Finnish Curve Cowboys

Thu Sept 7th – Sun Sept 10th riding home & summary

2006-09-10T12:25:00.000+03:00

We started from Hartmut’s hotel at 09:30 on Thursday morning and went to see our cousins at Cologne Zoo. We spent some 2 hours at the zoo and headed North from there. The weather got a bit cooler and we got some rain as well. We had the rain jackets as wind protectors but no rain pants. Our Venting Machine pants give not much rain protection but as we were all the time on the autobahn we did not get all soaked because of the “adequate speed” we could maintain. And after a while the rain stopped and the wind took care of drying our gear.
We decided to stop for overnight in a small German town called Vechta. We had ridden about half of our trip to Travemünde. Luckily the hotel had WLAN connection so I could update my blogs.

On Friday we started quite late from Vechta and covered the remaining 280 km in less than three hours. We were supposed to be at the ferry check-in at 16:00 and but we arrived two hours earlier and spent the time at Travemünde harbor looking around and enjoying the nice weather.
The ferry was a brand new one and as usual the ship suffered some of the “new boat syndromes”. Not all the TV:s worked in the cabins or some sewage pipes seemed to be vented right into the corridors etc. The biggest disappointment was however the slow speed that the ship was using on this journey. The ship is supposed to make the distance between Travemünde and Helsinki in 24 hours but now it spent 36 hours on the journey. Not that it was a big deal but we were both kind of prepared to be back to our families by Saturday evening instead of Sunday morning.
On these combined cargo / passenger ferries the only pastime is eating. The ticket price includes all the meals and they certainly are plenty and often enough.
We arrived to Helsinki harbor at 07:00 Sunday morning and for me it was a 40 minute ride to get home and for Jouko it took about two hours.

Statistics of the trip:
We rode a total of 11190 km (6953 miles) on this journey (from home to home).
My bike used 654 liters (172,8 gal) of gas. Average mileage was 5,8 liters / 100 km (40,2 mpg).
Jouko's bike did about 10 - 12 % better mileage than my bike thanks to the more stock appearance and less farkles to distact the air flow. My bike was especially bad on the free speeds of the German autobahns. My worst mileage was 9,13 liters / 100 km ( 25,7 mpg) with an average speed of 153 km/h (95mph). The best mileage we got cruising around Yellowstone and climbing up to Red Lodge MT: 4,43 l / 100 km (53 mpg).
Moneywise we have not made a summary and I doubt if we ever will. Living costs everywhere and compared to our everyday life the daily motel cost (from 60 to 120 $ per room) would be extra.

We came home safely and the only dangerous situation was on the Interstate South of Denver when the trailer tire blew in front of the car who was ahead of me. Bike dropping (one for me) does not even count...
Big thanks also to my family and especially my dear wife who was understanding enough to let me do this tour.
So, all in all, it was a really fun trip and this has to be tried the second time some day!

Cousin taking it easy at Cologne Zoo.

Semi-legal parking place in Travemünde harbor.

Enjoying the daily ice cream at a nice street cafe in Travemünde.

Our ferry, the brand new M/S Finnmaid seen from the other side of the harbor.

On our way out we passed a famous
four mast bark "Passat" in Travemünde harbor. The ship was built in 1910 and it was saved from a destruction and restored in 1959.
More info (only in German):
http://www.ss-passat.com/

Sunset on the Baltic Sea.

There were a total of 10 bikes on "Finnmaid".

Helsinki skyline early on Sunday morning.

Our ship seen from the shore in Helsinki.

Back at home and first greetings from our 7,5 year old miniature dachshund Ippu.

Monday Sept 4th – Wed Sept 6th flying and waiting

2006-09-08T10:24:00.000+03:00

Our flight was leaving at 18:10 on Monday evening so we had plenty of time to goof around. I updated my blogs and we left the hotel (Four Points Sheraton at Pearson) just around noon time.
We found a place at the airport close to a power socket so I kept on writing. Same thing on the plane until my laptop battery died…
To my experience flying overseas eastwards has always been more difficult than flying west. However, this time I did not fly all the way to Finland so we flew through only 6 time zones and the flight itself was relatively short, too. Only 6:45 hours. We had booked our Frankfurt hotel at the same Intercity Hotel in Cargo City South where we stayed three weeks earlier. Hotel is within walking distance from Aviapartners cargo terminal.
Anyway, the hotel was not going to give our room before 14:00 Tuesday and we arrived to Frankfurt at 08:00 so we just sat at the airport.
When we finally got to the hotel we took a nap of 1,5 hours and went to bed at normal time in the evening. This was by far my easiest getting over the jetlag.
The bikes were supposed to arrive around 09:00 on Wednesday morning so we figured that if we are at the Cargo center around 11:00 the bikes should be pretty much ready to go.
We left our bags to the hotel, walked the ½ hour distance to Aviapartners Cargo and went to the import department. It turned out that the plane had arrived only some 20 minutes earlier. The official filled out some papers, asked for 12 euros from each of us and advised us to visit the customs office some half kilometer away. Customs visit was smooth, about 15 minutes and we went back, this time straight to the cargo hall.
We were very surprised to see our bikes standing on the floor, all unpacked and practically ready to go! We were prepared to unwrap them ourselves. We saw right away that most of our tie down straps were missing. (Yes, this time the guys at Toronto did use them unlike the Germans three weeks earlier.) We found the straps among dozens of others on the pallets.
We got the bikes ready to go and rode away.
As our ferry to Finland was due only on Friday evening we had plenty of time so we drove to Lindlar to see Tom and Hartmut and to pick up some extra gear that I left there on our way out.
Tom and Hartmut had arrived from their flight some two hours earlier and they had actually seen our bikes being loaded in Toronto – but not on the same Air Transat as they were flying but on a German LTU plane! And now we also got the explanation why we did not need to do the unpacking ourselves…The bikes were not packed at all. They were just strapped on a pallet and that was all.
In any case, we did not see any damage done to the bikes so the guys in Toronto obviously did not drop either one of the bikes…
We stayed overnight at Hartmut’s hotel and tried to keep him awake together with Tom until his normal bed time. We managed until 19:30 but then Hartmut gave up and went to bed.

Air Transat aircrafts in Toronto on Monday. We thought that our bikes will fly on one of these but it later turned out that the flying was subcontracted to German LTU.
Writing the blog in Toronto.

Aviapartners cargo center in Frankfurt Cargo City South
Bikes almost ready to go in the caro hall.

Packing the bikes in front of the Intercity Hotel in Frankfurt.

Sunday Sept 3rd Meadville Pennsylvania – Toronto /Pearson Airport 393 km

2006-09-05T20:43:00.000+03:00

Seemed that our good luck with the weather had finally ended. Previous day had already been quite a bit cooler than we were used to. But Sunday morning in Meadville was grey, foggy and rainy. We started at 07:30 and headed for Erie PA and took I-90 towards Buffalo NY.
The border crossing to Canada was piece of cake or actually I would call it a joke. The whole process took 4 minutes. The border control checked our passports, looked at the funny licence plates and made sure that we are really going to leave Canada shortly. That was all.
As we seemed to have plenty of time we decided to take a look at the Nigara Falls. I had seen them back in 1991 but it was high time to refresh my memory. We visited the Skylon tower and luckily the weather improved slowly (or at least the rain had stopped although the clouds still hang low).

