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Fall/Spring Motorcycle Camping
Not for everyone, but the payoff is worth it
You like the open road and a lack of RVs in front of you
all day? Right on! You like walking through goose crap to get back in your tent
after a late night pee. Buddy – welcome to my world. You like twenty degree
temperatures at night and waking up at 5 a.m to orange vested hunters next door
packing guns into their trucks to get the early morning chucker? Me too!
In general, motorcycle camping isn’t for the faint of
heart, but motorcycle camping during inclement conditions isn’t something I hear
most riders talking about at all. Ever wondered why?
In the Northwest there are 52 weeks in a year, 26 of them
suck, so everyone tries to cram several hundred motorcycle events into the
months of May through September. Yow! I’ll agree that between October and April
the Northwest is not the most wonderful place in the world to be riding a
motorcycle, let alone taking your chances on an overnight or weekend trip, but
it does have its advantages. You might wind up riding in the rain for a while,
but if the end of the day provides a stunning sunset, it’s worth the trek.
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10 tips for those who ride
overnight in the Fall and Spring
Heated Clothing – Own it.
Insuring you’re warm when you ride will put you in a far better
position to make the decisions on the road you need to and operate
your bike effectively.
Be Water Tight – Everything
you have needs to be water tight. Buy high quality luggage like
Nelson-Rigg textile gear, or hard bags from a company like Givi. Pay
the money for a quality tent, rather than the $29.95 Kmart special.
Carry plenty of plastic bags you can use in a jiffy to protect
things like books, maps cameras or your electric shaver. Invest in
quality rain gear like Tour Master or Nelson-Rigg. Make sure your
gloves and boots are water tight and treat them with waterproofing
products like Nikwax several days before you ride so they have time
to cure.
Get A Room – Snow up ahead?
Don’t chance it. Get a room, call the boss and tell them you’ll be
to work when things improve. You’re on two wheels, not four.
Check the Weather – If it’s
going to be raining the entire time you’re on your adventure, it
won’t be much of an adventure. Scrap it. Riding a motorcycle is fun
when the weather is good, it’s technical when it’s not. Sure you
want to do several days of technical riding?
Stay Optimistic – A little
rain, some cold, goose poop on your boots. Big deal. Get over it and
look forward to the things that make it fun like a nice road, a
great sunset, visiting a new place.
Private Campgrounds – With
all the government budget cuts over the years, many state parks are
now independently run. I haven’t come across one yet that was a slum
– in fact most of them are better maintained than when the state ran
them.
Eat out – After riding 325
miles in a day the last thing I want to do is cook and clean. I eat
out and relax amongst the town locals instead of fussing with the
chores.
Lists – There’s plenty of
them out there. Start by making your own several days beforehand to
be sure you don’t forget something important.
Dual Purpose – Many things
provide a dual purpose. You forgot a towel? Use a shirt. You need to
get tent stakes into the ground? Use your boot. Still not good
enough, use the butt of your flashlight.
Moist Hand Wipes – Carry
them, they come in handy for all kinds of things – like when you
find out there’s no warm water at the shower.
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I do make it a habit of staying away from the open
mountain passes November through February, so overnight trips are rare during
these months. This leaves late September, October, March and April open for
adventure.
These are great months to head south and east. The fine
terrain of places like the Columbia River Gorge, the Palouse region and Eastern
Oregon have few travelers, yet provide stunning scenery (picture fall colors or
spring blooms) as well as stunning sunrises and sunsets. These regions provide
no shortage of great twisties and plenty of campgrounds to boot.
On most tertiary roads you’ll often find you’re the only
one out there. I’ve ridden for one to two hours sometimes never passing a soul.
I’ve routed rides through the Palouse that were great in this respect, but I’ll
admit I wondered what would happen in the event of a breakdown. It’s the chance
we take.
Rain is obviously an issue. If you head out overnight
during these months you’ll run into it here and there more often than not. Good
rain gear, a well made tent and sensibility will get you through it.
Cold is also an issue. Heated clothing is advised, a
decent sleeping bag is critical and stopping for coffee often seems to do the
trick.
Several anecdotes from past trips come to mind.
During a cold October I did a great job of maintaining my
core body heat. I had on insulated clothing (not heated), put my rain gear on
over it and rode up into Snoqualmie Pass where it was 36 degrees. My core was
warm. The problem was my body decided to relive the excess heat via my fingers
and I perspired into the insides of my insulated gloves. Long-story-short my
gloves were wet inside, the 65 mph wind I was riding at stole the body heat from
the gloves and my fingers chilled. Solution: I pulled out at Travelers Rest in
the pass and held the gloves over the air blowing hand dryer in the men’s room.
Problem solved.
Another Snoqualmie Pass trip back to Seattle, this one
during April, was met with a downfall of snow. Once you pass Easton there is
essentially no turning back. Solution: I put myself behind a tractor trailer and
rode the swath of his path as he cut down to the bare pavement with the weight
of his rig on the wheels. It was the most intense 50 minutes I’ve ever
experienced on a motorcycle. Once I hit the west side of the pass where the snow
subsided, I pulled out and massaged my extremely tense shoulders back to
normalcy, then completed the ride.
I once spent the night at a campground where several
hunters resided in the space next door. "When you wake up make sure you don’t
put antlers on your helmet when you leave" said one guy from Tri-Cities.
Solution: I did as I was told and am alive to tell about it today.
September in the Columbia River Gorge is usually
beautiful, but not one summer when it rained for 6 days straight. My tent
absorbed the smell of fresh gnat larvae and I was left with pretty stinky
housing. Solution: I washed the tent when I got home and then sprayed it with
Nature's Miracle, an enzyme-based liquid used to remove cat urine odor from
carpets, available from the pet store. Problem solved.
There’s always a solution to the problem. Riding during
the spring and summer months requires a cool head, some wherewithal about the
elements and a positive attitude. If you posses these three attributes you’ve
got what it takes to hit the road and enjoy the adventure.
Patrick Thomas/Fall 2004
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