A day later, we found ourselves at Mike and Kati's place for an overnight stop before heading back on the road in the morning.


Mike rides a BWM R1200GSA - hey no one's perfect and Kati rides a Can Am Spyder. As much as Lori loves riding on the back, a Spyder has just always managed to rev her engine when she thinks of riding her own bike.






Kati working her Spyder out of a turn here. Lori and I test rode one of these guys last year. First turn I took I almost got thrown off, I didn't realize how much you as the rider have to actually lean compared to a regular bike.


Stopping at Busters BBQ for breakfast. Ok so it was more like brunch, even though it was the first thing I had to eat. Cool place though. I'd just like to point out that when they say that their sauce is HOT, they kind of mean it. A trend I'm seeing more and more of as we head further south. In Canada, HOT typically means MILD-MED...if that.

We took mostly back roads north through wine country (to avoid all the tourists), super twisty and a lot of fun. Much to my delight, Mike was taking a more exuberant pace through the twisty stuff. At first I was even surprised to see Kati keeping up. It was very nice to play follow the leader all day. We ended up at Navarro Beach Campground for the night, perfect spot right on the ocean. Funny enough Lori and I recognized the road we had turned off to get here as we had ridden past on our way south. After setting up our tents, Mike and I went scavenging for some fire wood from the beach and nearby bushes. FREE! All this time, Lori and I had been paying for the stuff. Duh!




Mike then pulled out his saw and tiny axe and Lori & I took turns cutting the wood into smaller pieces with Kati’s help. While Mike...


Well, he supervised the job site.


Even had a local pay us a visit.


Can't go wrong with this campsite view.



Armed with some extensive local knowledge in the form of our very own tour guides, we continued our take 2 of Northern California the next morning. First it was breakfast in Fort Bragg followed by lunch at the Avenue Cafe along the Avenue of the Giants in Miranda. Mike then led us down some interesting roads towards the middle of nowhere, also called Honeydew. What’s in Honeydew?


Besides a general store and some stupid expensive gas ($4.869/gallon), not a heck of a lot.

We arrived at Mattole Beach campground nice and early and had our pick of sites. Another stunning spot right on the ocean.


Starting our day with a beautiful ride along the ocean on Mattole road before making a very sharp turn UP!


Looking back near the top.


Welcome to Happy Camp. We had wanted to ride down Route 96 through here on our way south but there were road closures due to the wildfires. Thanks to all the firefighting efforts, the wildfires had been contained and all roads around Happy Camp were opened again.

We stopped at another very basic (as in Pit toilets only) state run campground right along the Klamath river. Of course as we were about to set up, Mike noticed fresh bear scat about 30 feet from our site right along the path we all just rode down. Apparently we all managed to miss it. After discussing it for a few minutes, we all decided to stay anyway. I have to say that I was pretty impressed that Lori was ok with staying. A few months ago, she would have ran, not walked but ran out of the place.

After setting up, Mike pulls out his camp shower, looks over at Kati and asks "so what temperature do you want the shower water?". "How about 110," she says. Lori and I looked at each other "A hot shower? Really?" Mike fired up the Jetboil a few times and 15 minutes later we're all taking turns showering behind a big tree. Nice!

The next morning we continued east on 96 for a short time before turning south onto Scott River road. A very narrow and twisty road that serpentines through the mountains and what appeared to be ground zero for the Happy Camp fire. We rode past a house that had been burned to the ground, cars parked in the driveway also completely scorched. It was quite a sight. We would see other houses like it. Everywhere we looked, trees were completely burned up, the entire landscape was black. The air still heavy with the acrid smell of smoke. The road itself was absolutely mesmerizing. One of the most twisty roads I have ever been on, blind corners with several hundred foot drop offs to the valley below on our left, rock walls going straight up on our right. As if the ride wasn’t exciting enough, on our descend, we encountered a transport truck coming the opposite direction. WTF? We all came to a standstill. Now what? The truck moved over to our right as much as he could while motioning for us to move closer to the edge on our left. I guess the one with the biggest toys gets to call the shots. Luckily there was just enough room for all of us to squeeze in together. Mike and I pulled up beside each other and Kati right behind us. Had we met 10 seconds earlier, the three of us would have had to turn around and go back up the mountain to a spot that was wider. The road was that narrow. Lori and I just scratched our helmets wondering how he ever made it up here and how he was getting out. Judging by the confident pace he was moving at when we met, he had done this before. Good Luck buddy!