We arrived to the Cargo Zone International at 14:30 and we had plenty of time to wash the bikes at a local Shell station. We had accidentally filled too much gas on our way to Toronto so we had to use our siphon to take out some 12 liters total from both tanks. We donated the gas to the gas station manager who put it in his own tank and this is how we paid for the bike wash water.

The Skylon tower.
Horseshoe seen from the Skylon.

The other waterfall (whatchamacallit...).

Jouko taking gas out from the tank. We took it to the level where the yellow alarm light comes on.
However, we could have had any amount of gas in the tank. Cargo Zone guys were not checking the amount. They must have trusted us telling that the tanks are almost empty...
Of course the captain of the aircraft can demand a checkup of the fuel so it makes no sense trying to fool anyone.

"Cargo Zone International" sounds like a big enterprise. In reality it was one of the three dozen other similar small cargo handling companies. The only way to get the bikes to their warehouse was to ride them up a (pretty light looking) aluminum ramp, which the guys dropped down from the loading dock. We could have easily damaged the bikes already there. It was slippery and the angle was way too steep for LT, it got stuck from the belly but enough speed helped...

Bikes already in the warehouse being loaded with our riding gear.
The practise and standards of this company were about 10 years behind the cargo handler in Frankfurt. No security measures, they had no idea how the bikes would be packed, on a pallet or in a container. (And still they said that they do this all the time...)
We taught the foreman how to operate the electric centerstand but we consider it a miracle if one or the other of the bikes has not been dropped.
But all the paperwork was very easy in Canada! No running around or calling different companies. Cargo Zone took care of everything. (Or at least that is our hope!) We will see tomorrow morning!

Blog being updated at Motel 6 in Meadville PA previous night.

Saturday Sept. 2nd Braselton Georgia – Meadville Pennsylvania 1253 km

2006-09-05T19:26:00.000+03:00

We had left the “sugar to the bottom” in terms of riding distances as we had to make it to Toronto by Sunday afternoon for the bikes to be dropped off. We made the route plan on Friday afternoon and found that in this case we’d better stay on the interstates and make sure that we are in Toronto in time.
So we started at 05:13 from Chateau Elan and took I-85 to Charlotte NC. From there we continued North on I-77 to Charleston WV and further to Meadville PA where we finally found a motel that had vacancy.
A “typical Ari” incident happened on this leg:
We pulled up to a gas station in Gassaway WV. I parked my bike by pump 11 and Jouko on the other side to some other pump. I used my Amex card to pay for the gas at the pump and then I went to help Jouko as he had some problems with his Visa payment. We also decided to ride to the neighboring Pizza Hut for a lunch. Jouko took off first and I mounted my bike, put my helmet on and rode after him. After the lunch I started looking for my wallet. Could not find it anywhere. I rode back to the gas station and started looking for the wallet by the pump, went inside to ask the cashier if anybody had returned a wallet. No luck. A guy on his pickup was filling his tank and he saw that I had something wrong and he gave me the valuable hint: As there are surveillance cameras hanging from the roof of the pump field, maybe one of them has the story recorded…
I went inside again and asked the ladies if they could run the film back about 30 minutes and the whole story was there: I mounted my bike and at the same time something fell on the ground from under my rain coat. This something (my wallet of course) was lying on the ground when a green Ford pulls up and two guys step out. They pay for the gas with their credit card and while they are filling their tank the other guy spots something on the ground on the other side of the pump. He goes and picks it up, looks inside and puts it in his pocket! There goes my Diners, Amex, 150 in cash, my European ID card, two insurance cards and a prepaid phone card.
The gas station shift manager (who had been called in from her day off for this incident) called the cops and after while a young Braxton county deputy sheriff pulls up with his Jeep.
We went through the whole story, I gave him my contact info and regretted that I have no time to stay longer as we had a plane to catch from Toronto. He promised to nail the guys which should not be too hard as all the evidence is there. The film that shows what happened plus the guy’s credit card transaction info that should give identity to the guy after right persons get involved to the investigation process.
Luckily I had my third credit card in a separate wallet and neither my famous 100 dollar driver’s licence was in this lost wallet. Plus I later realized that I have travel insurance that covers my losses anyway. So this was a good lesson. I have been trying to figure out what actually happened when the wallet fell. I had two jackets on which is a bit exceptional. I always keep my wallet in the left breast pocket inside the riding (mesh) jacket. I must have accidentally slipped the wallet between my rain coat and my mesh jacket instead of putting it in to the mesh jacket breast pocket when I walked to Jouko and helped him with his card payment. So the wallet stayed between my jackets until I mounted the bike and then it fell on the ground.
But I still blame Jouko as he was supposed to ride after me and pick up the stuff I drop behind me…Now why did he have to start before me and ride first to the Pizza Hut?? ;-)
We lost a valuable 1,5 hours with this incident but we still made all the way to Meadville PA, but not voluntarily. We would have stopped some 40 miles earlier at Hope Mills PA, but all the motels were full. The weather was getting worse...

Packing the bikes at Chateau Elan early morning.
Breakfast stop after some two hours.

Entering one of the few tunnels on the Interstate 79.
These truck escape roads were quite thrilling! We saw these already on our way South from Banff and I never had a camera available until now.
I wonder how often these get used by a semi with faded away brakes...
On the interstate near Denver we saw escape road that was built across the opposite lane to the left hand side! (Obviously there was nothing but a very deep ditch on the right side of the road...) Now that would not be nice to encounter a fully loaded brakeless semi rushing on to the escape road across my lane..
As I was sorting out my stupidity and the dishonesty of the other guy Jouko had nothing else to do than take pictures of the sheriff's Jeep...

Tue Aug 29th – Friday Sept 1st at CCR

2006-09-05T12:15:00.000+03:00

The famous CCR has been reported and commented already by so many people that we really have not much to add to those stories.
In short: We did no day rides except for one. On Thursday we went to the local race track to see some road racing practicing. Now I have forgotten the name of our nice riding buddy who has been racing those bikes himself too. We were lucky to get a full introduction to a modern racing team as we happened to park our bikes in front of Dick Barbour racing team’s building. We were invited in from the rain and the marketing manager showed and explained us the whole story on how this size of an racing organization works. So on top of the Panoz race car factory tour we had had a handful of racing education for one day.
Later we tried to make a 60 mile ride around the Braselton area but we seemed to hit both rush hour traffic and some heavy rain so we decided to come back to Chateau Elan.

Of course we purchased some essential and important additional farkles for our bikes. I bought the saddlebag trim protector rubber (why on earth would I need them…?), some RAM mounts, a Chicane duffel bag and a set of Motolights plus the brake light flasher. Jouko got a Chicane tank bag, Motolights and brake light flasher. We also found the famous Plexus and wow, that stuff really works on the CeeBailey windshields.
We donated three highway handles and some Ari’s cup holders to the silent auction and all of them seemed to find a buyer. Joe (“messenger 13”) got hold of 3 cup holders so he must be in process of starting a retailing business…
I gave several “tours” on my bike and it’s farkelization as people seemed interested and not least by the “dual exhausts” that Jouko had fabricated.
All in all, we had a really good time at CCR and would surely like to come over some day.

