Mid-Life Rider

“Hal, why don’t you ride along with me to Baker City and meet Ron. You can ride along or ride home after that or whatever suits you.”

“Well, can I come along for the whole ride?”

“I was hoping you’d ask.”

Hal and Ron and I had been talking about riding the Big West since the spring but we couldn’t seem to get it all sorted out. Finally Ron and I were able to settle on a week but what about Hal? Wasn’t he driving a relative someplace? Well apparently not. Game on

Every long ride is at least a journey within a journey. Maybe even a layer deeper than that. There’s the part about going down the road. In our case, we agreed to meet up in Baker City, Oregon. Ron would work his way up from Salt Lake taking the most circuitous route he could imagine. I met up with Hal on the road to the White Pass on the shoulder of Mt. Ranier. We would ride across to Yakima, down to Goldendale on the Columbia River, and from there, we’d skittle along Route 19 to Route 26 and on into B-Town.

Then there’s the inner journey. Unless you’ve done a long distance ride, “inner journey” sounds hopelessly hackneyed. If you have, you know that hours alone in your helmet staring at some distant horizon or wide-eyed and riveted as you bend the bike into yet another sweeper or hairpin is all about tapping into what you have, who you are, and what you’re carrying with you. Each day is different. Each road is different. You find there what you bring there.

And if you ride with others, there’s the potential for a third journey. I can’t imagine just riding with anyone, certainly not for any meaningful distance. Leaving aside the obvious parts about bladder size, relative riding ability and pace, and food preferences, there’s the part about their inner journey. I’ve ridden with Ron many times and he is without ego when it comes to riding. Hal is the same way. So while we went down the road on our own bikes, we went down the road together in a kind of mutual support society. It’s maybe the only time I can think of where I am completely aware of what other men are feeling. If you’re dialed into your riding partners, you can just sense when something’s not right with one of them, or when something is. We’d chatter like jaybirds when we’d stop like we were the same person in the same helmet. Weird and wonderful. Or it could be the exact opposite.

I have done the ride down 19 and over 26 many times, but never with someone else. It’s big and empty and stunningly beautiful (the ride).

It turns out that Hal and I are nearly perfectly matched and we make quick work of the long straights and arching sweepers. He and I were certified by Lee Parks to be instructors at the same time, have similar bikes, similar riding styles, and similar riding philosophies. Particularly in the twisties, it’s like dancing while looking in the mirror. He’d hang off, I’d hang off, he’d tip in, I’d tip in . . . I had to force myself not to watch him ride and look up the road.

I’m not one to stop when the riding gets good, but Hal was particularly good about making sure we paused from time to time to notice and reflect what we were in the midst of. Somewhere along the way, the local cowboys were moving their herd up the road . . . a nice juxtaposition to us and our bikes. The best part were the dogs yipping at the fringes. Oh to love your work as much as they do.

Day 2: Baker City to Missoula

We had no plan other than to get to Baker City and then head roughly east. It’s best that way I think. The minute you make a reservation, the ride changes completely. Now it’s about getting there instead of going there, with there now a specific destination rather than a general direction.

We rode so many good roads the entire trip that it’s pointless to use adjectives. But for the record, if you’re ever in Baker City with a day to spend, head immediately east, hook up with Rt. 86 and work your way up the edge of Hells Canyon to Enterprise, Oregon. The road starts out with long vistas and long sweepers and soon enough tightens up as you climb through the alpine woods of the Wallowas. We stopped some miles in just to whoop it up.

Hal lead us up and over, working his big BMW hard as we dropped in and out of a series of 20 mph bends . . . the real kind, the kind where you really should be doing that speed.

Somewhere along there I lost my mojo. It was like I no longer knew how to ride. One minute I’m hanging off the bike, knee skimming just above the pavement, looking way up the road. The next, I’m deer-eyed, tensed up, and running wide on turns where I really, really didn’t want to be doing that. Scary.

At lunch we talked about what had happened and agreed that the next time it happened, we would stop and help whoever had fallen out to regroup and get it back. It happens to everyone and gutting it out is stupid. Get off the bike, out of the boat, off the rock . . . and take care of yourself. Playing scared is playing dumb.

Out of Enterprise is Rattlesnake Canyon, otherwise known as the road up to Lewiston. My mojo was back. The big FJR bit into turn after turn as I danced from side to side across the saddle. It was no longer about a turn; it was one long continuous pas de deux with the bike as we went from full lean one way, to SNAP, full lean the other.

Come Lewiston, come 100 degrees. Actually my bike read 103. Out came the wet gear, down went a couple of bottles of expensive water, and we were off along the Clearwater River and ultimately over Lolo pass to Missoula. A very different road then before, with lots of long sweepers and fine views of people rafting and fishing.

