Husky Trip to the Tip

[xymotic]

The road past Puertocitos is progressing quickly.
There is no mistake about it, the Government of Mexico has raised the priority of roads throughout Baja. We ran into it several times on this trip, many roads that were dirt a year or two ago are paved now.
As much as we complain about the Mexicans taking over California, the opposite is certainly just as true, the gringo's are having a HUGE and negative impact as well.

Since I knew you'all were gonna ask, I did some GPS marking...
I have the end of the pavement about N30 08.568 W114 38.480

There really is very little left of the road from Puertocitos.
I was here less than a year ago, and all of the 'hard' parts have been paved.

There was a fair bit of traffic on the road, some really, REALLY heavily loaded bikes that were going pretty slow. I started 'feeling it' and so I was BOMBING down the road. I blew by a bunch of KLR's and some DRZ's and even a few Road bikes. Not to mention the typical campers and pickups etc.
We turned off and took the old road to Gonzaga,

It didn't take long for us to find a bit more challenge, and JCH4 had a small biff turning in sand.

Eventually the wash turned on to a road.
Life in Sepia

Yossarian

The road led straight to the infamous Alfonsina's. At the Pemex we ran into the guy on the 640 who was waiting for his bud on the KLR. And Waiting... And Waiting... And Well, he had made a pillow and was taking a nice siesta.

After a little while the others rolled up...

I've actually never seen a KTM so loaded before

these guys take the hardcore biker of the day award though...

We spent a little time chillaxing and exploring the beach

Norcalslowpoke:

 

[Motosportz]

Awesome stuff guys, looks like a great trip. Hope to join in one day. Keep the pix / stories coming.

 

[LRPct]

+ 1 on the awesome pics and keeping them coming. If that's the same way, which I think it is, that we took on the ride in Feb. that paving surely is progressing. I remember then when George said to enjoy and and soak it in because the Baja most of us love is slowly disappearing under pavement.
Glad you guys all had a great and SAFE time !!

 

[JCH4]

Xymotic, appreciate the photos of the trip and keep them coming. When I get the videos, I will add them to the report. Have some nice video of the run down the beach and a water crossing. Safe travels home to all.

 

[miketv]

You guys be safe and have a trip of a lifetime! xymotic, thanks for the pics! keep em coming

I hope to be able to join you folks sometime on a trip like this, I'm at least 2yrs out with little ones that need all my attention right now. Till then, thanks for letting me live a little vicariously in frozen Ohio.

cheers,

Mike

 

[glangston]

You guys be safe and have a trip of a lifetime! xymotic, thanks for the pics! keep em coming

I hope to be able to join you folks sometime on a trip like this, I'm at least 2yrs out with little ones that need all my attention right now. Till then, thanks for letting me live a little vicariously in frozen Ohio.

cheers,

Mike

Speaking of FROZEN, from Joe Chod in NY

I guess to put it into perspective for those not from upstate NY

65 above zero:
Floridians turn on the heat.
People in Upstate New York plant gardens.

60 above zero:
Californians shiver uncontrollably.
People in Upstate New York sunbathe.

50 above zero:
Italian & English cars won't start.
People in Upstate New York drive with the windows down.

40 above zero:
Georgians don coats, thermal underwear, gloves, and wool hats.
People in Upstate New York throw on a flannel shirt.

35 above zero:
New York city landlords finally turn up the heat.
People in Upstate New York have the last cookout before it gets cold.

20 above Zero:
People in Miami all die.
Upstate New Yorkers close the windows.

Zero:
Californians fly away to Southern vacation spots .
People in Upstate New York get out their winter coats.
*I put my shorts away for the winter.*

10 below zero:
Vegas disintegrates.
The Girl Scouts in Upstate New York are selling cookies door to door.

20 below zero:
Washington DC runs out of hot air.
People in Upstate New York let the dogs sleep indoors.

30 below zero:
Santa Claus abandons the North Pole.
Upstate New Yorkers get upset because they can't start the snow-mobile.

40 below zero:
Hell freezes over.
Upstate New York public schools will open 2 hours late.

 

[xymotic]

I landed @ LAX at about 4:30

It was Grey and foggy and it felt like 0 degrees even though on the Radio the were talking about how we have the best weather in the whole country!

We breezed through customs with no trouble at all and then spent a couple hours in the finest traffic LA has to offer.

I got to Mike's brother's house about 9:30 and Yossarian and BentAero were already there.

The bikes all made it and looked good. I loaded up mine and figured "what the heck he don't need it no more" and so I took SepticSkeptic's as well.