Getting an oil change.
Some fancy paint jobs...

The "German connection". I am an outsider judging from the speed of my hand movement.
Chateau Elan Hotel main entrance.
On Friday we decided to visit the pool, too.
Getting ready for the Thursday SockHop.
Lots of LT:s...some even three-wheelers.
The "European connection". Tom Russel is missing as he had already retired due to the very early Friday start.

Monday Aug 28th Tapoco Tennessee – Braselton Georgia 380 km

2006-09-05T11:27:00.000+03:00

So we saved the Dragon for the Monday. We went there first thing in the morning but we were not the first ones. We visited the Deal’s Gap store and bought the obligatory T-shirts and some stickers. (However, later at CCR we realized that we had missed the Dragon figure itself. Luckily there were folks going there from CCR who were kind enough to bring us them afterwards. Thank you all!)
Anyway, the Dragon itself seems to be a well marketed (biker)tourist attraction. Yes, it may be fun but for the weight we were carrying and the slight rain we encountered we firmly decided that our windshields will not end up in the famous Tree of Shame. With half worn Metzelers and wet asphalt we did not feel like scraping pegs or centerstands. But still, it was a nice experience anyhow. I stayed firmly on my side of the road and had the videocam recording all the time. Now I have something to watch in the rocking chair in 30 years…
After the Dragon we took the Foothills road to North and merged to Hwy 321 and later to 441 and from there further to Hwy 74 and 23 towards Braselton. Our EuroNav II worked like a taxi driver, brought us right to the front entrance of Chateau Elan.
So far we had covered about 9000 km (5600 miles) from home. The only incident was my bike drop which actually is considered as “standard procedure” with these bikes. The only technical “problems” were the breakage of my helmet camera connector and the breakage of my helmet microphone cable during the bike drop. Both of these we could fix as we had spare parts and actually I am embarrassed to even mention these as at the same time our buddies from Germany, Tom and Hartmut, suffered from a leaking gas tank gasket and a broken rear drive bearing.
We had also been extremely lucky with the weather. We had gotten a total of max 6 minutes of rain on the American continent. Minimum temperature was 10 C (50 F) in Montana and maximum was 42 (108 F) somewhere in Oklahoma.
Now we were finally at CCR and it was time to get settled at least for five nights in a same room! So no packing and stuffing of things like we had done every morning for the past two and half weeks. Time to meet people in person with whom I have been in touch for over two years…

A hydroelectric power plant in Tapoco.

The famous "tree of Shame

Jouko was looking for a place to hang his CeeBaileys windshield in case the need arises...

Stay on your own lane and beware the trucks...
.
The official souvenir shop and the other early birds of Monday.

Finally reached the top and admiring the view down to Chilhowee Lake.

No way of taking riding pics on the actual Dragon. This one is taken after it.

Sunday Aug 27th Waynesboro Tennessee – Tapoco Tennessee 610 km

2006-09-05T10:42:00.000+03:00

From the riding point of view we were already on the “final lap” on our way to CCR. But there were still the two famous routes to go: Cherohala Skyway and The Dragon.
When doing the route planning previous night we were not sure where the Dragon exactly was located so we could not decide will we do it or not.
We got up in decent time and got going at 07:00 and the humidity must have been 150%. We had looked for some waypoints (on smaller twisty roads) previous night and I gave them to my EuroNav II.
After 50 minutes of riding on various smaller and bigger roads we were passing Paddler’s Motel (the place we stayed overnight). Now, this is a good way to collect miles but not a good way to get somewhere…
So I changed Roy’s Garmin in the cradle and we rode relying on that until the unit ran out of detail maps somewhere near North Carolina.
Anyway, in Turtletown Tennessee when we were taking gas, we met a local Harley rider who advised us on finding the Cherohala Skyway and the Dragon. He recommended that we should leave the Dragon for Monday morning rather than rushing there for Sunday evening.
So we did the Cherohala which was nice. However there was some traffic on it so we waited and let them get further, some of the vehicles we passed…
After the Cherohala we thought that what the heck, let’s do the Dragon as well to get over with it!
Despite the Harley rider’s explanation I still was not sure of it’s location. This time I was again using my EuroNav II but just as a map. We took one right turn instead of taking a left and after a while we realized that let’s turn back. With close to 600 km ridden and a bit annoyed I was sloppy and dropped the bike in the middle of the road while making a U-turn in an slightly uphill road. Now that’s nice! Since the bike fell in downhill direction, my XL J-Peg was extended and all the saddlebags plus rear seat fully loaded the result was that the left mirror touched the ground. The mirror came off, which is completely natural – even in my bike although I have secured the mirror with a 5 mm allen bolt to the bike frame. I have cut most of the material off of the bolt head neck believing that this would be the breaking point in case something is to break. Well, I was wrong…the plastic from the mirror base broke before the bolt neck gave up…
My XL J-Peg bumper worked again. J-Peg folded nicely in and the tip of it hit the steel bumper and that was all. Some scratches on the J-Peg outer corner as well as on the left saddlebag trim. Good luck I did not change it before this trip although it was already scratched. At least some projects for the coming winter…

We put the mirror in the trunk and continued. Now I was positive that we will come to the Dragon. We followed a nice and curvy mountain road until the asphalt ended. Well, I guess this is not the Dragon…I’ve never heard that to be gravel road. Oh s**t! There we were on a very twisty loose gravel road with our superlight 600 kg off-road bikes. We just continued as I could see from the GPS that this is not a dead end. After quite a few miles and lots of curves we finally merged to Hwy 129 just few hundred feet before the Tapoco Lodge came in sight. The time was already 18:30 and we had no idea of a better place to stay overnight so we decided to call the day off.
As we were pulling in to our cottage we were welcomed by Jeff Eagan and his group who were just standing outside their cabin when we were passing by. Nice coincidence!

In the evening I used some epoxy glue that I have along and glued the mirror base and installed it in the morning. Works as new…

Packing the bikes at Paddler's Motel.

I had to give up a bit on the safety...
No gloves and the mesh jacket open.

But Jouko was the brave one. He rode with T-shirt only until he got sunburned.

I was doing 74 mph but I seemed to be too slow for the truck.

Nice rafting and canoeing resort somewhere along Hwy 74 in Tennessee.

Stopped to get gas and a lunch downtown Turtletown TN.

"Gentlemen, start your engines!"

Naw...just kidding. We took it easy.

Wievs from the Chreohala to Smoky Mountains. Sure look different than the Rockies.

Saturday Aug 26th Little Rock Arkansas – Waynesboro Tennessee 590 km

2006-09-05T10:12:00.000+03:00

As usual we were up at 06:00 in hoping that we could enjoy some cooler air in the morning. When we were packing the bikes and ready to take off from Holiday Inn at 07:30 we realized that we were badly delayed. We were all sweaty but once we got going the mesh suits gave a cooling effect for the first couple of miles. After the sweat had dried then the cooling ended as well… We had + 29 C (85 F) already at 09:00.

