2 Weeks In The High Sierra: Granite, Water And Dirt

Mechanical Issue #3
I waited too long for Eric to come up the trail, and I had a feeling something was wrong. I took off my helmet in hopes of hearing him coming...but I heard nothing but normal forest sounds.
I backtracked down the trail, enjoying the giant embedded granite boulders covered with sand. I came upon Eric not too far from the creek crossing at the bottom and he was already getting ready to take the tank off. I pulled up and asked if he needed a jump. He said "No, I need a tow."

Crap.

There was a lot of this going on...




Eric pretty quickly found the source of his trouble...


This had happened before, but that time the broken piece found its way into the tailpipe without causing any damage. This time it got ingested and the motor was none too happy about it. We buttoned it back up and coasted back down to the creek. We tried to get it to start with my tiny set of jumper cables but it was a no-go...


{...sigh...}

We got out the rope.

It was hot.

The trail was steep.

The trail was loose.

Traction was hard to come by.

No, make that impossible to come by.

Ok, so I've done a lot of towing in my day and I'm fairly good at it, but the mighty 610 could not get enough traction to pull the behemoth KTM up the hill. I'm not sure I could have gotten enough traction even if I'd been sporting full-on knobbies (I've got 2 brand-new sets of them in my basement, BTW ) The surface was all loose and slidey and it was hard just to stand on our own 2 feet, much less find enough purchase to heave the hulking dead mass up the hill. But what choice did we have? We pushed. We pulled. We swore. We gasped and panted in the high-elevation atmosphere til our lungs felt like they were on fire. We made progress...progress that was measured in mere inches instead of miles, but progress nonetheless.

This went on non-stop for about 2 hours.

We finally got to a not-so-steep spot were I could get going so we hopped back on and I towed it up to within inches of where the trail leveled out. Seriously...inches! We stopped when I lost all forward momentum and started sliding and spinning the wheel. We parked the bikes and just stood in the trail looking at each other...and then Eric's bike fell over...and then my bike fell over...
At this point all I could do was laugh...and grab my camera...


We didn't even pick them up right away. We dragged the KTM up onto the flat-ish spot and then picked up both bikes and continued on. About 30 feet past this spot it just turned into a gradual slope the rest of the way and I was able to tow him out without anymore drama. I had to stop a few times (quite unwillingly, I might add...) to let my motor cool down as it was getting mighty hot but that was the only thing that was going to get me to cease all forward motion at this point. I just wanted to be done with it.


It took us 3 long, sweaty hours to get back up to the road...


We'd seen a campsite down the road earlier in the morning and we knew it was mostly downhill so away we went. We also knew we'd be able to get the van in there for retrieval since it was closer to a paved section and the road wasn't too bad. I gathered firewood while waiting with the dead carcass while Eric went back on the 610 to pack up our campsite. We'd be spending the night here instead...


Hey, look! My sidestand is still working

What a long day.

The next day was even longer.

Is that a Keihin throttle plate that broke? Without one of the wheels?

Yeah, it's a plate that fits over the slide in the carb. There's an o-ring behind it. The wheel is there, probably in his other hand.

Hey! Long time no see! How's your TXC running? Yeah, we had planned on riding the dirtbikes anyway, but it was kind of a drag not having the KTM. We would have done more bike camping rides (more than the one we did later in the week while 2-up on the 610) but it all worked out OK like it usually does. We had a great time without it

We got up really early the next morning and loaded up all the stuff we couldn't live without (tools, binoculars, rope, my cute new sandals, our beloved thermal shirts and microfleece tights, etc) and threw all the other stuff in the tent. We left the KTM to stand guard over all our precious camping gear and took off 2-up on the 610. The seat was pretty cramped, what with my backpack strapped to the rack, the doggy panniers full and the tankbag on the seat keeping the rider from sliding up any further on the tank. I graciously accepted the pillion position and settled in for a long and grueling ride. It was actually pretty fun looking around and enjoying the scenery and not having to worry about anything except scraping my boots on the ground. I think I'm in the minority as a full-time competent rider that enjoys riding on the back. Eric was having a good time, too. He really likes the torquey 610 motor and 6-speed tranny, and was quite pleased at how it handled the task of getting us from Point A to Point B in the least amount of time possible. I was pleasantly surprised myself, thinking it would be much more sluggish with both of us aboard We took the most direct route possible (not direct at all) and it took us about 3 hours to get back to our van that was parked at our friend's house near Shaver Lake. My knees were not happy...

