bamamate
Elite Member
- Joined
- Oct 5, 2012
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- Location
- Allford, FL/Dothan, AL
I had planned on riding the Colorado Back Country Discovery Route next year to celebrate my 50th birthday. A friend I’ve done day rides with a couple of times, he rides a BMW F800GS, called me up in July asking if I could go for a trip at the end of Aug. He is an ER nurse and also going to school to become a nurse practitioner so getting time off is rare for him. We talked about riding the continental divide route in New Mexico but since I’d already been collecting info on the COBDR we decided to go ahead and ride it. Brad had met another F800 rider, from Washington State, Eric, on FaceBook and asked him to join us. Brad nor I had met Eric in person let alone ridden with him so we were a bit nervous about it and after seeing a pic of the NC Eric was also a bit nervous about riding with us. Short version we all got along great with similar skill levels and Eric now has a new appreciation for the NC.
We decided to meet in Steamboat Springs, CO and ride down to Delores, CO. That cut out the northern most part which, from reports, is all good gravel county roads and the southern part to 4 Corners which is all paved roads. Our only real mishap happened on the way out when Brad got a flat tire and the rim strip thingy that protects the tube from the spokes exploded into a hundred pieces in Kansas. We found an independent shop that thought he could make 2 of the narrow strips he had on hand work so I loaded up the wheel and took it to him leaving Brad on the side of the Interstate. The shop owner was great. He checked for damage, made sure the spokes were all tight, installed the spare tube and mounted/balanced the tire all for $35. I gave him $5 extra for dropping everything to fix us up. He was currently working on a sweet 1983 Honda Magna V65. He also gave me tips on tube installation which I greatly appreciated. I arrived back to Brad and after he installed the wheel we took off only to have Brad pull back over because his ABS light came on. On inspection Brad noticed the axel spacer wasn’t there and the ABS sensor had gotten eaten by the ring. So I went back to look at the previous stopping location and Brad got on the phone to the shop. After digging around in the weeds I went back to Brad to find out that the spacer was at the shop right where the owner had worked on the tire. It didn’t look like the bearing was damaged so off to the shop I went again to retrieve the spacer. Upon returning I found a friendly state trooper making sure Brad didn’t get ran over. Brad installed the tire again and as it was getting dark we decided to get something to eat and decide on what to do. After a very needed meal we decided to continue on until we were tired. We dropped our pace down to 55-60MPH and around 1AM grabbed a hotel room in Colby, KS. The next day we made it to Steamboat Springs without any more issues.
The actual COBDR was a blast. It rained on us at some point every day which this is normally their dry season. Packing a wet tent became the norm along with wet and muddy roads. We only had one section where dust was an issue and that was on a night run into Lake City since we couldn’t find a good camping spot. We arrived after 9pm to find the town had rolled up the sidewalks. After asking a local we found an Inn that had an attached restaurant. The owner took pity on us and gave us $10 off on the rooms and as he was also the chef for the closed restaurant whipped us up the best chicken sandwich I have ever had. We dropped some bikes but no real damaged was had. Riding in Arkansas is good training for the COBDR. The terrain is similar with Arkansas being on a smaller scale and Colorado having more and deeper ruts. They actually have dirt on top of the rocks where the Ozarks only has a thin layer for the most part.
We spent a couple of nights at a camp ground in Ouray, CO which had a mother bear and 2 cubs come roaming through the night before and while eating dinner I watched a buck in velvet come running down the main road (Hwy 550). On the way back Brad and I rode late into the night and decided to keep going so we wound up doing an impromptu Iron Butt with me arriving home at 9:30 AM which was about 23hrs for about 1,100 miles.
I’m thinking about doing a ride report on ADV but for now here are some pics. Videos will come later.
Overlooking Telluride, CO
Bridal Vail Falls
This is my favorite pic I took
This was labeled as impassable when wet section. It rained on us while on it and we had to wait out the rain for an hour and then 2 more hours for it to dry enough to continue.
Eric slid out going down this pass. I found a spot I could stop and go down to help him. It was so steep and at over 10k, I had to stop 3 times to catch my breath walking back up to my bike.
I'll add more pics tonight.
We decided to meet in Steamboat Springs, CO and ride down to Delores, CO. That cut out the northern most part which, from reports, is all good gravel county roads and the southern part to 4 Corners which is all paved roads. Our only real mishap happened on the way out when Brad got a flat tire and the rim strip thingy that protects the tube from the spokes exploded into a hundred pieces in Kansas. We found an independent shop that thought he could make 2 of the narrow strips he had on hand work so I loaded up the wheel and took it to him leaving Brad on the side of the Interstate. The shop owner was great. He checked for damage, made sure the spokes were all tight, installed the spare tube and mounted/balanced the tire all for $35. I gave him $5 extra for dropping everything to fix us up. He was currently working on a sweet 1983 Honda Magna V65. He also gave me tips on tube installation which I greatly appreciated. I arrived back to Brad and after he installed the wheel we took off only to have Brad pull back over because his ABS light came on. On inspection Brad noticed the axel spacer wasn’t there and the ABS sensor had gotten eaten by the ring. So I went back to look at the previous stopping location and Brad got on the phone to the shop. After digging around in the weeds I went back to Brad to find out that the spacer was at the shop right where the owner had worked on the tire. It didn’t look like the bearing was damaged so off to the shop I went again to retrieve the spacer. Upon returning I found a friendly state trooper making sure Brad didn’t get ran over. Brad installed the tire again and as it was getting dark we decided to get something to eat and decide on what to do. After a very needed meal we decided to continue on until we were tired. We dropped our pace down to 55-60MPH and around 1AM grabbed a hotel room in Colby, KS. The next day we made it to Steamboat Springs without any more issues.
The actual COBDR was a blast. It rained on us at some point every day which this is normally their dry season. Packing a wet tent became the norm along with wet and muddy roads. We only had one section where dust was an issue and that was on a night run into Lake City since we couldn’t find a good camping spot. We arrived after 9pm to find the town had rolled up the sidewalks. After asking a local we found an Inn that had an attached restaurant. The owner took pity on us and gave us $10 off on the rooms and as he was also the chef for the closed restaurant whipped us up the best chicken sandwich I have ever had. We dropped some bikes but no real damaged was had. Riding in Arkansas is good training for the COBDR. The terrain is similar with Arkansas being on a smaller scale and Colorado having more and deeper ruts. They actually have dirt on top of the rocks where the Ozarks only has a thin layer for the most part.
We spent a couple of nights at a camp ground in Ouray, CO which had a mother bear and 2 cubs come roaming through the night before and while eating dinner I watched a buck in velvet come running down the main road (Hwy 550). On the way back Brad and I rode late into the night and decided to keep going so we wound up doing an impromptu Iron Butt with me arriving home at 9:30 AM which was about 23hrs for about 1,100 miles.
I’m thinking about doing a ride report on ADV but for now here are some pics. Videos will come later.
Overlooking Telluride, CO
Bridal Vail Falls
This is my favorite pic I took
This was labeled as impassable when wet section. It rained on us while on it and we had to wait out the rain for an hour and then 2 more hours for it to dry enough to continue.
Eric slid out going down this pass. I found a spot I could stop and go down to help him. It was so steep and at over 10k, I had to stop 3 times to catch my breath walking back up to my bike.
I'll add more pics tonight.