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Post your Day Rides Here!

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Ally Spring Old Mill (still operates!)
Just west of Emminence on MO106
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SCREAM TILL DADDY STOPS THE CAR!!

A billboard sign on US60 sez....or it usta...
(big ol 50s car full o kids with dad drivin)
Its a bit different now....

Jolly Cone ice cream stand in Van Buren MO since 1953.

Lunch today was a double hoagie burger w/cheeze & a root beer float....sorry..no pics
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Jus now workin on this breakfast at Grannys Kitchen in Huntsville AR
Good cakes n sausage for $5.75
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Before this....a quik stop at Yeagers Junction Store in Jasper...netted me the biggest bag of assorted taffy flavors Ive ever gotten from there....$15!

Hedded west over into OK this afternoon...

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I attended the East Texas BMW Plus club ride-in today, it met up at Miss Mollie's Diner in Alto for breakfast, 9am meet time.

I left out at 6:45am, it was an 80 mile/1h-45m ride. My phone showed 70F at my house. This was my route:

goo.gl

13155 County Rd 461 to Miss. Mollie's Diner

goo.gl goo.gl

Awesome ride and weather. In the low spots I'm seeing 69F on my dash temp gauge. It felt like fall. Arrived at Mollie's at 8:30, thought I might be the first one there. Nope, 4 bikes already in front of the diner. I expected there would be 6-8 attendees, but bikers kept pulling in after I took a seat. Ended up with 14 bikes and 16 attending.

I wish I'd taken photos, but got caught up in the ridin'/eatin/talkin'. There was a good variety of rides in the parking lot. Mostly (as expected) BMWs, but also KTM, Honda, Harley, Kawasaki and my V-Strom. Really great collection of riders too. Most senior bike was Rich's 1988 BMW K75S, longest distance ridden (two-up) was Jeff and Terry's 150 miles (one-way) from Midlothian.

It did warm up for the ride home. I took an unplanned route, I just wanted to avoid Tyler at noon time on Hwy 69. Covered 162 miles round-trip.
 
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A quik note about road conditions on AR220 near Devils Den State Park...
The section recently paved from about Fall Creek to AR170 has several cave ins making the road very hazardous...numerous gravel patches too...at inopportune places....like a 20mph curve!
BE CAREFUL
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One last stop up in the cool air on Talimena Skyline Drive
Emerald Vista
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Needed to get some highway miles in so rather than hit I-35 or MoPac I took the RE 650 up to Marble Falls and back via TX-71. Not twists really but just wanted to be out an about on a beautiful morning. Wanted to be back before it got too hot and also to have brunch with the family. Nice to see so many riders out there - maybe some from this forum in fact.
 

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Mr2mch said:
The section recently paved from about Fall Creek to AR170 has several cave ins making the road very hazardous...numerous gravel patches too...at inopportune places....like a 20mph curve!
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Any time I hear or read "recently paved" I make a note. Thanks for the heads-up!
 
Figured I'd better take advantage of the cold snap and try out the new ECU tune installed recently. It is always good to start with a plan, and I had one. Then, once the bike was rolling I realized I needed fuel, so ended up reversing my course. Went through LaGrange and topped up, then headed out by the Chicken Ranch, off through Rutersville, staying on unpainted pavement and stretches of lovely gravel, eventually ending up in Fayetteville. It being Sunday, and lunchtime, and I was thirsty, so a stop at Orsak's was in order for a bacon cheeseburger and some tea. Lots of tea, as from here it would be steady riding until I decide I've had enough and head home.

My plan, BTW, was essentially to ride without a plan and explore roads I hadn't ridden, hadn't ridden in a while, or, old favorites. Picked up Kimek (no water over road), Willow Springs bridge, Wunderlich, then Gebhart/Nassau/Noak into Round Top. After that, I can never pass up Waldeck Cemetary Road. Stayed on the back roads and snuck down to Post Oak road that runs between 2145 and 77. After that I found a brand new bridge on Piney Creek road (progress ain't no durn good). Swung through Winchester and caught Camelback Road over to Center Union then was getting a might parched, so headed home.

The new tune was good, very responsive and less popping on decel, but it seemed to be burning through fuel faster. I'll need to do more testing, let the ECU have time to learn and calculate MPG. Overall, a major improvement on performance. Also, still loving the Dunlop Missions on all surfaces.