Day 3: Missoula, through Helena, to Red Lodge

We set off with the intention of riding over Bear Tooth pass and dropping into Cody, Wyoming. We didn’t get that far, nor did we care.

I’ve been to Missoula at least three times previously: Once on a bike last year, and twice before driving through on the way to the west coast. I remember nothing about central Montana other than it took about a month to get through and the sky really is much bigger up there than it is in Rochester where I grew up.

Our route took us east on 200 and then southish on 141, skirting the Garnet Range (part of the Rockies) on the way to 12 and into Helena.

The morning air was crisp and clear as we rolled out, and the scenery went from stunning to whatever resides out past that. I keep using terms like “long vistas” and “far horizons,” head-nodding terms that seem trite without actually being there, but that’s what we rode towards. The land has a visual texture that’s completely different than the high deserts of Nevada, eastern Washington wheat country (The Palouse), or the Great Plains for example, even if the sense of space and scale is the same. If you were to hope to meet the iconic laconic western American, it might be out there along the Garnets.

Helena Montana was a complete surprise. I remember it from my daughter learning State’s capitals years ago, but otherwise it was a cypher. I’m sure there are really dumb parts of town, but the older central area is terminally cute. The No Sweat Cafe offered up fine home style cooking that was to last us until dinner.

I didn’t know this until hours before arriving, but there is a bar in Two Dot, Montana that is a mandatory stopping point for anyone traveling by on Rt 12. Some years ago Two Dot was a booming town of 200 or so people, set down there to serve the needs of “The Milwaukee Road.” Today, the full time population requires your hands and one other to count, but there is that bar. We stopped to see and be seen and wound up in conversation with a local named Judy and then later a delightful couple from Portland who were on their way home from Sturgis, their Harley loaded up into their pickup truck.

On the subject of Harleys . . . it’s all you see out there. Admittedly this was Sturgis week, but on the days we were riding, the true faithful were already there. So all we saw were the zillion or so riders who were either doing something other than Sturgis, or in transit one direction or another.

People have all sorts of opinions about Harleys and motorbike riders are no different. I actually like them in an odd sort of way, even though I can’t imagine owning one for longer than a summer, much less riding one further than the local bar. But I don’t feel the sense of judgment that other riders I know have towards followers of the one true motor company.

Having said that, sometime by around day four I was well and truly done with looking at full-dress baggers from Milwaukee. I know I feel a tiny thrill when I see another bike just like mine coming down the road the other way . . . but it’s a feeling I get about four times a year. Wherever the other FJR riders are, they’re not on the roads I ride. But what about seeing a billion of what you ride coming the other way every day, ridden by people dressed in the same leathers, wearing the same doo-rags, wearing the same non-helmets (if it’s a helmet law state), sporting the same accessories, making the same sounds . . . ? Maybe it’s just me.

Round about Red Lodge we decided to call it a day. The sky over Beartooth Pass was low and threatening, not the gilded invitation we were keening given the legendary nature of the road. Happily, the historic Pollard Hotel was happy to provide some beds, and we passed a pleasant evening eating outside, trying to talk over the din of passing Hogs.

Red Lodge to Ketchum Idaho

Beartooth Pass is unexpected . . . though not unanticipated. I’ve been told that Charles Kuralt described it as the most scenic drive in America. Or the most beautiful. Or the most something. I haven’t driven all the passes or roads so I can’t say, but it’s breathtaking.

The first light was stretching to find the sky when we packed up our bikes. Clear sky, cold but not too, open roads . . . this was how we wanted to cross the great pass. Indeed, we were the first ones over that morning, having the roof of Montana to ourselves going, and seeing only one or two cars coming the whole way over.

I was prepared for a more technical ride than the bear offered up: Our day through Hells Canyon and Rattlesnake Canyon was tighter and more demanding. With that said, we rode carefully and precisely as we could. The penalty for putting a foot wrong seemed high.

I’m not good about wanting to stop and gawk once I get going, so God bless Hal for making a point to get us off to the side of the road from time to time to take it all in. You just can’t while you’re riding, can’t and shouldn’t, and with nobody pressing us from behind, there was no immediate reason to rush.

Yellowstone was something altogether different. The granddaddy of US parks does not disappoint when it comes to sweep and scale. We should all light a candle for Teddy R at least once a year for pushing this one through.

At first we were all giddy at riding through the park. The road courses gently through frame after frame of perfect scenery, each living-picture nicely detailed with the odd eagle here, a moose or two there, a sprinkling of elk down there, and of course the bison ranging about wherever they please.

You see no pictures here of all these critters because we were the only people in four states who weren’t stopping every ten feet to record yet another image of four brown dots on a sea of yellow and green. The fact is, the traffic through Jellyspoon park is appalling, on the scale of Friday afternoon heading out of any of fifty cities I could name. Having been through once, I’ll never go back. It belongs to the taxpayers, but if it were mine, I’d close the roads, build a new one around the place, and tell people to stay away.