We met up with our friends Tim,Theresa and Sandy the WonderDog there. They'd gotten in from Washington the night before. It was great to see them again! Tim loaned us his big `ol manly diesel truck to go back and retrieve the bike and, hopefully, our camping gear. The KTM would have to share the bed of the truck with Tim's GasGas ECO300 but I figured they'd get along well back there since the KTM shares its garage with one just like it at home

The truck made short work of the trip (Thanks, Tim!) and we were back in Shaver before dark, KTM and all camping gear in tow. We were treated to a hot shower, a great meal of home-raised pork chops, and the excellent company of new friends and old friends we hardly ever get to see.
The next day we ordered a new slide from Sudco to be overnighted, hoping it would be enough to get the KTM up and running. It came the next day while we were out goofing off on the 610...


Squint your eyes when you look at this photo...


My knees were really cranky from riding, pushing the KTM and then spending hours on the back of the 610. A high-altitude hike should be just the ticket to make them feel better, eh?


Our first glimpse of Doris Lake...



Doris...that was my mom's name...Doris Lake is fed by hot springs bubbling up underneath the surface. When most of the lakes at this elevation were running about 57 degrees this little jewel was a sweet 74 degrees...





These guys were everywhere! They were big and fat and meaty...



It was 76 and sunny when we reached the shore. It was 67 and raining less than 10 minutes later...



It stopped, then started again, then stopped...




We decided to get back as soon as we could when the thunder and lightning started. It wasn't bad at first but we were pretty soaked when we got back to the bike and all our gear. We had our helmets, pants and jackets locked to the bike with our boots underneath. The jackets were pretty wet but everything else seemed ok. It really started coming down so we grabbed our clothes and boots and ran across the road to a campground bathroom. We were there for over an hour waiting for it to let up. Mother nature put on a pretty spectacular show for us...awesome in the truest sense of the word. The bolts of lightning were within our reach and the almost-simultaneous thunder made the walls of the bathroom tremble. Pretty humbling stuff...and slightly scary. I'll try to add the Quicktime videos as attachments at the end of my post. I can't figure out how to do it as they downloaded to PhotoBucket as jpegs instead of videos. I'm not even going to post a photo as it cannot even begin to describe the magnitude of the monsoon. We heard later that the area got about 3 inches in this one storm that lasted a little over 2 hours

Anyway, we grabbed our saturated helmets and made a run for it, running across the campground and through the parking lot through 4" of mud, rocks and debris raging down the road to the little restaurant at the Mono Hot Springs Resort. We watched the show through the tiny little windows while we enjoyed our Buffalo Reuben sandwiches and hot coffee. It stopped after about 45 minutes and it looked a whole lot like the birth of the world must have looked...all shiny and new and fresh...simply stunning! We were at about 6500' and we still had to climb Kaiser Pass at 9184' to get back, though. It was a beautiful and interesting ride...lots of water, debris, sand, gravel...it was kind of dicey being on the back but Eric rode like a champion and kept me off the ground. There was still hail on the ground in the meadow just below Kaiser Pass...


There's still snow on the ground under the trees, too...



I took no more photos on this ride. We got back to our friend's house, partied with about 40 of our closest friends we've never met before in celebration of our friend Pete's 60th birthday, loaded up the van and trailer and prepared to head south to Kennedy Meadows in the morning.
Primo dirtriding on some of the most beautiful trails in California coming up!

(sorry for the wordy post)

WoodsChick

Ok, I figured it out...I think...
Turn up the volume

woo hoo! I can watch them both at the same time!

You do know that they're two different videos, right?

