Weekend Ride - Monterey, Hollister and such.

[ColonelMorgan]

Last weekend, a bunch of us went on a ride from San Francisco down to Monterey.

Of course, going straight there would have been balls, so we took the long way, which was lovely. After some dog petting, coffee, pastries, and some last-minute bladder draining at bluesboy's place, we hit the road.



We took the 101 for a little bit (yawn), then cut through on the 25 through Hollister, Tres Pinos, Pinnacles, down to the 198. Absolutely beautiful and the weather was perfect. Trplgrl and tchaftantouri were sailing out there. I would blame some kind of inherent evil engineered into the British triple, but you know what they say about the nut that connects the handle bar to the seat...



I really should have taken a picture of it, but as was mentioned in another thread, the butterflies were out, and damn if those little buggers aren't chock full of guts.



You can kind of see the bits of them on my windshield, mirror and headlight, but I took two to the face shield with a bit of speed, and boy-oh-boy. I had to turn my head sideways into the wind to try and sheer some of the guts out of the way. Yech!



We stopped at the intersection of 25 and 198 and waited for Ginsburger to show up. We took some pictures, compared bug guts, and stretched our legs a bit.




Here comes ninjakitty.


tchaftantouri and his Green Goddess. Sorry about the bad picture. It's practically criminal.




Here comes Ginsburger!


Little bit of chitting. Little bit of chatting.

From here, we could have gone east on the 198 towards Coalinga or west towards King City. East was supposed to have been really beautiful, but we were all kinda starving, so we headed for King City and some lunch.

[ColonelMorgan]

Thoroughly sated and all gassed up (no pun intended), we headed north-west for Carmel Valley Road.



I had a lot of fun on that road. Despite being 2-up with my girlfriend, these tight, technical roads are my favorite. Even with a couple cars blowing through on blind turns, it was still a ton of fun.

We pulled into the Blue Sky Lodge around 4ish (I think).



Poor Trplgrl ended up with a flat rear tire. tchaftantouri tried his best, but from what I could gather, the fiasco that ensued was something epic in its scale of failure. We ended up locking the bike up for the night.

To digress a bit.



We had beer, and thank goodness. 7 hours of riding is sure to build up a thirst. At some point, Chuck showed up with his Desmosedici. Like a fool, I forgot my camera when we did see it. Perhaps someone can post up a picture of it. Man, that bike was hot sex.

After a few cold ones and the sun having descended beyond the trees, we decided on some thai.

---------------------

I was pretty tired the next day, so I don't quite remember exactly what route we took back. I sort of just hung back and tried not to kill my already-fried rear tire.

Trplgrl was no longer with us as she was waiting for her ride. So we traded a lightning quick triple for a lightning quick desmo. If I recall correctly, we took the back roads somewhere off the 68, headed up towards the 1.

We went back through Watsonville for lunch, up 9, stopped at Alice's for a soda, then headed home. By the time we got back, my rear tire was toast, but it was worth it. It really was a perfect weekend for riding. Sorry Lili.

To those on the ride: Joe, David, Lili, Mike, Vanessa - feel free to post up your pics as well. Someone's got to have one of Cone Head Mike, the Desmo, and maybe some photos to fill in the gaps. I'm really bad at photo-documenting.

I can't wait for the next ride. Til next time!






Chuck, David, Joe, Vanessa, Mike and me.


Feels like we had it all...

[cease3184]

Dang guys, looks like you had a lot of fun. Nice pics!

[ColonelMorgan]

Thanks!

Too bad you couldn't come with. Maybe next time.

And yes, I had a lot of fun. I won't answer for everyone else, but there were definitely a lot of smiles.

Originally Posted by cease3184

Dang guys, looks like you had a lot of fun. Nice pics!

[tchaftantouri]

Here is the desmo, in front of the Goddess to prove that it really was there with us. One of the few that actually gets ridden hard.
Accelerating it sounds like some wild beast that wants to disembowel you and make you watch while it devours your steaming entrails....