Not only did Mike and Kati not stop often but Mike was really keeping up a blistering pace riding. Even at the campgrounds, they always managed to have everything set up before we did. They were up before us, even had coffee ready for us when we finally managed roll out of our tent. Camp showers, saw, ax, free firewood, these guys were schooling us in the art of camping. We were starting to get tuckered out while this retired couple seemed to be running on fresh Energizer lithiums. Zoom Zoom Zoom!

We camped at Cooper Gulch campground, located on Trinity Lake. It’s a small little campground with just 5 sites, but what a view! Kind of reminds me of Ontario a little.


Such a beautiful evening we didn't even bother with the fly. In the morning we got up to a stunning sunrise coming up over the mountain across Trinity Lake.

With our flight already booked for the following morning, we made our way toward the dreaded but much more direct I-5 which would take us back to Mike & Kati's place. We arrived in time to re-pack our gear while our hosts put together a little care package so we wouldn't go hungry during our flight home. They then dropped us off in San Francisco where we booked a hotel since our flight was at 6am and we had to be at the airport around 4-ish. Yuck!

It would be a gross understatement to say that Mike & Kati are AWESOME!

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Our flight home to Ontario went by pretty quickly even with the one layover in Chicago, and to no ones surprise, rain greeted us upon arriving in Kitchener. Kitchener you say? Yup. Apparently KW offers international flights, who would have thunk it? Here’s a tip for you cheap, I mean savvy travellers. When we booked our car rental online, we booked the cheapest car that was available - a Chevy Spark. Sadly (ok not really) when we arrived to pick it up, none were available and they offered to upgrade us to a what they called an “economy” vehicle. In car rental parlance, this turned out to be a Hyundai Sonata. They initially wanted to give us a fully loaded Chrysler 300 but on inspection one of the tires was showing a low pressure reading.




We even managed to find a couple of nice days for a hike on the Bruce trail.


It was strange but seeing all the fall colours made it seem like we had somehow missed the summer. Both because we had spent summer on the road away from home, from the normal routines we typically have during the summer but also because we never really experienced a hot summer on the road that we typically have at home. We had a couple of warm days in Idaho and then again in northern Washington. Of course California was perfectly warm but it was already October there.


Had to make an obligatory stop at Saffin Grill in Hamilton for some SHWARMA!

It was wonderful to see friends and enjoy a wonderful Thanksgiving with family but we soon found ourselves back on the plane heading west.

Back in California, we appeared to have some difficulty getting back on the road. We were pretty tuckered out and decided to take Kati up on her offer to stay with her. It was nice just to relax and we took the opportunity to go through the rest of our gear. On our flight home we managed to bring about 25lbs of "stuff" as carry on, and now we were about to put together another 26lbs of gear to send back. Most of our camping gear made the packing list although we decided to hang on to our tent, air mattresses and sleeping bags since we didn't know where else we were going to go before Mexico. Utah, Nevada, Arizona? Straight down Baja? No idea. My thought was that if we were going to spend another few weeks in the states I wanted to have our camping gear as hotel stays add up very quickly. We had however decided to ditch the tent once we make a break for the Mexican border. Our logic? Decent hotels can be found in the $20-40 range throughout Mexico and all of Central America, including secure parking for the bike. I admit it was nice to lighten the load on the bike a bit.

In the meantime Mike was away in South America on a motorcycle trek of his own; 2 weeks with Rawhyde Adventures through Peru, Bolivia, Argentina and Chile. Kati was getting daily updates from Mike on his (mis) adventures, everything from menu items such as guinea pig, border crossings, broken down bikes, 16 hour riding days, trying to buy gas or riding the Death Road in Bolivia. It sounded like Long Way Round on crack, the only thing missing was a film crew to document everything.

I took advantage of our mini vacation and had Tigger in for another scheduled major service at a local dealership, CalMoto in Livermore. I left my bike and rode off with a loaner BMW GS700 for the day. Not exactly my favourite machine to be honest, and not because it’s a BMW. I was actually pretty excited to ride it when I found out I’d have it as a loaner bike. After my short little test ride, here are some quick thoughts on the bike: definitely a smaller and lighter feeling bike. Everything about it seems…precise - from shifting to braking. Suspension is MUCH more firm than on the Tiger. So much so that I’m wondering if our suspension is starting to show wear from all the weight we’ve had on it. It’s hard to say since I don’t have another Tiger to compare it to and I don’t really recall what it felt like new. I was repeatedly tossed up off the seat during a rough stretch of highway on the little GS, while the Tiger seemed to absorb the same rough road infinitely better. Even the bimmer’s steering seemed stiff, granted this was a brand new bike and obviously would loosen up over time. I know this is very subjective, but overall I though the GS700 lacked character.