Our Saturday route:

We took the familiar Interstate 40 East but we had no plans on visiting Memphis in the middle of the day so we headed South on Hwy 49 in order to go around Memphis from the South side. We crossed Mississippi at West Helena and continued East. We crossed Hwy 61 and went on on Hwy 315 towards Sardis Mississippi. From there we took all kinds of even smaller country roads and ended up to Hwy 310 East and the Hwy 7 North until we found Hwy 72 East. We stayed on 72 until Lime Kiln TN and from there we headed Northeast and crossed Tennessee river at Lauderdale.
We were heading for Waynesboro TN as we hoped to find motels there like the friendly gas station attendant at Corinth Mississippi advised although I really had hard time understanding her heavy Southern drawl.
When we finally got there, we could not find a (working) motel in the whole city and finally we found a campground by the river Buffalo that also had some cabins for rent. So we stayed at Paddler’s motel which was actually much better looking from inside than from outside. The room was big, A/C very effective, beds were comfortable, shower worked…what else can you want for $65? Ok WiFi would have been nice, but in those circumstances …maybe not.

Crossing the river Mississippi at west Helena.

Getting cooled off at gas station in Corinth Mississippi

Crossing Tennessee river at Lauderdale Alabama

Same bridge from the other end.
At least in this point Tennessee river seemed much wider than Mississippi 150 miles ago

Finally found accommodation. Exterior was much worse than interior!

Friday Aug 25th Oklahoma City Oklahoma - Little Rock Arkansas 715 km

2006-09-04T03:52:00.000+03:00

We planned to do some miles on Friday so we got the alarm ringing at 06:00 and we had slowly improved in our morning routines as we were on the road already at 07:00. East from Oklahoma City the landscape was pretty flat. We took Interstate 40 East but after some 50 miles we headed South towards Tecumseh and further on Hwy 270 to McAlester. I had read from somewhere that there should be some nice roads starting from Talihina so we headed that direction.
Our Friday route with yellow:

We had also planned a meeting with Malcom McGee (aka “zaphod”) as he invited us for a beer since our route went by his home at Little Rock AR. We had a phone conversation previous night and I asked for some route suggestions between Wilhelmina Park AR and Little Rock. (Of course our cell phones died right after we left Oklahoma City…)
Well, as our Friday riding proceeded we made some changes and shortcuts. We did not go to Wilhelmina Park or Mena AR as Jouko said that “have we come here to ride or to watch trees and such”? Instead we kept on going and all of a sudden a Harley rider pulls up behind us from a house we just passed. He kinda started encouraging us to ride a bit faster and that we did, too. Unfortunately (later I realized - fortunately…) my low fuel warning light went on and I started to get worried about my fuel. We left the Harley guy behind in the twisties but he caught us on the straights as I was concerned on my fuel and of course a little bit on the local LEOs. My fuel was getting really low and I tried to locate a gas station from my GPS while keeping enough speed for the Harley rider to feel “comfortable”. Then the GPS commands me to turn left but I thought that on that road there will definitely be zero gas stations so let’s stay on this one. Ten seconds after I intentionally missed the crossing I saw an LT coming the opposite direction. I thought that what a coincidence! This is the sixth LT on the American continent and the rider waves high to us. Maybe he saw our Finnish flags flying on our flagpoles and he could be one of the LT-forum members and he just waved at us. I had already slowed down and let the Harley guy pass us and at the same time I looked to my mirrors and saw the LT making U-turn and coming after us. We stopped and there comes this very tall guy with his full face helmet and full riding gear and presents himself: Hi I’m Malcom! We thought that how on earth did you find us on this little Arkansas side road and he replied that he had planned this!
Well, if I had not been low on fuel we would have turned left just ten seconds before he came to the crossing and he would have missed us. In any case we met and Malcom led us through very nice roads towards Little Rock and on top of everything he offered us a dinner in a nice New Orleans style restaurant. What a nice guy!
He took us to our hotel and we shook hands and said goodbye and thanks! This was again one nice riding day...

Somewhere on the Ozarks. Nice roads...

...and nice scenery.

But who invited the heat here?!
This was again one of the regular +35 - +37 days.
I was very happy with my two 0,5 liter Thermos coolers in my famous cup holders+ one 0,75 liter one in my RKA bag on the rear seat. The Thermos coolers have a genious cap that enables you to drink straight from the bottle without spilling the contents all over.

Enjoying the nice dinner with Malcom McGee, the guy that spotted us in the little curvy roads of Arkansas.

Thursday Aug 24. Dalhart Texas – Oklahoma City Oklahoma 515 km

2006-08-29T22:21:00.000+03:00

Our Thursday route on yellow.

Because of writing late on the blog previous night we slept late and got up only at 8:30. So we got moving pretty late and our target was Oklahoma City where we had agreed upon a meeting with John Spencer (aka “jspen” on the LT-forum).
We totally missed the "cooler weather" morning as it was already +26 C when we started.

Our GSM cell phones were dead most of Texas but they came alive when we got to Oklahoma so we agreed with John that we will stay overnight at a new Best Western in Yukon (a suburb of Oklahoma City).

After few miles from Dalhart Texas my (or actually Roy’s) Garmin ran out of detail maps. Obviously these Southern states were left out when the SD-card was downloaded but we were allright with the basemap only as we did not need to do any street search in cities. I was hoping that the unit had already Oklahoma City but that also was on the base map only.
So, I got a very good excuse to download my US maps to my European BMW Navi II and see how that would manage on the new continent. I had not used that unit since Farnkfurt, Germany as Roy’s unit worked so well. Now I installed my unit on the bike and fired it up. The GPS starting procedures took quite a while but as soon as the unit got figured out where it was it worked perfectly! Or let’s say almost perfectly…As the unit has no American base map it just shows a pink line on a plain yellow base every time it starts a new route. But as soon as I hit the “IN” button of the BMW cradle the unit switches to detail map mode and everything is clear as a bell.
BUT, (and this I learned later…) as the unit has no American base map I can not choose the routing options between “shortest” and “fastest”. The unit wants always do the shortest. As long as the shortest and fastest are pretty much the same it is not a problem, but sometimes the routing can be very confusing. The unit speaks to me in Finnish but I set it to show miles so I can keep some track of the speed we are doing. So now it was proven that my concern of my Euro GPS not working in the US was unnecessary.
So after all it was good that Roy’s unit ran out of detail maps. This way I got to test my own unit and now I know it works.

Getting started from Dalhart TX and
Long Texas straights...
Finally hit the magic +40 C mark, waaaaay to hot for us Finns....
Meeting John Spencer in Yukon OK.
He and hs girlfriend took us to a nice bike shop -resturant on the famous Route 66 which we would have missed otherwise. We had the false impression that riding on Interstate 40 was the same as doing Route 66...We realised it only few miles before arriving to Oklahoma City.

Thanks to John and Lindy we made it to Route 66 and here is the proof.

In the bike shop there were some very nice "Kit Bikes" for sale.

Jouko was about to trade his LT for this one but then he realized that the speedometer was only reading miles (or maybe it was missing totally, I don't remember...) . Now that is a real inconvenience on the European side of the pond so he decided to leave it for now.