Got about 130 miles in, and managed to get home just in time to catch the SpaceX Starship SN6 static fire test on the nasaspaceflight.com youtube channel. (Edit: this attempt was aborted just after I posted this, the window for testing closes at 20:00 CDT)
 
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Technically, today was day 2 of 4 days of riding.
Took a trip to Easter Island and Stonehenge.
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We also went and saw 3 sisters today. No pics, but do have some video I will post once I get a faster connection.
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First part from Houston to Kerrville was yesterday (~340 miles), today was the Sisters, then tomorrow Willow loop.
I was a little disappointed in the sisters, they were not well prepared for me. Seems I got some sloppy seconds.
The northern half of 335 and all of 336 has just been resurfaced with chip-seal in the past week (was warned before hand by @grimsweeper ), but I was hoping it improved. 335 was OK, I slid a little once, lots of loose stuff in spots, 336 was pretty bad. If you stayed in the tire lines, you were OK, but if you went into the center (you know, like you do when running a curve fast) you would hit piles of loose rock. I have enough issues with my newer to me 800 lb bike with my fat butt on it as it is. After sliding the rear out twice I slowed it way down. I think in a month or so, it will be a really great road with the fresh chip on it, but only once all the loose stuff is gone.

337 was a blast though, and taught me 3 things:
  • I am not as good as I thought I was (which I knew was not very good)
  • Trying to keep up with a K1600GT with a rider that knows the roads and how to ride them is not a good idea
  • I am not a big fan of the linked braking on the GL1500
Still lots of fun though, we went down 16 from Kerrville, and man that is a ride for sure.
The morning was really nice, like 74° @ 8am, warmed up to the high 80's by the time we were wrapping it up after noon, was still hot (but not as hot and humid as yesterday on the trip over).
Stopped @ O.S.T. For breakfast in Bandera.
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Also found this old guy rummaging around the bikes outside...
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He kept mumbling something about having had a BMW at home, said it was his Big Mexican Woman, whatever that means. ;)

A little later we had some fat old guy come up and look at the bikes mumbling some jibberish about how only Harleys are real motorcycles and these bikes from overseas are just toys.
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we did not pay him any attention, Just threw him some steak and he went away.
 

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Another fun day done, but man did it get hot!
Started again about 8 am, temp in the mid 70's, not a cloud in the sky. Left the Inn and went to get breakfast at a little place in Ingram called Hunters House. Nice typical small town diner, just a cook and waitress working there. Food was good and filling for most of the rest of the day.
Rode from there through Kerrville up to 783 though Hilda, then onto 152 to Llano for gas.
Then down to Willow City Loop.
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After that, we took a ride down to Luckenbach:
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From there went to Comfort and rode some really neat roads (Skyline drive was a little scary). and then rode back to Hunt. Joe had debated going longer, but it is just too hot to be out past 1 pm.We both had to take a nap when we got back.
Not sure on actual mileage for today, Somewhere around 200 miles if I had to guess.
Todays riding was in yellow.
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We are heading home tomorrow, hoping to miss any rain from the storm.
 
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Rode home today. ~ 300 miles today. We took a route south of I-10 between Seguin and Columbus (but not Alt 90).
We were planning on splitting up at Columbus, me taking 10 and him working his way up the back roads to Conroe.
When we went to split up, I-10 was backed up when we pulled on. We drove on it for about a mile or so and then I decided I would follow Joe to New Ulm rather than sitting in the hot traffic.
We got to New Ulm and split up, I went through Bellville to 529 and home, Joe went up through Brenham and Navasota.
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I can now say I have done the Sisters and Willow Loop, and plan on doing them again, but now know not to do it in August.
Tons of thanks to @jfink for being an amazing guide and helping me out. He made it a much more enjoyable trip than it would have been otherwise.
Quick estimate is 1200 miles in 4 days.
Prior to this, I have not ridden 1,200 miles in a whole month, much less in less than a week, so this is definitely big increase.
Heck, my yearly average since I started riding again 3 years ago has been about 2,500 miles/year.

I have a ton of video footage to go through, and will post up some youtube links when I get them up.

