With the Canadian Rockies trip now less than 30 days away, and work taking up a good deal of my waking hours, this post has been on the back burner for a little longer than I was hoping. The good news is that Steve and I, along with mutual friend Joel, got out for a quick shakedown ride and night of camping over the Memorial Day weekend. We call it a shakedown because basically we packed as if we were going on the big trip to test out equipment and packing - we've still got just a few tweaks before we do this for real. I did get to practice a bit with my action camera and learned a few things that will make for better footage on the trip. Here's my first attempt at capturing footage from the bike. This was shot on the Mindoro Cut in western Wisconsin.
Now back to memory lane - the bikes and trips!
We've come a long way since those first trips to Sturgis and The Dragon and there have been several bikes along the way, each offering it's own personality to the trips. After the trip to The Dragon, I sold my Road Star and bought a Triumph Trophy as I wanted to try a more sport-touring approach. Steve kept his Road King but somewhere in that timeframe he ended up with a Triumph Daytona as a second bike (sorry no pics) and then a Triumph Trophy as well. We didn't do any big camping trips with both of us on our Trophy's though.
2007 trip to Vermont and upstate NY.
A rare shot of Steve with two Trophies - and our friend Chris was on his BMW
Next up for me was a V-Strom 650 and Steve stepped up to a H-D Street Glide. Pictures below are from our 2008 epic trip with friends Chris and Doug to Yellowstone and the BMW Rally in Gilette, WY.
The V-Strom would be replaced in late 2010 as planning started for my daughter Savannah's first moto camping trip in 2011. My wife, Sandy, and I decided that if she was going to ride, I needed a bike that was going to be better for an almost 11 year old to ride so I found a well seasoned Gold Wing (well seasoned because it had 200,000 miles on the odometer) and started prepping! Steve and Becky would be on their Street Glide but Steve would warm up to the Gold Wing over time.
We met up with a former student of mine, Zach, for the ride out to Yellowstone. Zach had been visiting family in MN on his new GS800 and was heading back to his job in Yellowstone.
The 2011 trip was the last moto camping trip that Steve would do on his Street Glide. I think the Gold Wing may have altered his perspective... More on that next time!
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