In a complete twist of dealership experiences, CalMoto was just amazing. Staff are super friendly, knowledgable and honest. Much much different than has been my experience with Triumph dealerships so far. The shop called in the afternoon to tell me the bike was ready and also to let me know the brakes were essentially shot. Since I already had brand new brake pads with me, I told them not to bother replacing them. I was planning on doing some of the maintenance myself since we had a few extra days here. At a savings of $100+ an hour, why not? The only reason I’m even taking the bike in for service still is to maintain the warranty. When I picked up the bike later that day, I discovered they not only replaced a missing spacer and bolt on the crash bar (which another dealership had neglected to either put back on entirely or forgot to tighten so it fell off), but they had also replaced another broken part (about $500 worth) for free. I’m sworn to secrecy on the details but WOW! Can’t say thanks enough to CalMoto or to Mike for steering me their way.

The surprises continued when I went to do my oil change a couple of days later. I reached down to remove the filter and was greeted with a perfectly clean oil filter. Even the oil looked to be clean. Hmmmm?! I had asked the dealership to forgo changing the oil during the service since I was going to do it myself but it appears they did it anyway, at no charge. Thanks CalMoto! Now why can’t all dealerships be like these guys?




Yikes! Definitely got my moneys worth out of these bad boys.


That's better. Hey the squealing sound is gone...go figure!


Lori even got in on the action and installed her own Powerlet socket by her seat.

A few days with Kati turned into a week, and our indecision of where to go next grew that into nearly 2 more. To be quite honest, we were both also enjoying the downtime and decided to wait till Mike returned to get a first hand accounting of his trip. We are after all heading down to the very countries Mike was riding in, so the more first hand knowledge we have the better.


In the meantime, we dog sat and got to know the neighbours enough that we got invited to a grade 8 Halloween concert by one of the kids. We were becoming regulars at the Panda Express and the staff at the local REI were starting to get to know us by name. Kati took us into town to check out Adventure Designs - another very cool moto-shop, where we picked up some short cuffed summer gloves and some RAM mounts.


Lori even managed to get some baking in.

"Live in New York Once, but leave before it makes you hard. Live in Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft", from Baz Luhrman’s 1998 Everybody’s Free (to Wear Sunscreen) song. The lines popped into my head one chilly evening as I reached for a sweater. It was 18 degrees out. Kati laughed and agreed that I was indeed getting soft. Hey at least I wasn't like some of the locals who were wearing down jackets and toques.

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Last month we had seen the Golden Gate but never actually made it across the bridge into San Francisco. We decided to make a day of playing tourist and took the BART into the big city one day. Getting off at Embarcadero we walked through Chinatown before hiking up to Coit Tower.




Not sure who's winning…but it was a fantastic place to people watch.


Every Chinatown needs a bad ass dragon.




There were supposed to be 400 stairs to the top of Coit Tower, I think we must have ascended a different wall or something as I don’t think there were more than a 100.


There was this unique (to us anyway) single serving bathroom at the top. Dude was trying to figure out how to work it for like 5 min. It seems he walked in as the person before him was leaving, which is a no-no because the thing needs to go through a cleaning cycle in between uses. Lori tried to explain it to him but he wouldn’t have any of it and continued to look for the button that would close the door, surely it must be hidden within. Sigh! I finally took a shot at coaxing him out, suggesting that perhaps a new course of action was needed since this one wasn’t working too well. Persistent bugger but he finally came out and let it do it’s cleaning thing. It was pretty funny except for Lori doing the pee-pee dance the entire time.


Coit Tower in all its glory.




There were some pretty cool murals inside.


Besides the outdoor pooper, you get a great view of San Francisco, Alcatraz and the Golden Gate from Coit Tower.






Saw a few classics while walking back down.


Always remember to stop and smell the flowers along the way.


We stopped at Boudin Bakery & Cafe for some lunch. It was way tempting to get something deliciously bad for us.


Never stuff your face with more than you can fit in I always say...or something like that.


Saw*a few earning their keep...


Others….well...


We met a few celebrities…




Ahhh, put a cork in it!


And for all you single guys out there who like long walks by the water...this ones a keeper. SF has just about something for everybody it seems.


The not so famous SF-Oakland Bay bridge. With the sun beaming on the residential area across the bay, it was quite a view. Not sure it turned out as well here in the pic though.


Oh and congrats to the Giants who won the World Supercup or something like that the day before. Hey I haven't watched baseball since the first strike. Lucky for us we hadn't picked the day before to visit SF, I'm guessing it may have been a little busier...

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Hi
Will you come to Spain in the future?

We're hoping to make it there, yes.