Wednesday Aug 23. Aurora Colorado - Dalhart Texas 570 km

2006-08-26T06:03:00.000+03:00

We got up in Rick's camper around 07:00 and were on the road only at 9:30 after looking for a set of new 30 amp fuses. We headed for Colorado Springs where we had a meeting with Bill Garrison ("pieceofficer" from LT-forum).
We took Hwy 83 South from Denver instead of Interstate 25 and found Bill's workplace with the help of good old Garmin. We shook hands with Bill, had some LT-related chat (what a surprise, eh?) and I gave him the little led switches to be mounted on the BMW Phoenix housing. Bill explained the things he had done to his bike and showed the nice and proper gear he has bought for his 5-year-old daughter. As we dropped by in the middle of his workday we pretty soon continued our trip towards Raton New Mexico.

From Raton we headed Southeast on Hwy 64 towards Texas and at first we tried to book a motel in Clayton NM. However the hotel had no (working) internet connection , so we decided to continue to Dalhart TX.
We found a Best Western with a working Internet and stayed there.

Finns being wondered by Bill Garrison(third from left) and his work mates.

Somewhere in the plains of New Mexico or Northern Texas.

Tuesday Aug 22. Laramie WY - Aurora CO 348 km

2006-08-26T00:30:00.000+03:00

Now this is the second time I am posting this story ...Last night in Oklahoma City the hotel WiFi went dead and my postings disappeared in the bit heaven :-(
Here is our Tuesday route in yellow:

Anyway... we had decided to leave a little shorter leg for Tuesday as we wanted to be in Aurora (Denver) CO in decent time to meet my American brother Rick Shenkel whom I had not met since 1974.
We left Laramie WY around 08:00 and took Hwy 230 Southwest and further to Hwy 125 towards Denver. This time we were at least on the edge of the mountains and found some interesting curves and nice scenery. And one remarkable thing happened as we were approaching Denver. Our European GSM cell phones came alive! We had been in total radio silence since we crossed the US / Canadian border on Thursday previous week. We made some phone calls home and let them know we were alive and kicking and continued to Rick Shenkel's home address where we arrived already around 13:30 which was way earlier than we were expected.

Roy's Garmin led us right through the city expressways and whatever big time motorways they were and we could not stop wondering the modern technology...Without the GPS we would have surely spent the rest of the week searching for Rick's home in a strange city.

Packing the bikes at Super 8 motel in Laramie WY on Tuesday morning.

We stopped at a small town Walden Colorado to buy some stamps for the postcards we bought at Mt. Rushmore which we still have not even written ...

My helmet camera quit working and after some studying we found the problem to be a broken wire near a water tight connector. Luckily I had an extension cord that had a similar connector and some soldering (yes of course we have a 12V soldering iron with us...) plus some shrink tube (the heat gun I had to borrow from Rick) took care of the problem.

After fixing the helmet camera we found another problem, which was obvious but which I had not thought about before:

I have a total of four HID lights (plus four Hella halogens) on the bike. One of the HIDs is the low beam and the three others are the stock high beam (converted to HID) and two Hella Micro DE Xenons under the nose cone.
The halogens are connected to be operated from the stock high beam switch (via relay of course) and the three HID's are behind another switch and ther respective relays. Now all these have their own fuses under the nose cone and the front fuse block is fed by a 6 mm2 cable through a 70 amp relay but this main feed cable to the front of the bike has a 30 amp in line fuse. And this fuse blew right away when I fired the three HIDs....
For some reason this did not happen at home during my testing four weeks ago after the installation and neither did it happen previous night at Laramie when I aimed all the lights.
I called the HID expert back home and he said that in car use the Micro DE Xenons have a 25 amp fuse EACH...and I am trying to fire up three ballasts simultaneously through a single 30 A fuse ...!!! Stupid me!
Well, looks like I will not be lacking projects this coming winter ;-)
We used all my spare 30 A fuses goofing with this until I believed that let's leave the HID high beams and just rely on the halogens and get some more fuses from Checker Auto parts when they open next morning.

We had a nice dinner at Texas Steakhouse and slept well next to our full tummies in Rick's camper.

Monday Aug 21. Sundance Wyoming - Laramie Wyoming 800 km

2006-08-25T04:25:00.000+03:00

Our Monday route is marked with yellow on the attached map. We did a lot of kilometers compared to our actual progress southward.

We started in decent time (07:00) as the motel had no breakfast available. We rode Interstate 90 from Sundance to Spearfish South Dakota and we continued on Highway 14A to Savoy SD where we had our breakfast in a nice loghouse restaurant. The whole ride on this 14A is just perfect for "curve lovers".

The restaurant at Savoy South Dakota

We decded to miss Sturgis on purpose as we were warned that two weeks after the big event there is nothing but discounted T-Shirts and other Sturgis-related kitsch for sale. So we rode a nice and scenic route to Mount Rushmore, stopped at Pactola Reservoir to take some pictures and were at Mt Rusmore around 10:30.

Pactola Reservoir, South Dakota

There were of coure a lot of (other) tourists as well at Mt Rushmore and we got the compulsory pictures.

The famous American stonefaces: G. Washington, T. Jefferson, T. Roosevelt and A. Lincoln. (The upper faces, that is...)

And the Mt. Rushmore souvenier shops had their own little Sturgis Departments with all kinds of Sturgis 2006 leftover junk for sale! So I had to buy myself a Sturgis cap to provide proof that I almost made it there. (The cap is not the one in this picture, though...)

Our plan was to continue at least to Casper, Wyoming as we were supposed to visit my "American brother" Rick Shenkel in Aurora Colorado on Tuesday and we did not want to leave too much miles for the Tuesday. We took the more western route towards Denver in hope to be able to ride on or at least alongside the mountains but it was not so. We arrived to Casper without meeting the mountains and decided to continue all the way to Laramie Wyoming as we thought that what the heck, it is just this dull long straights anyway. Let's just get enough of them for today. So we covered a little over 800 km and were a bit unhappy because we could have spent the day wiser as well.
We missed the Spearfish Canyon and we missed the Crazy Horse monument but instead rode a couple of hundred kilometers extra on the Wyoming plains on highways 450, 387, 220, 487 etc.... Okay, we came here to ride but honestly speaking we would do this day differently if we could do it over.

Somewhere on the vast Wyoming plains.

The weather started getting hotter as we proceeded towards Denver. Our bike therometers hit the 35 deg C mark and we thouht that this is like a poor Finnish sauna. The only difference is that you are taking it with your riding gear on...

More pics of Sunday

2006-08-24T08:47:00.000+03:00

This Blogger software drives me nuts.... it decided that no more pics to my previous post. So I started a new one:

Sunday afternoon we visited the famous Devils Tower. Please don't expect me to give explanation how it was born...See for yourself in Google for instance.
Devil's Tower ,too.

Our motel Bear Lodge in Sundance WY.

And now it is past midnight Wed in Texas. I must hit the sack now. Until next time...

Sunday Aug. 20. Red Lodge MT - Sundance WY, 630 km

2006-08-24T08:13:00.000+03:00

First of all I apologize for my late updates. The problem is that I have two sites to keep updated: One in Finnish and this one in English. After a 10 - 12 hour ride + unpacking the bike + getting cleaned up + getting some supper + uploading three cameras and sorting out the pics the evening gets very short. Especially now that we entered Texas and to our surprise lost one hour! Forgot that we are travelling East through time zones.
But I try to update this site to my best ability and provided that the motels have internet connection.
As for some questions regarding our bikes and their "specialities" everything is pretty much covered on the LT-forum. So please use the search function of that great site and you should be able to find answers whether you are interested in our fake exhaust pipes, the video cam systems or whatever...
And after we are done with this tour I will make a short summary which will include the statistics of the trip as well as complete Garmin maps of our route. At this moment we just have to concentrate on the riding as it is pretty tough in this + 35 - 36 C weather and we do not ride in T-shirts and shorts!!