Exiting the park and we were 150 miles and four hours into our day. We were losing time, a concept we hadn’t dealt with up until then because until then, we didn’t have any place specific to be. That changed the night before when we made reservations in Ketchum, Idaho for the next night. It wasn’t the money. I can afford to walk away from a couple of hundred dollars if I have to. It was the fact that we had a destination, not a direction. That changes everything.

We also had laid out an ambitious route that was to take us north out of the park, across a couple of passes, and then into Ketchum from the North on Rt. 75. All in the GPS said we had 740 miles to ride that day, nearly 640 to go, and it was nearly 11:00 am. And we hadn’t eaten.

Still, fortified with eggs and flapjacks, we powered north to Ennis never really finding our pace as we were stopped for the second time that day for construction. By Twin Bridges we were seriously off target and by Dillon we were staring into the teeth of a definitively angry sky.

Once again it was Hal that brought a halt to the proceedings, this time pointing out that hanging onto 650 pounds of metal while riding through a lightning storm didn’t pass for a good idea. We sat and waited to see what the storm had in mind . . . which was to sit and wait and see what we had in mind.

At this point there really wasn’t any debate between us. Wicked storm this way, sunshine that way. Tiptoe through the mountains this way, or head south on US15 where the roads were dry, the speed limits high, and the total distance something like 70 miles shorter. Hmmmm.

So we hightailed it down to Dubois and from there skirted one storm and raced another through the Craters of the Moon National Monument, finally arriving in Ketchum Idaho in the semi-dark. We had made the right choice.

As an aside, the ride through the Moon takes you quite close to something called the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory.

Ensuring the nation’s energy security by performing unique science and technology research in the following areas.

Nuclear Energy

We develop advanced nuclear technologies that provide clean, abundant, affordable and reliable energy to the United States and the world.

National and Homeland Security

We deliver critical technology solutions to identify and defeat threats to the security of the nation.

Energy and Environment

We integrate advanced energy and carbon management systems and processes to deliver the right form of clean, safe and secure energy at the right time, the right cost, with the slightest environmental footprint

I know this now because I looked it up. All I knew then is that my radar detector would inexplicably go off fifty miles from nowhere, citing multiple bogeys on six different vectors. I guess that’s what happens when they slice open another alien or whatever it is they really do at the INL.

Ketchum to Home

Ron went south, Hal and I went north. It was our last day, another 740 mile butt buster.

Another early morning start, another clean get away out ahead of the traffic. I didn’t have any expectations of the ride home, so the first couple of hours came as a delightful surprise. Like all the other mountains and passes before, the ride through the Sawtooth National Recreation Area to Stanley, around to Lowman, and then over to Rt. 55 was rider’s heaven. With light to no traffic, dry roads, and good temperatures, Hals K-bike and my FJR bellied up and ate. We needed to make tracks and we did.

A couple of hours later and the roll up 55 to 95 into Lewiston would have been insufferable. We made the halfway mark in great time, stopping to gas, refresh, and gear up to deal with the now 100 degree heat. Ah Lewiston.

Not long after crossing into southeastern Washington, Hal and I split off, he to motor east to Olympia, me to zag through Palouse country in order to catch US 90 near Ritzville. This is the second year I’ve ridden through the amber waves while the wheat is being brought in, and it never disappoints. The sight of the waving grain, closely coupled up with the recently shorn fields, hard against the recently disked fields, all under and azure sky is something that everyone should see once. Think about it the next time you tuck into a piece of toast.

About five minutes after hewing off 12 to head northwest, I was completely lost. True believers say you can never be lost on a motorcycle, and they are right unless you have a GPS. Without one, you’re just on a road you didn’t expect to ride. With one, you’re often on a road you’re quite sure isn’t the one you want to be on. It’s a measure of modernity that we’ve come to have so much faith in an algorithm. I had to breathe and laugh when Mr. Garmin told me to turn left on a goat track through a field.

Fortunately, my internal Philosopher King took over. “You’re on a motorcycle on a spectacular twisty road going roughly north and roughly west in the middle of god’s country. There a problem here?”

“Ummm, no.”

The final 200 miles or so never exist on a ride like this. The Philosopher King is dead. I just want to be home. Head down, throttle cranked on, I stretch one tank and then another, pulling into my garage with less than two quarts left on board. Great to go, great to be back home.

• Total miles: 2694.7
• Total time on bike: 45.10 hours
• Average speed (moving): 59.6 mph
• Highest recorded speed: 104 mph

Tags: Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, Helena, Bear Tooth Pass, Yamaha FJR, V-Strom, K1200S, Hotel Pollard, Baker City, Rattlesnake Canyon, Hells Canyon, Red Lodge, Ketchum, Palouse