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By the end of the 2 weeks we were itching to get going again. Mike got back, took a day off and said “OK LET’S GO!” Part man, part machine, I thought I could hear the Six Million Dollar Man sound effects as he packed up his bike. Just like that we were back on the road with our energetic tour guides leading us south.


Mike and Kati wanted to take us down the 17 mile drive in the Monterey Peninsula but checking online ahead of time we discovered motorcycles were prohibited, something about motorcycles being too loud . Ah, the 'loud pipes save lives ideology strikes again.


We stopped for a picnic lunch on the beach at Carmel Bay instead and got treated to some seals fishing for their own lunch along the breaking surf and a very large pod of dolphins doing the same a bit further out in the bay. I didn't realize till later when I looked at a map that the famed Pebble Beach golf course is located off 17 mile drive. Thanks to Tiger Woods golf video games, there was a time when I could tell you every break on every green on that course. Except for the prohibitive cost, playing here was at one time on my bucket list.


Dude in the background reminded Lori of Weekend At Bernie’s for some reason. But don’t worry, this guy was still breathing…we think.


Alas we continued south along the incredibly scenic highway 1 past Big Sur to Limekiln State Park campground where we camped out for the night. This absolutely stunning stretch of road turned out to be a fantastic consolation prize.








This little tunnel just outside Limekiln State Park had a very European feel to it.

After setting up our tents at Limekiln, we hopped back on the bikes and Mike led us to another gem down the highway, Nacimiento road.


Nacimiento road snakes it's way away from highway 1 climbing steeply up the mountain through Los Padres National Forest.


The setting sun casting an warm orange glow on the mountain as we rode up.


We pulled over and enjoyed a spectacular sunset.

The following morning Mike took me for a hike through Limekiln State Park to see the remains of several kilns from the late 1800's that were used to harvest limestone from the area. What was interesting was the redwood forest we were hiking in had been completely eradicated during that time when they used the wood to fuel the kilns. Yet here we were walking through a beautiful fully grown forest, gotta love how nature takes care of itself. Sadly no pics as my iPhone ran out of juice. On the way back we passed another camper packing up his site, I couldn't help but chuckle at the winter parka, hat and gloves he was wearing. Here I was in short sleeves sweating. It was about 16C out. Proof I guess that I wasn't quite 'California soft' yet.


A little further south along highway 1, we made a pit stop at the Piedras Blancas Elephant Seal Rookery. Although they can be found all over the world they seem to like this spot in California. Nearly hunted to extinction in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries for the oil in their blubber, their numbers have managed to skyrocket from around 50 to 175,000.




Male Elephant Seals can grow to 5,000lbs! That's the size of a Ford F-150 pick up truck!


The males fight for breeding rights and dominance over a section of beach. It appears beach front property is highly sought after even in the animal kingdom. The battles can get pretty bloody leaving them with serious scars on their chest. Apparently these 2 males were just practicing for the main event later in the season.


While the ladies spend most of their time pregnant or nursing.


Nap time it seems, also plays a very important role in the Elephant Seal world. I think I like these guys.

We had a fairly short ride to Morro Bay for brunch and to set up our tents again. We also made reservations to play tourist for the rest of the day.


Welcome to Hearst Castle (Home - Hearst Castle). 65,000 square feet, 165 rooms & 127 acres of gardens of pure opulence.






Everything here is imported from around the world.


Restoring the smoking room. Estimated time of completion...oh about 10 years, for real. This guy was using a Q-tip to clean the ceiling and the lady doing the tour said it was a 10 year project to restore this one room.






The entire property is really quite something.




Mike & I chillin' by the (outdoor) pool.

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The detail has detail.




The indoor pool.


Oh and this was the road getting up here. Sadly we had to park the bikes and hop on a bus to get up here.

The following day the four of us went out for some very early morning coffee. Due to previous commitments, Mike and Kati had to make an early departure and head back. A few weeks ago we met a complete stranger who opened up his garage, his home and his heart to us. Today we said goodbye to two amazing individuals that we can only describe as...family.

We really can't thank you guys enough for everything.

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From Morro Bay, we headed south to San Luis Obispo where we took a little detour Mike suggested, See Canyon Road. It actually starts out as Perfumo Canyon Road and ascends the mountain in typical twisty fashion.


Near the top we had a pretty nice view of Morro Bay behind us.


Pit stop in Avila Beach for some ice cream. Total tourist town, pretty beach with a couple of very long piers. It was a spectacular day so it was strange to see the beach so empty.