Packing the bikes in motel parking lot in Red Lodge MT.

As we started from Red Lodge, we figured that we still have enough gas as we both got excellent mileage through Yellowstone and even climbing the mountains to Red Lodge.

Pretty soon we realized that none of the little tiny villages had a gas station. Finally when Ari's fuel gauge was totally empty we found this lonely pump station (in Deaver WY) that worked with our Visa.

On the way from Red Lodge, still some fantastic sceneries.

And we managed to get the camera timer working as well...

Saturday Aug 19. West Yellowstone MT - Red Lodge MT 330 km

2006-08-22T07:21:00.000+03:00

Yellowstone was fantastic! As we had spent about 5 hours for the first 60 km, we realized that we have to speed up a bit in order to make it to Red Lodge in decent time. We had booked the motel in the morning through the internet so we did not have to worry about finding a place to sleep.

We saw buffalos and a bunch of other wildlife as well.

And the obligatory Old Faithful.

Plus countless mountains and rocks.

And we saw fabulous waterfalls and canyons.

It appeared as if Jouko and myself were also a kind of a tourist attraction with our full riding gear on. I was surprised to see that practically none of the riders that we saw had much of any decent riding gear on! The majority were even without helmets. Well, long live the liberty and freedom! Somebody must have invented a spare parts store for skulls, I have not found one, yet...

On our way to Red Lodge we climbed pretty high and we really needed some more clothing under the Venting Machines.

Pretty close to Red Lodge we saw a light yellow LT coming into opposite diection. That was #2. The first one (the same color) we saw at Glacier Park.

Friday Aug 18. Browning MT - West Yellowstone MT 630 km

2006-08-22T06:50:00.000+03:00

This time we got started at 07:00 without breakfast and instead of taking US 89 from Browning we tok the Heart Butte rd which goes through the Indian reservation. It was really a magnificient ride in many ways. First of all the Montana sunrise...Then the roa was nice and winding and totally empty - Ok we met three cars during the 40 miles. And the last 15 miles was unpaved! This was a surprise but no worries, we managed fine on our 400 kg "SuperEnduro" bikes. Doing 140 - 150 km/h was no problem but the few corners that the road had we had to take it easy...

We stopped at Choteau MT for breakfast.

Montana is called the "Big Sky Country". No wonder...

The weather was just perfect all day long.

In the afternoon we finally got to West Yellowstone and bookes ourselves to a Best Western motel. As there was a gas station with car wash facilities we washed the bikes and changed the H7 headlight bulb for Jouko's bike.

Thu Aug 17th Radium Hot Springs BC - Browning MT

2006-08-22T06:19:00.000+03:00

We got up at 06:00 and packed and had breakfast at a local gas station and we were on the road only at 08:30. We gotta improve our starting speed the next mornings...

Anyway, here is a beautiful view to Lake Windemere on a cool morning. Temperature was about 11 C and as our Venting Machines give not much warming effect we had our rain gear on top and that blocked the wind.

We were at the US border in Roosville MT at noon time and with all the paperwork and waiting for the previous customers to get cleared it took us an hour to get through. To my disappointment nobody was interested in my driver's licence! And I paid 100 USD to get it shipped...

We continued to West Glacier where we had lunch.

After the lunch we headed for the Going to the Sun - highway. Of course for us flat land people the scenery was breath taking. We had to park at almost every possible point and admire the scenery and take pics.

Jouko on the road.

After riding about 500 km we ended up in a small Montana town called Browning. It is next to the Blackfeet Indian reservation and we stayed at a local motel which looked much worse from the outside than inside.

Wed Aug 16th Calgary - Radium Hot Springs

2006-08-17T08:11:00.000+03:00

Wednesday was a very exciting day! Despite my fears everything went smoothly. My driver's licence was at DHL as we visited them on the way to Calgary airport to see if the bikes had arrived. They had arrived! After some waiting and a visit to the Canadian Customs office we got to strip the bikes and see if any damage was done. I was a bit concerned about the straps that were pulled over my Russell leather seat as there were pretty bad marks on the seat. However, looks like the upholstery is going to be normal after a while.

We thanked Roy for his enormous help and hospitality and said goodbye and headed for Banff. Fisrt thing we had to visit the gas station, though and there was our first problem: Esso pumps said 89 and 91 octane. What...are we in Russia? There I have seen such octane readings the last time. I called Roy and he advised to use the 91 octane. Obviously the method of determing the octane reading must be different on this side of the pond as our gas in Finland is minimum 95 octane and 98 is the "Super". After calling Roy once more things cleared out: let's use the 91 octane.

Anyway, we headed for Banff and had lunch there. Magnificient scenery on the way! From Banff we continued to Radium Hot Springs and the whole journey Jouko and myself were most of the time just totally speechless of the beauty of the landscape. Although we have a lot of forests in Finland but we do not have the mountains.

This time I managed to attach some pictures to this blog which hopefully makes this more interesting.

Mon & Tue Aug 14th & 15th in Calgary

2006-08-15T23:19:00.000+03:00

We are currently at Roy Jorawsky's home in Strathmore, near Calgary Alberta. Our flight from Frankfurt was fine, pretty much on time and everything worked OK. Roy was there to meet us at the airport and took us to his very beautiful home. We were also welcomed by a nice 25 deg C Alberta weather with clear skies. I'm writing this on Roy's computer as we did nor get mine hooked up on the internet as the network at Roy's seems to be computer specific.
We have been admiring Roy's fantasticly painted "firebike" and have been doing some serious "LT-talk" while at the same getting Roy's Garmin 2610 in operation for us to use on our trip.

At this stage I want to apologize for the not-so-many pictures on this blog but believe me I (and even Roy with me) have tried hard! We managed to load the one picture on the first day post but for some strange reason no more pics come visible. They seem to disappear in the bit heaven...

Tomorrow is Wednesday and we shall see how things work out with two exciting things: Do we get the bikes out in decent time and shape and will I get my driver's licence from DHL cargo terminal...

Sun Aug 13th Oldenburg - Frankfurt

2006-08-15T23:07:00.000+03:00

We decided to be on the safe side and started at 06:30 from Hotel Hoheluft towards Lindlar in the neighborhood of the city Cologne Germany. We were both for the first time riding on German autobahns (or actually I was there last May but I had my dear wife sitting as a speed limiter behind me..). And there was not much traffic at all for the first two or thee hours. So we were doing a steady 160 km/h for the first 1 – 1,5 hours which still felt comfortable speed with the load we were carrying. Okay, we had to try a full throttle with the windshields down and I got it up to 202 km/h but that was maximum. Of course with average speed to 158 km/ h you can kiss goodbye to any fuel mileage. My bike with all the extra lights and mirrors got about 1,2 liters / 100 km worse mileage than Jouko’s bike which is mostly stock. I had to fill the tank every 220 km when Jouko would have gotten about 300 km. So now it is proven that if speed is doubled the air resistance grows by quadrature. We made it in good time to Lindlar and got a chance to meet Tom and Hartmut plus a whole bunch of other German LT-riders who were having their regular "stammtisch" at Hartmuts hotel.. I had met many of these guys at the German LT-Treffen last May.

