp?LangType=1033

Please note, I'm not here to front load my taste in Celtic music and it's artist. But I would like to present it passively.

Quote :

I'm with wildland fire div. here in BC. I work for BCFS during fire season.

Ah! Another fellow inmate in purgatory.

Just kidding, I loved my career. Hope you love yours. Do you travel off your unit to fire and Rx fire assignments?

I never got to Alaska or Hawaii. But I did get into 19 states in the lower 48.

They can deploy me wherever needed, but I tend to stay in the area because I'm the only one on this end who knows where all the hidey holes are at, and secret trails that the crews don't know exist. After being evacuated twice from where I actually live, I've found that there's plenty of action right in my own back yard.

This fire was taken from across the lake, but it was about 3 miles south of my house.

SheWolf wrote:

They can deploy me wherever needed, but I tend to stay in the area because I'm the only one on this end who knows where all the hidey holes are at, and secret trails that the crews don't know exist. After being evacuated twice from where I actually live, I've found that there's plenty of action right in my own back yard.

This fire was taken from across the lake, but it was about 3 miles south of my house.

Yep. That's sure enough a major ragger!

I know what you mean by plenty of action in your own backyard. For 28 years my home unit was the Angeles National Forest in Southern California, USA. Initial and extended attack was, and is, nearly a weekly occurance there between about 1 May and late November; or later. Campaign fires, well, never mind... It always bugged me that fires came in bunches and I could only be on one at a time.

Your avatar (and Jäger's) is a contributing reason why I decided to join this Forum. But I haven't figured out if that equipment you are missusing is a drip torch or a 5 gallon fuel can. I take it to be a drip torch.

Welcome Greenfire... You know any oldtimer hot shots out of Susanville ? My buddy worked as the Captain of the station there.

SheWolf wrote:

I've found that there's plenty of action right in my own back yard.

...and when she says that I believe it. There's something enticing about a girl who loves to be muddy.

My girl and I have a friend in Fallon and we're looking at a ride somewhere about there next spring.

[quote="X-Racer" You know any oldtimer hot shots out of Susanville ? My buddy worked as the Captain of the station there.
[/quote]

Could be. I worked, or at least crossed paths, with loads of awesome, hard working, no nonsense guys and gals up and down the golden state for many years. These gung ho peeps were state as well as federal. Your reference to Susanville and the term Hot Shots strongly implies federal, which is what I was and increases the chance of having a mutual friend/acquaintance. Not that it matters but I was part of the Hot Shot community in the mid '70s.

Do you know the time frame? I started in 1970 but went into the US Army for a quick two years. So, really, my carrer started in 1973 and I retired in 2000.

BTW, thanks for correctly writing Hot Shots as two words. There is some confusion about that even within the US Forest Service and the other federal land management agencies.

Yea... He (Ken Estes) was a fed "agent" then, and moved with the fires all over the W. US, but moved to the city (read : "desk") job as a function of age. He lives at Eagle Lake now.

So what I'm thinking (assuming you are near Fallon or north of there) is to pull off a two-way E-W and something N-S from the two places to ID and MT and the coast of CA/OR.

I just wanna ride !

greenfire6 wrote:

The 435 Transport and Rescue Squadron (Winnipeg, Manitoba) likes Loreena. They invited her to be their Honorary Colonel in December 2006.

Yeah, but they're wing weenies. And as you and I both know, aircraft and pilots were not invented because parachutes were inherently unsafe.

I've always kind of been of the opinion that as long as there are distinguished WWII veterans alive, you really don't have to look any further for your Honorary Colonels. We had Lt Col Fraser Eadie as our Honorary Colonel... it doesn't come much better than that. The wing weenies could take a lesson from that.

When we run out of older vets, we have more than enough guys coming out of the sandbox who have served and sacrified with sufficient distinction that they would make outstanding Honorary Colonels. Really - who better to mentor the troops and foster esprit de corps?

Quote :

Please note, I'm not here to front load my taste in Celtic music and it's artist. But I would like to present it passively.

Ah, we talk about lots of stuff besides WRs here - the bikes are so damned reliable that we need something else to talk about now and then.

I guess it could be either or, couldn't it? I never really thought about the drip torch, but hey, it fits. Me likey!

X-Racer wrote:

Yea... He was a fed "agent" then, and moved with the fires all over the W. US, but moved to the city (read : "desk") job as a function of age.

Oh, a Special Agent, or more likely a Law Enforcement Officer (LEO). Affectionatley known as Law Dogs or Gun Toters. I didn't hang with those guys 'n gals much, except the two or three on my home unit.

You may want to delete his name from your post. A couple of days won't hurt but I would suggest you remove it before long.

Early in my career I did get tapped to work with a couple of Special Agents on a deeply covert surveillance operation. We were trying to catch a serial arsonist who was setting vegetation fires in the mountains at night. I was one of the crew that cammoed up every evenning and, after dark, rolled out of an unmarked 4 door into the brush, low crawled up to my hide and whispered observations into a hand held tape recorder and 2 way radio until dawn. This was before night vision devices were readily available. The old binocs worked OK though, most nights.

Man that was a long, boring two weeks. Somebody had to do it I suppose but it cured me of any thoughts about getting into the enforcement side.

That op went on all summer and cost the taxpayers a load of dough. It turned out to be a two man arson team and they were finally outed by a tipster that fall.

X-Racer wrote:

So what I'm thinking (assuming you are near Fallon or north of there)

Were we live the Deputy County Clerk serves a jury summons by pinning it to a roll of Charmin and tossing it out of a low and slow flying, single engine airplane!

Just kidding, but not by much.

Jäger wrote:

Yeah, but they're wing weenies. And as you and I both know, aircraft and pilots were not invented because parachutes were inherently unsafe.
.

Hey! Some of my fav people are rotorheads and loadmasters!

Captian Nick. US Army paratrooper, Blackhawk driver and all around cool guy:
https://2img.net/h/i819.photobucket.com/albums/zz113/greenfire6/MILITARY/JumpFARP87.jpg

Seriously though I generally agree with you, with a little wiggle room for exceptions. This relationship with Loreena and the 435th might be one of those rare exceptions. There is more to the story...

I'm active with the 82nd ABN DIV Association. The WWII guys are fading away and I want to support them and know a few of them before they are all gone. Ditto for all the combat vets, especially the current generation. In this vain my Chapter is hosting the 65th National Convention this summer. More about this and the events open to the public later...
https://2img.net/h/i819.photobucket.com/albums/zz113/greenfire6/MILITARY/conv-MODIFIED.jpg

Finally, I want to be very clear. I was only in the US Army for two years active. The Army was so generous to me with training and rank by the time I finally got to the 82nd's 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment I only had 10 months left. I only made 7 jumps with the Division and two of those were daytime Hollywood jumps from a Huey at a Battalion picnic.

Well, I guess the one thing I can hang onto is I'm not a five jump chump...