A short ride south we came across the Monarch Butterfly Grove in Pismo Beach. This small eucalyptus forest is home to about 10,000 butterfly’s at the moment, a number that will swell to about 30,000 by the end of November. It turns out that most of the butterflies west of the Rockies call this home in the winter, while all the ones east of here, including all the ones we have back home in Ontario during the summer, head to Mexico for the winter. Of course it’s not quite as simple as packing up the family and flying south for the winter. These guys go through several generations just to get there, it’s pretty impressive. They weren't super active on this day however, I think we may have come during siesta hour. For weeks we’ve been smelling these intensely aromatic trees down the coast and I only recently discovered they were eucalyptus trees. The visit here only added to our excitement of heading into Mexico to see the Monarch Biosphere. Patience grasshopper…er…


Looking up initially, it's easy to miss all the butterflies as they blend in and look like tree branches.


But a closer inspection reveals hundreds of them on each branch. Because they were quite high, it was difficult to get a great shot without a good zoom lens.




The sky was on fire in a thousand shades of orange as we pulled into Jalama Beach. Instead of setting up the tent, we went to the beach to watch the amazing display of colours. It meant that we set up our tent in the dark, something we typically dislike doing but we both agreed the sunset was totally worth it. Our days had gotten shorter and losing daylight savings meant we were now watching the sunsets happen before 5pm. A far cry from having daylight at midnight up in the Yukon. The long days are so nice when you're camping and we were now finding ourselves in our tent before 8.

As strange as it seems, Lori and I spent the next couple of days seriously bummed. We were missing the company of our friends more than we imagined we would and decided a couple of days at Jalama beach was just the ticket to cheer us up. With a store/restaurant right on site, it’s the closest we’ve been to an all inclusive campground. They served up a pretty delicious Jalama burger and a huge very yummy breakfast burrito. It was tempting to stay longer. We ended having to move our tent the second day to a more open area as the site we were in had already been reserved by someone else the following night. The wind picked up overnight and we woke up with quite a bit of sand inside the tent and all over us. Yuck! The joys of camping at a beach I guess. Sand in Lori's hair did not make her a happy camper, lemme tell you.


Drying out the towels and shorts and keeping drinks out of the sun. Tigger is a true workhorse!

We got an early start the next morning and were on the road just after 8am, stopping for breakfast in Santa Barbara. We were hoping to do some Moto-sightseeing in town but discovered a big race going on and roadblocks setup everywhere we wanted to go. A bunch of people were running everywhere, Lori pointed out that no one was chasing them....


Map,map, on the wall, which is the twistiest of them all? After careful measurements and curve counting, I concluded that the one on the right just past Malibu seemed like the most twisty of them all.

Passing Neptune's Net we turned North on Latigo Canyon Road. Man what a seriously fun road. It looked kick ass on the map and turned out to be even better in person. Chock full of S-bends and blind corners, it's the type of road to put a biker driving a cage into serious misery. Being on two wheels, I was all smiles. "Lori? You still back there hun?" Lori gets a bit quiet on roads like these and I usually have to make sure she's ok every a few minutes. I'm not sure she shares my passion for the twisties, or maybe just not to the extent as me. But I do think she's learning to appreciate it more, not unlike someone being thrown out of a perfectly good airplane learns to appreciate skydiving.


We made a right onto Mulholland Highway looking for the Rock Store where we heard Jay Leno likes to hang out. No Jay Leno here but we did get to talking to someone who was really curious about our trip. Also along the way, we passed a cool spot I had seen many times on YouTube, a particular 180 degree curve that plays host to a lot of crashes. You know it's a fun spot when there's a camera guy taking pics at the side of the road. The place attracts bikers, not unlike the Tail of the Dragon, although I think Deal's Gap seems to offer a much more of an atmosphere compared to the Rock Store. As we went around the curve, it was hard to miss all the gouges in the pavement left by scraping pegs no doubt.

LA traffic is as crazy as I had imagined. Love the fact you can lane split here although being about as wide as a smart car, it's not something we took advantage of frequently. Now lane splitting in stop and go traffic to me makes sense, even in very slow moving traffic. But some of these bikes were lane splitting around vehicles that were already travelling well above the posted speed limit. Huh? Welcome to LA! After an unforgettable afternoon riding, we found ourselves on the east side of LA staying with family for a few days.

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Hi Mark Lori, still silently following you guys & tiger Just wanna say a super big Merry Christmas & have a super happy & safe new year. Stay safe & have fun have a on me

Keep the rubber side down go for it .....
Vince

Thank you Vince, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you

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We ended up spending a few days with family in Los Angeles. I've never really had any interest in LA before this, although surprisingly we enjoyed our whirlwind tour of Tinseltown anyway. Can't argue that seeing where the Oscars take place, Hollywood Boulevard, all the studios and Rodeo Drive wasn't at least a bit cool. Still, the highlight of the day was watching all the buskers perform at the Santa Monica Pier and dinner at the very British Ye Olde King's Head pub. Oh and let's not forget all the exotic cars around LA. I spied six, count 'em SIX different Aston Martins while cruising around town. I've seen two on the road in my entire life prior to today. Six here in one day - crazy!