[NorCalBusa]

(PS- all these pictures are at H25 and Bitterwater Rd- not at H25/H198)

Originally Posted by ColonelMorgan

Last weekend, a bunch of us went on a ride from San Francisco down to Monterey.

Of course, going straight there would have been balls, so we took the long way, which was lovely. After some dog petting, coffee, pastries, and some last-minute bladder draining at bluesboy's place, we hit the road.



We took the 101 for a little bit (yawn), then cut through on the 25 through Hollister, Tres Pinos, Pinnacles, down to the 198. Absolutely beautiful and the weather was perfect. Trplgrl and tchaftantouri were sailing out there. I would blame some kind of inherent evil engineered into the British triple, but you know what they say about the nut that connects the handle bar to the seat...



I really should have taken a picture of it, but as was mentioned in another thread, the butterflies were out, and damn if those little buggers aren't chock full of guts.



You can kind of see the bits of them on my windshield, mirror and headlight, but I took two to the face shield with a bit of speed, and boy-oh-boy. I had to turn my head sideways into the wind to try and sheer some of the guts out of the way. Yech!



We stopped at the intersection of 25 and 198 and waited for Ginsburger to show up. We took some pictures, compared bug guts, and stretched our legs a bit.




Here comes ninjakitty.


tchaftantouri and his Green Goddess. Sorry about the bad picture. It's practically criminal.




Here comes Ginsburger!


Little bit of chitting. Little bit of chatting.

From here, we could have gone east on the 198 towards Coalinga or west towards King City. East was supposed to have been really beautiful, but we were all kinda starving, so we headed for King City and some lunch.

[ColonelMorgan]

Ahhh...it's all coming together now.

[TrplGrl]

Might as well add a couple of mine...



Before the ride at Joe's house enjoying warm coffee and muffins...



Vanessa arrives to the cut off to king City...



Taking a break after meeting Mike.



Who knew the Speed Triple was really a sport-tourer?



Back at the hotel...my first glympse of a Desmo "in the wild."



Good food and good company at dinner...



Vanessa and Joe smile for the camera(s)



4 plugs and 2 cans of Fix-A-Flat could not coax my old girl into action. Perhaps she knew that David was going to let me ride his NEW Speedy that day and she thought that might hasten her replacement! Thanks again to Dennis for rescuing me and to David for his seeming endless determination to get my bike rolling again!

And now...for everyone's auditory pleasure...Chuck's Desmo:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Av2VaNtTifM

[NoGall]

[atoyf]

i rode almost he same route this past Sunday... only i ended up back in the city.. long beautiful ride!

too bad you guys didnt make your ride public, id join you.

[Beezy]

From the pictures it looks like it was a beautiful ride!
Ahh... I am getting inspired to do some much longer treks out ...
thanks for sharing! I like the route.
Did it suck too much to do so much Hwy 101?

[flying_hun]

What a great trip!

[TrplGrl]

Originally Posted by Beezy

From the pictures it looks like it was a beautiful ride!
Ahh... I am getting inspired to do some much longer treks out ...
thanks for sharing! I like the route.
Did it suck too much to do so much Hwy 101?

The freeway ride wasn't too bad...especially since we were rewarded with hwy 25! It is a great route for newbies and not so newbies alike. But I wouldn't recommend it in the dead of summer...it get oppressively hot on 25 in the summer.

[ColonelMorgan]

Originally Posted by TrplGrl

The freeway ride wasn't too bad...especially since we were rewarded with hwy 25! It is a great route for newbies and not so newbies alike. But I wouldn't recommend it in the dead of summer...it get oppressively hot on 25 in the summer.

It was definitely nicer to start with 101 than to end with it. With what we had to look forward to, 101 was just some time to get my head in the saddle.

And yes. 25 sure was a blast.

[Spec-ECU]

Is it just me, or does Lili need a new bike that can keep up with her blistering pace?