Indigo Ride

Day 3-4 May 28 & 29     Junction - VanHorn - Silver City NM Ride Mileage : 625 Total Mileage : 975 The planned ride for today was to get to El Paso and be done with the heat for a while hoping that New Mexico would  offer a nice break. Well it didn’t work out that way, right after Fort Stockton the temperature started to increase dramatically to top at 106F (41 celsius). I had to stop every 50 miles to rehydrate and cool off, the heat reflected by the asphalt was unbearable and I was also concerned by the rear tire that was running really hot. So I decided to shorten a bit the trip and stop in VanHorn for the night.  6:30AM in Junction, going for breakfast  I booked at the Days Inn for the night and had a decent diner at El Capitan, a historical VanHorn hotel and restaurant from the 1920s.  I Setup the alarm clock for 5:30AM to ensure a cool morning ride but when the alarm went off in the morning, my phone was showing 4:30 and my IPad 5:30. Weird but I soon realized that the city w

  Day 1-2 Houston - Austin - Junction   Ride Mileage : 350 May 26, 7:30AM bike is loaded.  Left Houston an hour later to Austin, not a very exciting ride but it gave me time to test the electronics. 130 pounds of luggage  You can definitely feel the load but the bike is riding great. Day 2 to Junction was a bit more enjoyable, nice countryside but with a temperature around 36C you are a bit in a hurry to arrive.  Short stop in Mason Arrived in Junction pretty early. Most of the rally attendees were still on the road. Around 5pm there was a nice crowd on the Best Western parking lot. I met a bunch of old friends and new ones and had a really good discussion with Ed from Dallas who did the Alaska few years back on a Husqvarna 701 (yeah really!). Good diner, great people, this Junction Rally is always a fun event.

Preparing the motorcycle prior to a long ride is a critical task. You want to minimize the risk of having mechanical issues during the trip as it could be a major headache and potentially very expensive. Obviously not all mechanical failures are preventable but a lot are and this is what should be the focus when preparing the bike.  This 2016 Honda AfricaTwin has 40k miles and has been very reliable so far but maintenance is key. Knowing your motorcycle and how to service it is also a critical skill as you’d be able to diagnose more accurately any mechanical issues during the journey and possibly fix simple ones. Here is what has been done as part of the preventive maintenance  Oil and filter change Front forks suspension basic rebuild (oil change and replace oil and dust seals) Rear shock rebuild (done by EBR Performance) Air filter cleaning  Brake fluid replacement  Replace front sprocket, chain and rear sprocket  Replace front and rear tires (Dunlop Trailmax Mission) All inspection

A round trip from Houston TX to Alaska This motorcycle ride project started back sometime during fall 2019. The idea was to spend most of the fall and winter months to prepare the trip and do the actual ride sometime during summer 2020. Well, I guess I’m not the only one to have had to change their riding projects that year …and following year…nevertheless the project was still very  much alive and it looks like 2022 is the year to grab the opportunity.  Below are the maps with the planned routes. The departure from Houston is planned for late May and I’m expecting to be in Canada an Alaska between mid-June and mid-July.   US central routes The northbound route will go through Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, Oregon and Washington states. The section from California to Washington state (also known as the Great Pacific Divide) is mostly in the rocky mountains with nice trails and scenic roads. The southbound return route is following the famous Continental Divide trail. The Canad