Keeping the selfie streak going. Hey is it still a selfie if someone else is in the pic?


Hollywood's finest keeping the peace.


I found it kind of eerie to read the words <em>carpe diem</em> next to Robins name at the Chinese Theatre


Boldly going where others have been...


That Jimmy Kimmel guy seems to be getting pretty BIG.


The very first Oscars were held in this room at the Roosevelt Hotel back in 1929.




Woody is more famous than I thought.


Some more sights of downtown LA, or is it uptown? The place is so huge it's hard to tell. This was just around the corner from Union station.


We stopped by at an outdoor market, sure was perdy!


Avila Adobe was built around 1818, it's the oldest existing house in LA.


Dating back to the late 1800's, this is the original fire house in LA. Back in those days the fire truck was only two horsepower. When they arrived back at the firehall, they would drive straight in, unhook the horses and manually turn the pumper around on the turntable (seen under the wheels). Pretty high tech stuff.


Checking out Santa Monica Pier.


A display on the beach for Veteran's Day was also bringing awareness to the number of military suicides. A sign indicated that number tops 154 every week. Very sad.


You can easily tell the Canadians apart from the Americans here. The really pale looking people in the water...Canadian!


Me? I was getting soft so I put on a sweater.


I didn't know route 66 ended here, cool.


This is what you call juxtaposed...


We found this beast at the Hard Rock Cafe at Universal Studios.


I bet it would make an awesome RTW tourer.

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Welcome to Rodeo Drive dahhhling!




You might recognize this hotel from Beverly Hills Cop…


A thick layer of armor, this guy was well protected, kind of how I envisioned my wallet looking as we walked around Rodeo Drive.


We did a tour of Lake Arrowhead another day. Meh! Nice enough lake with a lot of incredibly expensive homes around it. I think this was supposed to be Sammy Hagars place here.


Ryan, careful, most things in there*don't react well to bullets...Not wanting to spend a small fortune to go aboard, we viewed the Queen Mary and a really old Russian sub from afar.*


So we goofed off at the gift shop downstairs instead. Hello this is your Captain speaking...

What do Michael Jackson, a stunning massive stained glass mural of the last supper and the Art of Motorcycle exhibit have in common? All were on display at the Glendale Forest Lawn Memorial Park. Ok, maybe MJ isn’t exactly on display, but I understand he’s laid to rest here. We came to the moto exhibit purely by accident when I noticed the sign as we were leaving. Quite a few very unique and classic bikes on display here, custom painted helmets and fuel tanks and even a Valentino Rossi Ducati race bike signed by the legend himself. Seemed like a very unusual setting for the Moto exhibit to be honest. No pics from the exhibit as signs everywhere said no photos and well, we were the only ones in there at the time.


We found this right next to the bike exhibit.


On the way back we made a stop at the Griffith Observatory. I recognized it immediately from at least one movie I had seen. The place was absolutely packed for a Tuesday, maybe it's always like that I'm not sure. There's a great view of the Hollywood sign from here and also of most of LA.




Hey, what are you guys pointing at?


Oh I see.

We decided to finally pack it in and send the last bit of our camping gear home as we departed LA. That's it for camping , we're hotel bound from now on.

We doubled back a bit leaving LA and headed west to pick up Angeles Crest Highway - what a stunning road. Wow! Twisty doesn't begin to describe it. I was surprised to find out we were up over 7100 feet.


Seeing the clouds gently roll over the mountains as we looked back towards LA was just stunning, it looked almost surreal. We passed the Pacific Crest Trail marker along the way - cool! I hope to one day return to that spot, hiking instead of riding, from the Mexican border all the way to Canada. That will be a very different trip report though.

Angeles Crest Highway is easily in the top 10 riding roads I've ever been on. I know we haven't seen everything in the states, or every amazing road but I have to say that California in general is my most favourite state to ride a bike in. There is definitely no shortage of amazing twisty roads. I have to be honest that the thought of spending the entire winter in California did cross our minds.


Just a spectacular view up here.