Tom and Hartmut had left their bikes to the Frankfurt Cargo already on Friday so we got very valuable advise from them for the drop off procedures. As we hade made it in such good time to Lindlar we decided to push the remaining 200 km to Frankfurt so that we could drop off the bikes to the Gargo already on Sunday well before 18:00. We even washed the bikes at Hartmut’s and when approaching Frankfurt airport we had to watch and adjust the gas level so that we would not have more than a quarter tank at arrival. Of course I had to fill 5 liters some 50 km before and Jouko did not need any…
The Cargo Center did not have their full staff on Sunday but there was a very helpful supervisor who advised us with the bike preparation. Of course many (or most) of his advise were somehow safety regulations related and everybody was a bit jumpy because of the latest terrorist news from London. We were advised to remove all possible extra liquids, aerosols, tire filling cartridges or whatever would look suspicious in the possible X-raying of the bike. We loaded our riding gear in the trunk and left saddlebag. I left some other luggage in the right saddlebag. I was allowed to leave the Chicane tank bag on. The radio antenna, flagpole and the bike-to bike phone antenna had to be removed / folded down. We disconnected the battery, locked the cases and left a spare key for the supervisor. Nothing was allowed to be left tied on top of the bike simply because the freight company does not want to take responsibility of any losses of loose stuff on the bike.
So we had already handed over the bikes on Sunday which was very good as the procedure was quite time consuming and we would have been tight with time on Monday morning as our own flight on Air Canada to Calgary took off at 14:00. The bikes will follow on Air Transat flight on Wednesday. Or this is at least the plan….I’m writing this on the Air Canada flight.

Of course a Big Trip like this needs at least one unplanned episode. I had (or still have) mine already: When discussing with Tom Russell in Lindlar about his and Hartmut’s travel plan we got to talk about the Canada / USA border formalities and what all documents will be needed. Tom mentioned drive’rs licence…DRIVER’S LICENCE! Oh s**t, my licence is at home in my regular wallet! I decided not to take that wallet as it is too bulky and it has a bunch of different kind of plastic cards that have no value abroad. Besides it is already falling apart. So I took a totally new one in which I just loaded three credit cards and some cash and that was all. I even had a fancy packing list but the driver’s licence was not on the list….
My own fault of course. Well, I had already driven through 3 countries without a valid driver’s licence but I would hate to try to enter the U.S. without one… So I called my dear wife and she packed the licence into an envelope and DHL picked it up today (Monday) and they promised it to be in Calgary by Wednesday. Now in the ideal situation we can pick up my licence at the same time when we are getting the bikes. That remains to be seen…

Sat Aug 12th Stockholm - Oldenburg

2006-08-15T22:41:00.000+03:00

We arrived to Stockholm, Sweden at 07:00 Saturday morning and we decided to tune Jouko’s Icom bike-to-bike phone before starting the 570 km trip to Helsingborg Sweden.

The morning was fine weatherwise and we were trying to obey the Swedish speed limit of 110 km/h. We succeeded in this most of the time and the times that we did not succeed, there were luckily no LEOs in sight (or in the bushes with their radars..)
We stopped for gas and some snack. I moved my bike from the pump to the front of the restaurant and was wondering why Jouko is driving his bike back to the pumps. After while he came and handed me my gloves which I had left on the top of my RKA luggage rack bag tied on the rear seat and not on the rack. Nice that he again took care of my falling gear…
In the afternoon we got some rain and we had to put the rain gear on top of the BMW Venting Machine gear that we have. The rain gear also provides wind protection when the weather gets colder.
We arrived to Helsingborg harbor and bought tickets for the ferry to Helsingør Denmark. The weather on the Danish side was dryer and we started our 200 km trip to the next ferry in Rødby Denmark which would take us to the German side over the (Baltic) sea to the town of Puttgarden.
We had booked a "biker friendly" hotel in the little town of Oldenburg im Holstein just some 30 km south from the Puttgarden harbor. It was already 20:00 Saturday evening and we had covered 840 km. This was a good exercise, especially for my back. When riding on the highway I did all kind of exercise on the saddle. I used my electric height adjuster to raise it all the way up and this relieved my knee angle. I used my highway handle and just kept my hands in my lap which must have looked funny /scary / cool to the cars I passed on the motorway. Every time we stopped I tried to find a place to hang from my arms and thus give some stretching to my lower back.
The owner of the hotel was a biker himself and as we telling him our plans for the next day (Sunday) he was a bit concerned as the combination August – Sunday – German Autobahn can mean big problems. He was just returning from Belgium previous Sunday and it was a nightmare with "Staus". (A German term meaning a fully packed autobahn moving at walking speed if even that fast.)
So...our first waypoint was to get to a small town called Lindlar where we had a meeting with Tom Russell and Hartmut Bleeker, the two other Europeans headed for the CCR. Their flight was due already Sunday evening so they would have to leave around 15:00 to Frankfurt Airport. The reason for our visit was to pick up the new BMW Air Flow 2 riding boots for Jouko. Those were not available in Finland and we had no time to get them ordered and delivered to our dealer any more.
We went to bed around 23:00 and fell asleep with no problems. And I remebered to do my back excercise.

Friday Aug 11 – start day

2006-08-15T22:24:00.000+03:00

My original plan was to start from home at 14:00 towards Turku Finland (180 km) from where our ferry to Stockholm was due at 21:15. I did all kinds of last minute preparations including visiting a physiotherapist who gave some last minute treatment to my back. I also went and bought myself a kidney belt which has really been of big help. I finally got started one hour later at 15:00 and the bike odometer showed 40222 km as starting reading.

Jouko lives in the suburbs of Turku so we only had half hour to the harbor from his house. I stopped at his place and we did some last minute cleaning and especially waxing the front side of the bikes. This was in order to make the future bug cleaning easier as we were especially instructed not to leave any dead bugs on the bikes during the flight transport.

When we started from Jouko’s home it somehow happened that I drove first although we were in his hometown and he knows the best way to the harbor. All of a sudden I realize that he is no longer in my rear view mirrors. He must have forgotten something so I pulled over and waited for him a while until he came and we continued, Jouko in the front this time. This small incident started a series of similar happenings to which I will return later. Anyway, at the harbor he handed me my leather neck collar which had been flying from the back of my bike when we started from his home. My way of packing things…

We got our bikes on the Stockholm ferry and the fastening methods to the ferry were just as ridiculous as we were warned about. They had just simple nylon ropes and a rail on the wall of the ship cargo hall. I asked the loading officer if this was the only equipment they had and he told me that this is enough. They have never had a bike to fall down… OK, the ship is about 200 meters long and it will not rock much on a normal weather but still I have heard about occasions where a bike has come down. Maybe not on this particular ship, but on a similar one.
Well, we just parked the bikes on the side stand and used the nylon ropes to secure them the best we could. Luckily the sea was calm and everything went okay.