Ironic thing is I went the whole trip with no issues, and when we were about to split up at I-10, I hit some gravel getting onto the feeder road and put my foot down out of instinct. I did not twist my ankle, but my ankle and hip are sore now, more so than just the pains from riding.
 
blupupher said:
... Ironic thing is I went the whole trip with no issues, and when we were about to split up at I-10, I hit some gravel getting onto the feeder road and put my foot down out of instinct. I did not twist my ankle, but my ankle and hip are sore now, more so than just the pains from riding.
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Nolan, I had a problem there too. The maintenance crew had built up the entrance ramp and apparently decided that it really wasn't necessary to compact the asphalt for vehicles turning right. I saw you slip so I was able to brace. My front end washed out a little too. You did great and knew how to push that Wing around. I was impressed.

For the record it wasn't me that referred to the BMW as a "big mexican woman", just some random guy at the station. I didn't hear the comments from the Harley guy, but that's fine. Also, on Wednesday we did the "Willow City Loop". They have done some cleaning and scraping of the creek that runs by. In the spring when the flowers bloom, it is absolutely spectacular, but also very busy.

Thanks for the notes and the pictures. Also fun to look back.
 
Glad my slip helped you Joe. I actually had my gopro running at the time. My ankle and foot is still a bit sore, but hip is fine.


As for the BMW joke, I know it wasn't you, just some lame humor, not meaning to imply anything. Same for the big old fat Harley guy (ie me).

I put a few trip vids on youtube as well.

One is just the dash cam of the first part of Tx 16 south of Kerrville to Medena:
Sound is bad, it is a microphone in the left cubby of the wing, so lots of wind and road noise, as well as a weird hollow sound.


The other is the Willow City loop with both my dash cam and the Gopro (but had some video issues during transfer, so not all of it is there).
Added some music to it.


I will be going through some more of the footage I have and post up more as I get it loaded. I have the entire trip on the dash cam, almost 200 gigs of video.

Still trying to figure out how to make the videos where I have multiple cameras. With 3 views it is too busy, so I think just 2 views is better, thinking having the PiP in the upper right is better than lower right.
 
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blupupher said:
Glad my slip helped you Joe. I actually had my gopro running at the time. My ankle and foot is still a bit sore, but hip is fine.


As for the BMW joke, I know it wasn't you, just some lame humor, not meaning to imply anything. Same for the big old fat Harley guy (ie me).

I put a few trip vids on youtube as well.

One is just the dash cam of the first part of Tx 16 south of Kerrville to Medena:
Sound is bad, it is a microphone in the left cubby of the wing, so lots of wind and road noise, as well as a weird hollow sound.


The other is the Willow City loop with both my dash cam and the Gopro (but had some video issues during transfer, so not all of it is there).
Added some music to it.


I will be going through some more of the footage I have and post up more as I get it loaded. I have the entire trip on the dash cam, almost 200 gigs of video.

Still trying to figure out how to make the videos where I have multiple cameras. With 3 views it is too busy, so I think just 2 views is better, thinking having the PiP in the upper right is better than lower right.
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No problem Nolan, I just wanted to make it clear that while I was "an old guy (in the picture) rummaging around the bikes", it wasn't me with the comment.

You should start a separate thread about the trip to the Three Sisters. It was more than a day ride. :)
 
Had a great ride today, lots of gravel, rocks, climbs and descents. Great views in the canyon where the Rio Grande merges with another river. In all I got in about ten miles ... with me as the engine. So, yeah, an even smaller bike than those skinny ones @Aspear posted above.

Once done, headed back to the room in Taos, where they have outdoor air conditioning. I've been asking around for details so I can bring the tech back to Texas. So far nobody's shared any worthwhile info. I think they are keeping it a secret so the tourists keep coming up in the Summer.
 
MotoTex said:
Once done, headed back to the room in Taos, where they have outdoor air conditioning. I've been asking around for details so I can bring the tech back to Texas. So far nobody's shared any worthwhile info. I think they are keeping it a secret so the tourists keep coming up in the Summer.
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Jealous! Love Taos in all seasons. That is one serious cardio workout.
 
MotoTex said:
Had a great ride today, lots of gravel, rocks, climbs and descents. Great views in the canyon where the Rio Grande merges with another river. In all I got in about ten miles ... with me as the engine. So, yeah, an even smaller bike than those skinny ones @Aspear posted above.

Once done, headed back to the room in Taos, where they have outdoor air conditioning. I've been asking around for details so I can bring the tech back to Texas. So far nobody's shared any worthwhile info. I think they are keeping it a secret so the tourists keep coming up in the Summer.
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That air conditioning technician is scheduled to show up in Texas in about 2 weeks from now. But as you know with all appointments sometimes they are late.
 
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