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After an overnight in Victorville, we headed north towards Death Valley. It was hot and the wind was gusting from the west at what seemed well over 60mph. I got to practice that ancient art of “Drunken Tiger - Hidden Sphincter” as I tried to keep the bike on the pavement, all the while being sandblasted (literally) for that added degree of difficulty. Not quite sure why but all of a sudden I got this strange feeling like I really didn't want to go to Death Valley, a feeling that didn’t want to leave me alone. Maybe it was the wind, or sandblasting, or maybe it was because we had planned kind of a long day which would get us into our hotel well after sunset. I’m not sure. But after about 15 minutes I asked Lori if she really wanted to see Death Valley today. Right away she said “NO”, and that she had this feeling like we shouldn't be going there. Hmmm, interesting. Well that settles it! I told her I had the exact same thought.

We re-routed and headed east straight to Vegas. It was nice to no longer be tossed around by the wind but almost a little eerie to be in this pocket of nearly still air while riding down the road at highway speed. I lifted up the visor and could hear everything around me much clearer, everything from other vehicles to Tiggers engine purring along.

Bright lights, big city. Ahh Las Vegas. Much like LA, I never really had any desire to visit Vegas, but after an entire week (far too long by the way), here are my thoughts. The Belagio is stunning. They really go all out and put on a fantastic Thanksgiving display inside (I'm told the Christmas one is even better). The fountain show outside is just magnificent. Walking up and down the strip was pretty cool the first and second time, after that it was almost painful. There is someone in your face either trying to sell you something or snapping stripper cards (advertisements for stripper joints). Basically they snap the cards in your face to get your attention as you walk by and then try and offer you the card. You can't go 30 feet before another one is doing the same thing. It's really really annoying after about a block. I suppose one of those massive sized alcoholic beverages they sell all along the strip might have helped ease the pain. Some of these drinks even come with a lanyard in case you want to rid yourself of the burden of having to carry your alcohol, you can just hang it off your neck and slurp away.

Besides the countless homeless looking for a handout, there were quite a few performers working in the streets. One girl did her impression of Neil Peart on a set of drums made out of buckets, she sounded fantastic. Another dude had a sign that read "I'll let you kick me in my balls for $20". O_o Seriously! We wondered how successful he was in this endeavour, I mean who would take him up on that offer? Strangely enough we came across him later in the week and a guy was actually kicking him. A GUY! I mean I figured a pissed off ex-wife...maybe...but another guy? Probably wearing a cup, I think. I hope!

Walk into a casino and you're quickly accosted by someone "First time in Vegas?" "Where you from?" "Oh really, I have an aunt in Toronto" and you're quickly led over to a booth so someone else can try to sell you more stuff. Sell, sell, sell. Ugh! Everywhere you go, it's the same. About the only place you get peace and quiet is while playing one of the games. Although I wouldn't call the slots peaceful or quiet. On the upside, within moments of sitting down at a machine or table, a waitress magically appears and brings you free alcoholic beverages. I tried my hand at a poker tournament one night, getting to the final table and doing well until sadly the free beverages did me in. Someone once told me Vegas is nice to visit for about 3 days, max. I’d have to agree.

Here are some of the sights:





Inside Caesars Palace













We were both sick of Vegas by the time we hit the road again, and when we rolled into El Centro later that day, I was literally feeling sick. We decided to stay put and booked into a motel for a few days hoping I'd feel better. I had an ear ache and my head felt like it wanted to explode, both of which only seemed to get worse. Unfortunately my ear was bad enough that simply putting on my helmet was painful so riding anywhere far was out of the question. Our next stop was supposed to be Mexico but neither one of us wanted to go anywhere till this was sorted.

A visit to the local ER confirmed I had a bad case of allergies? Seriously? Allergies? Apparently allergies were the cause of some fluid building up behind my ear, which in turn caused an ear infection. Some Claritin and anti-biotic ear drops and I'd be right as rain. A few more days in El Centro it is then. What can I tell you about El Centro? It’s the largest city in North America below sea level. It did also have a decent restaurant, Burgers & Beer, which was within walking distance and served up some surprisingly great food. Sadly those two highlights weren’t enough to put it on the list of places to visit again. It’s also incredibly dry here...how dry was it? In the time it took us to walk from the store to the motel, the grapes we bought had turned into raisins. You were lucky to actually feel water hitting your face when you turned on the shower, most of it would simply evaporate before it got to you. It was dry!

We had initially planned on heading down the Baja coast but after spending a lot more time than planned in California and with our 6 day stop in El Centro, we made the decision to skip Baja all together and ride straight to mainland Mexico. Because of this, Lori suggested we ride a bit further east before crossing the border. With that, we finally managed to leave California…again. We lost an hour crossing into Arizona & MST and made a breakfast stop in Yuma at the Cracker Barrel. I must admit I have a weakness for their hash brown casserole, that stuff is seriously yummy!