Thanks, Swampds These kinds of trips are waiting right outside everyone's door, all you need is a map, little time off and a license plate on your bike. Oh...and a tow rope

Yes.. but I could still click the play button on both and watch them at the same time.

We left town early the next morning, headed for the Kern Plateau down in the southern end of the Sequoia Nat'l Forest. The hellacious thunderstorms and considerable rain we were driving through made me absolutely giddy with anticipation. I was sure the rains were making their way all the way up to the Plateau...and I was right! I've been riding this area for over 10 years and had never seen conditions so perfect! We got there mid-afternoon, a little late for a ride, so we set up camp at deserted Bonita Meadow and relaxed a bit with a bottle of homemade wine...



Sandy the Wonderdog guarded Tim and Theresa's tent...



We were up and out of camp pretty early the next day. Tim, Eric and I were chomping at the bit to get out on the perfect trails before they dried up. We were not disappointed...



Tim had driven down here from WA a few years ago to ride here with us and it was bone-dry and dusty. I think Tim is pleased with the conditions this time...



And who could blame him?



Cedar Canyon was closed, so we hung a left onto North Meadow Pass Trail...









Ugh...my only biff of the day, and the big tree tweaked my front end...



Eric and Tim trying to un-tweak it...



Tim decides to bust a move over the finish line triple...



I always blow this section on Sherman Pass Trail but it's ok because I love the big tree in the background...



I get myself going and clean the rest of the trail...









The boys do some quick jetting on Sherman Pass, at about 9400'...



My bike was already jetted for the high elevation...



More later; I gotta go play softball...


WoodsChick

Thanks, 7point62 I gotta figure out why my backgrounds are sometimes washed out (like the sky through the trees sometimes) but other than that I'm pretty pleased with the little camera. I was waiting to claim a big `ol fancy Canon with a few lenses and a swanky case and everything from Lost and Found at work but someone actually called about it and picked it up...a month after leaving it in the hotel I say if they didn't know the whereabouts of their camera for a whole month then they didn't deserve to have it, dang it

Yeah, Eric lost a similar piece of the slide plate last year, too, and it went right through without any damage to anything. He found it rattling around in the pipe
I don't think we'll be so lucky this time, though. It wanted to fire up, and sounded really promising, but it just wouldn't...almost like the piece is holding one of the valves open or something.
We dropped the motor off at our motor guy's house last Sunday and he knows we'd like to have it up and running for Labor Day so we should know the score soon. I hope it's not completely lunched.

I've thought about it once or twice, and I really like looking at video sometimes, but I really enjoy photos. I think they tend to be a little more thought-provoking, and they have a drama all their own. Now that's not to say that I'm not disappointed to hear Tim's camera wasn't functioning when he was riding behind me

I gotta agree with Tim, here...the towing was easy, the pushing was a total excercise in frustration. I was feeling it the next day, for sure. And I know what you mean about the KTM going down but not the Husky I gotta say, though, it wasn't really a KTM issue, it was a Keihin issue...same carb as on my 610. The KTM vibrates a lot more, though, and that plate rattles around a lot more as the inside of the carb is worn. It's got 20,000 miles on it and the motor has been really reliable.

In my mind the 800GS is a street bike, as is any bike that comes in weighing more than my SV650 You'd probably be fine on the easy side of the Bald Mt OHV trail, but the rest of the actual jeep trails in that area are small dirtbike-only unless you've got Cyril Despres skills. The little OHV routes we did in this report were doable on my SV, though. In my opinion I think one needs to have superior dirt skills to manage the big bikes in true off-road situations, but that's just me

Yeah, these photos are why I ride the dualsport stuff now, too. We can get to so many beautiful places when on two wheels. And yeah, the riding was easy, but the terrain gets more challenging as the bikes get heavier...one of the perks of riding them I guess; you don't need to seek out the 5 Miles Of Hell stuff in order to be challenged. The trails we were on were super-easy...again, I could have ridden them on the SV...yet the incline and slippery surface made recovery a nightmare. Well, not a nightmare completely, more like a bad dream that wakes you up before it becomes a nightmare...but still, it was brutal!