Got home about midnight, which FYI is 1am Cabo time. And let me tell you Cabo was WAY more interesting @ 1am

 

[xymotic]

I just got some additional pics from Septic Skeptic

here's me the morning we left San Felipe, before the beach.

photo: SepticSkeptic


Lifeinsepia

photo: SepticSkeptic


norcalslowpoke

photo: SepticSkeptic

here's one of me taking a picture when we got to the beach. R -> L BentAero, Xymotic, Lifeinsepia, Mike Kay

photo: SepticSkeptic

FWIW, here's the shot I took

here's one of me just S. of Puertocitos

photo: SepticSkeptic

Yossarian, same spot

Here's his shot of our lunch @ alfonsina's.
Mike Kay, BentAero, Yossarian, norcalslowpoke, xymotic, jch4

photo: SepticSkeptic


We ran into these two the night before. The rider was following the jeep, because he had no headlight. The Jeep however, has no shocks. So needless to say they were a bit slower going down the deep sand than a guy on a 610 with dual HID's for example

The street bike guys left Alfonsna's shortly after we did.

OK, so as I said before, I was feelin it on this road. Now I had a few shrimp tacos, 1/2 a vicoden and a couple cerveza's. Life was good.
I was flyin. 55 or 60 mph, then there was a pretty deep dip that I didn't see till I was on top of it. No Biggie, I've hit dozens of these things.
Well, whoooo boy! My suspension wasn't setup quite right, and my rear shock pogo-sticked me out of that dip with the bike nearly verticle on the front wheel. I remember loosing control of the bike, and that's it. I have no recollection of the impact.

 

[NumberCruncher]

Seems to me like that would be an improvement to what actually happened...

I mean wrestling is just wrestling no matter how naked you get. Other, worser things happened naked in Cabo.

And you are going to leave us hanging with that??? At least post one or two HD MPEG4's so we don't feel deprived . . .



NC

 

[pvduke]

Well, whoooo boy! My suspension wasn't setup quite right, and my rear shock pogo-sticked me out of that dip with the bike nearly verticle on the front wheel. I remember loosing control of the bike, and that's it. I have no recollection of the impact.

Yikes!

Did ya take the other half of theat Vicodin?

Hope yer ok man.

 

[Coffee]

.....

When you get a chance could you please turn off the auto responder on your email account? People have been sending you many PMs which contain the 'do not reply to this email' message, the auto responder replies, and those go into my email account.

 

[life_in_sepia]

Bike is back in the garage; trip is officially over. And on that note, I'd like to give another vocal appreciation to Mike. He threw in his truck, his time, his vast knowledge of the area, and limped along with us newbies, all for the purpose of us Husky riders having a great trip. And a GREAT trip I had. A very good man is he. Sincere thanks.

 

[xymotic]

Norcalslowpoke said he found me lying in the fetal position with my eyes wide open staring at him, but unresponsive. When asked my name, my response was "Ugummmmhuh"
In this Pic, john is standing where the rear of the bike 'landed' you can see the way I lost steering to the side, the hole is behind him about chest high and the pic is shot where the bike and I stopped.

I definitely took a decent hit to the noggin. The scary part is that it was the second HARD hit to the same side of the head in a week. As you'll recall I wiped out pretty hard on my test run. This was also an absolutely terrible place to eat it. Maybe 15 miles of hard dirt road from Coco's corner. I suppose if I was really in a bad way we'd have gone back to Alfonsina's and gotten a plane to come in and get me, but it would easily taken 6 hours to have gotten medical attention.

The bike looked to be in remarkably good shape, and (after 15 minutes or so) I wanted to ride but the boys would have none of it. They made me sit and relax and wait for the chase truck.

The guys really did things right, they were mad at me when I took off my helmet. They looked after me, the guys on road bikes rode ahead and told the rest of the crew what happened and the gang loaded my bike into the chase trailer.

I would have replaced the Shoei after my first big hit, but just didn't have time. This time I actually cracked the shell a little bit. This pic is me after the crash. The crunck at the bottom is new, the huge gouges at top were a week old. I thought they were too dang expensive, but boy I tell you I am sold on the Shoei Hornet!

All-in-all we probably lost a couple hours worth of time dealing with me because I was over-exuberant. I already knew that you need to be a little more cautious far out there, but I felt safe with a group and a truck and I rode like it was a local weekend ride. I had a long bumpy ride in the back seat of the truck to think about how dumb and lucky I had been. I also had a bit of a hard time discerning if I was getting car-sick, or if I wanted to barf because of a concussion... Well, at least I had a decent sunset to look at for a while.

photo by Septic Skeptic

photo by Septic Skeptic


Meanwhile the guys made it to coco's quite a bit sooner than we did. Coco really has the place decked out for xmas. He had a genny running, had lights all over, it looked like he had a couple campers he was even renting out to riders. Photo(s) by SepticSkeptic

 

[xymotic]

proof from others we were actually there...

http://www.advrider.com/forums/showpost.php?p=11833695&postcount=44

 

[SepticSkeptic]

 

[Yossarian]

I'm finally back in Omaha. You all will be amused that I had to use a heat gun to warm up my frozen bike ties so that I could undo the knots and get my bike off the trailer. And that was in my garage, not outdoors. Brrr!