With a few last minute items to take care of before entering Mexico, we landed in Tucson for a couple of nights over Thanksgiving. Thanks to a mystery hotel grab via Priceline for $39/night, we ended up at the very lovely Hampton Inn. Nice! Besides making sure we had extra copies of all our paperwork, we also bought our Mexican motorcycle insurance online so we didn’t have to deal with it once in Mexico. Apparently the insurance is mandatory - as in a mandatory cash grab since everything I read says it’s useless as far as actually being used as insurance goes. For dinner, we walked across the road to the R & R Grill. Real turkey, mashed potato, stuffing, gravy and cranberry jelly, about as close as we could get to a home cooked Thanksgiving dinner.

Next stop - Mexico...GULP!

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Hard to believe we have already been on the road for 6 months. What a trip so far! We’ve seen some pretty incredible sights and have met some truly wonderful people along the way. Whether at some random coffee shop or gas station or even at a well organized travellers meeting like the HU, meeting new people has turned out to be the highlight of our trip. In fact I’m not sure I ever anticipated the profound impact meeting a complete stranger and being welcomed into their home would have on me.

This trip has turned out to be so much more than I imagined before we started. For me, the freedom of being able to ride my bike everyday, to places I’ve only dreamt of seeing, is like nothing else. It really is a dream come true to not only have the opportunity to do this but to also have my wonderful wife along for the ride. Feeling a bit nostalgic, I thought I would write down some random stuff about our trip so far.

Favourite place:
Mark - California, maybe more NoCal (as I’m not a huge fan of LA and all that is rich and shameless). The state has mountains, ocean and some of the best riding roads I’ve ever been on (highway 1 coming into San Francisco - wow)
Lori - Northern California. Lori says this choice was made under duress since she wanted to pick others as she had so many favourites. Truth is we both did.

Least favourite place:
Mark - Vegas with El Centro in close second. Vegas has never been my cup of tea, I prefer the sounds of nature to stripper cards being flicked in my face. El Centro, neighbourhood’s way to dry and being sick the entire time I was there didn’t help.
Lori - Fairbanks, Alaska. It seemed to be the low point for Lori during the trip.

Do we miss anything?
Mark - Yes, a great home cooked meal. Seriously, I really miss eating healthy. Being on the road does not allow for a healthy diet overall. Yes we can make healthier choices but we can’t exactly fill up the fridge and often you eat less healthier because that’s all there is. I’m also missing my chiropractor at the moment. Now that we no longer have our camping gear, I find I’m missing a sense of home more than I did before. Having a tent and a space to call our own at least gave us a bit of a home.
Lori - That's easy. The kids and the rest of the family first and foremost. Next would be a sense of home including all the mundane daily chores believe it or not.

Any good tips or lessons learned?
Lots. Looking back on day one of our trip, the first thing that comes to mind is - NOOBS! Even though we’ve done quite a bit of travelling and a decent amount of that by motorcycle, I still look back and think how green we were starting out. Who knows I might look back at this point in our trip and think the same thing.
One of the most interesting things we’ve had to re-learn is how to travel. We’re so used to having a week or two at the most to get as much as we can into our holiday, that we’ve found breaking free of that habit has been hard. It’s taken us a while to learn to go slower.
Another problem with this equation is that we’re both very goal oriented. So going slow with no specific direction has turned out to be kind of difficult for us. Kind of like a stalling engine we've spent days in a single spot because we couldn't decide where to go next. Give me a destination and a time frame, and I’m good to go. It sort of explains why we did 25K in 3 months out of the gate. We had a destination and a time to be at said destination. Ultimately I'm not sure there is a right or wrong way to travel, you just have to figure out what works best for you. We're still learning it would seem.
Problems seem to have a way of working themselves out. Much like trusting your parachute will open once you jump out of that airplane, you have to trust that things will work out. There are far too many variables to account for each one before you embark on a big trip.
Stuff will go wrong, sure but mostly things will go right.
Compromise! A big one for 2up travel. Lori prefers the finer things in life like a clean bed and a clean bathroom that's all ours. While I admit there's a certain appeal to that, I'm just as happy to sleep in a tent every night for weeks. So we usually compromise and do what Lori wants . Couldn't help myself there, but hey "happy wife, happy life" as they say. To be fair, Lori has had to endure sleeping outdoors with the bears and mosquitos for more than half our trip and has seemed almost happy doing it.

We put together a short little video (or picturideo?) of the last 6 months (ok so maybe I went back a little more than 6 months, but it's where this adventure began back in Feb), and maybe I'm a little late posting it.

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Life's 2 Short...Ride the World
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Have been following your ride, You have been achieving what a lot of us dream about. will be looking to follow your further adventures, Keep up posting your travels. Stay safe.