Fixing the rider

2006-08-10T22:07:00.000+03:00

Oh well, today has been quite a day! Bike and luggage is all set to go but my lower back decided to get sore. I don't know what I have done, but the result was that I needed both chiropractic and massage for my back. Now it is slightly better, but sitting is actually the worst kind of treatment for it. Tomorrow I need to ride only about 180 km to the harbor of Turku, Finland. The boat starts at 21:15 and it should be in Stockholm, Sweden 07:00 Sat morning.
For Saturday, we have a leg of 850 km to Oldenburg im Holstein, Germany.

Darned, I have to say! Originally we were supposed to take a Passenger / cargo ferry from Helsinki to Travemünde, Germany across the Baltic sea. We had the tickets and everything was in order - except the shipping company's new ferry was badly delayed from the Italian shipyard. So they had no ferry and they had to cancel all the passengers. We had no other option than to ride through Sweden and Denmark :-(
In my present condition I would have rather spent the 24 hours on a nice ferry than riding through two countries.
Oh well, if that will be our only problem, then we are OK. Todays news about the air terrorists at Heathrow were not at all encouraging. I wonder if there will some extra exercise in preparing the bikes for shipping. Luckily Tom and Hartmut will be dropping their bikes off tomorrow (Friday). We will be in touch with them and learn about the latest procedures. Tom and Hartmut will be flying in the same plane with their bikes whereas Jouko and myself will fly on Air Canada and our bikes follow two days later on Air Transat. One might think that our bikes could be checked more carefully as we are not even on the same plane.
Well, let's not worry too early. Time will tell and now my back tells that I have been sitting long enough.
More later...

Packing and unpacking...

2006-08-09T22:51:00.000+03:00

Now we have Wed evening. I have been at work until afternoon and after that I finally concentrated on the packing. I always have a bad habit of leaving my packing to the very last minute. This works OK on my regular business trips when I know exactly what I need along. This time it is different. I have been reading posts on LT-forum about packing and what to take along etc. I followed one advise and made myself a list - or actually 5 lists. One for toiletry -related things, one for miscellaneous stuff, one for clothing, one for bike related stuff and one for tools. I already skipped the tools list and decided to pack the regular set that I usually need when I dismantle the bike in my garage. I even have a 12 V soldering iron plus all kinds of stuff to (try to) fix electrical problems.
My packing is in pretty good shape considering that I still have Thursday and half Friday at my disposal. The trunk liner is almost full. The right saddlebag liner (the smaller one as I used to have the CD-changer) is packed.

At this stage few words about my riding gear:

All the locals warned us that it will be HOT in the Southern US in August. As Jouko and myself are the full-gear-all-the-time-guys, we purchased the BMW Venting Machine riding outfits. We have had exceptionally hot and dry summer in Finland as well so I have had very good possibility to test the suit. It is cool I have to admit. It is black in color, so it absorbs heat when standing in the traffic but as soon as you get to a speed of 20 -30 km/h the cooling effect starts.
But...it will not be 30 - 40 deg C ALL the time... I have tested the suit in 15 C weather and I noticed that the best thing to wear under it is Gerbing heated liner, at least on upper body. Long Johns are still OK for the pants at that temperature but if the weather gets any colder then I will wear the heated pants as well. So, I have Gerbing heated jacket and pants packed on the bottom of my right saddlebag. They now occupy about the same thickness of space as the CD-changer did.
I also found very nice and comfortable hot weather gloves called Sweep Fly. They are made by company Sweep Racing, but I could not find their website...
My helmet is Caberg Justissimo flip-up and it is OK. Some people claim it is noisy, maybe so. However, I always wear custom molded earplug speakers, so I don't know about it. What is nice about the helmet is that I can convert it to a 3/4 helmet in five minutes if the heat gets unbearable.
And finally the boots: I ordered myself BMW Air Flow 2 boots and WOW, those are really cool. When I rode yesterday morning at 16 C weather I had wear thick snowboarding socks in them! Otherwise my feet would have gotten really cold. So I trust that with these shoes I will not get tempted to ride with sandals even in the hottest temperature. OK, let's see then...

Oh well, getting late. Still have to go to work for tomorrow morning at least and get things sorted out there as I will be gone for a full month.

Getting ready...

2006-08-09T08:36:00.000+03:00

Today we have Wed Aug 9th. Two days for our departure for the Big Trip.

Perhaps it is a good idea to give some background on this trip:

Everything started last fall when ay good friend of mine Tom Russell from Germany started talking about a possibility to ship the bike by plane overseas. He was collecting a group of riders who could possibly attend and we could get some group purchase discount from the shipper.
I called my long time business associate Jouko Saarinen and asked him how he felt about a bike trip across the US. Right away he replied that "good idea, I have never been there". I offered to act as his interpreter as Jouko does not speak English and I have visited the US about 8 times and even lived in Ohio for a year as an exchange student back in 73-74.

another target of the trip was to attend the BMW K 1200 LT riders annual Curve Cowboy Reunion. I have been a member of the famous BMWLT.com forum for 2,5 years and seems that I have gotten a large amount of friends who I would like to meet also in person.

So, at first we were planning to land somewhere on the West Coast. San Francisco was on the top of the list and I was already planning routes from SF to Atlanta. After some time it turned out that the shipping company http://www.motorcycleservices.com/ no longer ships bikes to the US. As a result of the Anti-Terrorist laws the border formalities have become so troublesome that it makes no sense trying to get the bike shipped directly to US territory. However, it still works to Canada relatively easy. And riding across the US border should not be a big deal. (Let's see in a week...)
We picked Calgary as our landing point and Toronto as our departure port. We have a route planned with the the help of the LT-Forum members and others. I have read through various travel stories etc.

And BTW, how big group decided to go after all? Well, it boiled down to 4 bikers, two from Finland and two from Germany. Tom Russell and his friend Hartmut Bleeker who also will be in North America first time. They will be traveling two days before us and they will have their separate route. We decided not to travel in a larger (OK, 4 four is not LARGE) group as it sometimes might create problems starting from finding accommodation and ending where to go next and what to see.

We plan not to camp en route. Neither of us is too eager in sleeping in a tent so we trust in finding a motel or similar for each night. Ad we have also received a bunch of invitations from my LT-Forum friends. Starting from the first two nights in Calgary when we are waiting for our bikes to arrive. Roy Jorawsky right away offered accommodation for us when he heard that two Finns were looking for advise on what to do bikeless in Calgary for to days. Looking forward to meeting him!

Another reason for not camping is the limitations in our packing space. The flight transportation makes things slightly more complicated. During the transportation only the factory cases can be packed. Nothing tied on the bike. So we plan to pack our riding gear in the bike cases and take all the rest with us on our personal flight.

Now, somebody must be wondering how much does it cost to send a bike by plane overseas. It is not that terribly expensive - compared to what a regular person ticket costs. Round trip for the bike Frankfurt -Calgary and Toronto-Frankfurt was about 2600 $ in April 2006. (Now with today's fuel prices, the price might be different...) On top of that we had to buy personal tickets which were 1100 Ã€ on the e-bookers. We also needed insurance as our European traffic insurance is worth nothing in the US. The cost of insurance was 500 $.

So, I hope this is a proper start for this story. I just recently found this website and I am new to these blogs but let's hope I can keep all you interested on how our journey proceeds.