What a great trip it was! Thanks to Mike for his excellent leadership and knowledge, and to everyone who rode for their cameraderie, willingness to assist anyone in need, photographic skills, and sense of humor. Big thanks to Zack for driving the chase truck; he sure earned his keep.

My photos are still on the SD card; it's late here and I will attack the process of sorting through them tomorrow (I hope). Mine won't compare to what has been shown so far; my skills and equipment (the camera) are not up to par. I'll still post up some that I enjoy, though.

Y

 

[xymotic]

As you can see the guys got to Coco's about sunset, we got there quite a while later in the truck. The guys left almost as soon as we showed up. In this pic you can see they are just streaks

I was rushed so I didn't really get to talk to Coco, but I did go in and wish him well. Last time I saw him was right after he lost the second leg, and he didn't look good. But I have to say he seems happy, he had a lot of family around and he was really doing well.


We discovered that my bike had taken a bit of a spill in the trailer.

Because my little adventure cost us some time, we dicided we needed to highway it to Bay of Los Angeles. The guys on the 310 and 350 were not looking forward to making a long slab run in the cold and dark so we loaded them up and there were now 5 of us in the truck.

Even though it was pretty late, the proprietor of the hotel in Bay of LA opened the kitchen and cooked us all a good meal. The next day we unloaded the bikes and I got to have my first good look at the bike.

Initially I thuoght I'd bent the bars a little. I took off the top clamp and adjusted some stuff which is when I discovered I had actually bent the top clamp.

I also really bent the through bolts that held the risers to the forks. This became a much larger issue, because when I tried to re-attach stuff I stripped out the riser. I was depressed that my trip was over after the second day.

I seriously thought my ride was over.
Then, to my amazement John says "you need a HDB top clamp? I think I have one! And then produced a huge bag of spare parts.

He didn't have a top clamp, but he did have two HDB bar risers which were exactly what I needed.

It was surreal to be in Mexico and have aftermarket Husqvarna parts magically appear.

The Owner heard about my crash and had offered to drive me back to TJ if I needed. He also sent his Maintenance guy over to help, and he took my top clamp and bent riser bolts and disappeared for 30 minutes.

When he came back he'd straightened the clamp and riser and I was able to get everything put back together.

 

[WoodsChick]

...I also really bent the through bolts that held the risers to the forks. This became a much larger issue, because when I tried to re-attach stuff I stripped out the riser. I was depressed that my trip was over after the second day.
...

Well, I'm really glad it turned out otherwise and you were able to continue the ride, but having your trip be over due to mechanical issues would be a huge bonus compared to having it be over due to head trauma. I've been there.

Please get a new helmet and slow down!


Loving the photos, too!


WoodsChick

 

[xymotic]

Well, I'm really glad it turned out otherwise and you were able to continue the ride, but having your trip be over due to mechanical issues would be a huge bonus compared to having it be over due to head trauma. I've been there.

Please get a new helmet and slow down!


Loving the photos, too!


WoodsChick

Yeah, in the truck felt like jail, I had a lot of time to think about it. I knew better too. Being on a familiar road, with a lot of guys and with a truck I just went nutso. I had been riding so well to that point, no issues at all, and I just acted like I was on a weekend ride in LA. No reason to ride "on the edge" like that but like I said I just lost track of the reality of the situation for a bit. That damned husky does want to GO sometimes

 

[WoodsChick]

Yeah, in the truck felt like jail, I had a lot of time to think about it. I knew better too. Being on a familiar road, with a lot of guys and with a truck I just went nutso. I had been riding so well to that point, no issues at all, and I just acted like I was on a weekend ride in LA. No reason to ride "on the edge" like that but like I said I just lost track of the reality of the situation for a bit. That damned husky does want to GO sometimes

Right on. I'm sure riding in the truck was a sobering event, for sure. No one wants to go to Baja for a ride and end up in the truck I'm glad to hear your perspective on the situation...it shows a certain maturity

I wanted to ride Baja for years, but with my propensity for injury I just never felt like it was a good idea for me personally. I jumped at the chance to go last February, though. I rationalized it by telling myself it was a somewhat safe situation, what with having a chase truck, a person familiar with the routes, language, customs, riding, etc, and not having to worry about the logistics of it all. Still, uppermost in my mind was the fact that I could not afford to get hurt in a 3rd world country. Also, I would have been embarrassed if I hurt myself and put a damper on everyone else's good time. I totally rode accordingly, and backed out of some good routes that I could have ridden with no problems whatsoever (according to Eric, anyway...he took the good routes) in order to avoid an increased chance of injury. Yeah, I could have ridden a lot faster, and I could have ridden the hard stuff, but it just wasn't worth it to me. In my later years it's been much easier to swallow my pride than it's been to swallow pain killers



WoodsChick